Crazy Love (Emerald Lake Billionaires 3) (11 page)

Daniel moved the cursor over the screen. “Did you want your image in the gallery or in a separate image box?”

“The gallery.”

“That’s where the problem is. You have to edit the image first before you put it in the gallery.”

“Then it will work?”

Daniel moved out of Sammy’s way. “Give it a go. If you have any problems, let me know.”

The door to the classroom crashed open.

“Oops. Sorry.”

Daniel looked at the woman standing in his classroom. Her curly red hair stuck out from under a green knitted cap and her eyes looked as blue as a summer’s sky. “Holly?”

The ten plastic trays she was holding wobbled in her hands.

She looked around the room, her expression becoming more and more puzzled. “I didn’t realize you taught after-school classes.”

“I started a few weeks ago.”

One of his students stuck her hand in the air. “This is our fourth workshop. We’re making our own websites. Do you want me to show you what to do?”

Holly smiled at the serious expression on the young girl’s face. “I can’t at the moment, but thanks for asking. I have to get ready for class. I thought it was in this room.”

“There were some last minute changes. I almost went to the wrong room, as well.” Daniel turned back to his computer. “Let me check where you should be.”

“It’s okay,” Holly said quickly. “I don’t want to interrupt your class anymore than I have.”

“It won’t take long.” Daniel opened the email he’d been sent earlier in the day. “It looks as though you’re in the next room.”

Holly nodded and walked backward into the corridor. “Thanks. I’ll leave you to your class.”

He leaped to his feet and followed her. “It looks as though you’re going to be busy.” He nodded at the trays, hoping she’d stop for long enough to realize he wasn’t as bad as she thought he was.

“I’m teaching my students how to do screen printing.”

Daniel didn’t have a clue how screen printing worked, but he did want to know how Holly was. “My class finishes in fifteen minutes. Would you mind if I sat at the back of your class and watched what you’re doing?”

“You want to know how to do screen printing?”

“I like art. Screen printing is art.”

Holly glanced toward her classroom. A group of four children were making their way down the corridor. They walked into her room with their backpacks bobbing against their shoulders.

A loud cheer rang out from Daniel’s classroom.

He looked over his shoulder and frowned. “I have to go.”

“So do I. Good luck with your class.”

Daniel wanted to keep Holly talking as long as possible, but the noise from his room worried him.

“Thanks,” he muttered. “I’ll come and see you after my class finishes.”

He didn’t wait for Holly to tell him what an idiot he was. He already knew that. The trick was doing something that made him look less like an idiot.

And admiring her students’ screen printing seemed like a good place to start.

CHAPTER FIVE

Ten minutes into her screen-printing lesson, Holly gave up trying to ignore the six-foot man sitting at the back of her classroom.

Evie Thompson raised her hand. “Ms. Miller? I think I’ve put too much ink on my stencil.”

Holly moved to Evie’s table and looked at the thick line of purple ink sitting at the base of her frame. “It shouldn’t make any difference to your print, but we’ll scrape it into another container to be sure.”

She found a small bowl and used Evie’s squeegee to scoop the ink off the frame. “Are you going to add more color?” Holly asked.

Evie’s hand was already reaching for the yellow ink. “I’ll only use a little bit next time.”

She smiled at Evie’s impish grin. “That’s good to hear. Your print is looking lovely.” Holly moved around the table to Daniel. His head was bent over his stencil. He was using a small blade to cut his pattern out of the card. “Are you enjoying yourself?”

“I am. Evie’s been giving me pointers on how to make my stencil.”

Evie sat a little taller in her seat. “It’s no bother. Mr. Sullivan said he’s making a picture for his new house. Did you know that he lives by a lake?”

Holly nodded. “I did.”

“Mr. Sullivan is going to buy a kayak and a fishing rod.”

“It sounds as though he’s going to be busy.”

Evie nodded and went back to her stencil.

It looked as though Daniel had made a new friend.

As Holly moved around the room she watched him interact with the other children at his table. He was genuinely interested in what they were doing and had something good to say to everyone. If she was being cautious, she would have said that he was almost too good to be true.

By the end of the class, everyone had finished a screen-printed canvas, including Daniel.

When her students had left, Holly looked around the room to make sure they’d put everything away.

“You’re a good teacher,” Daniel said as he pushed his chair behind the table.

“It’s not difficult. They’re good kids.”

“It’s not easy teaching young children, even if they are good kids.”

Holly put two tubes of paint into the box she’d brought with her. “What made you volunteer at the community center? I thought you’d be busy working on your own projects.”

Daniel shrugged. “I was happy to help. When I was growing up, we didn’t have a computer in my house. If it weren’t for someone showing me how to use one, I probably wouldn’t be here today.”

“How old were you when you learned how to use a computer?”

“About ten years old. I had a friend whose parents owned an old PC. He taught me how to turn the computer on and work out how it operated. As soon as I saw what it was capable of, I knew what I wanted to do with my life.”

Holly walked back to her desk. “Let me guess. Your lifelong ambition was to test a dating app that matched you with your perfect partner.”

“Not quite.”

The smile on his face made her uneasy. She was beginning to like him again and that worried her. “No one else is using this room tonight, but we should leave. The janitor will be here soon.”

“Are you always this hard to get to know?”

Holly thought she was the easiest person to understand. All it took was a little honesty, a healthy dose of respect, and a fondness for chocolate ice cream. “If I was easy, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

Daniel raised his eyebrows.

A wave of heat hit Holly’s face. “I didn’t mean it that way.”

“I know.”

She picked up her bag and put it beside the box of paints. “How important is your friend’s dating app?”

“I guess it depends on who you are. Blake has invested a lot of time and money into making it work. It sounds corny, but Crazy Love could change people’s lives.”

“It’s not corny. Mia, Hannah, and Claire registered to be on the trial because they wanted to meet someone special.”

Daniel passed her jacket to her. “Blake isn’t the cold-hearted person he sounded like at the auction. What you heard were the words of a man who’s desperate. If he doesn’t get his app onto the market soon, someone else could launch a similar product. All of the work he’s done will mean nothing if that happens.”

Holly zipped her jacket up to her chin and picked up her box of supplies. “And the questionnaire we filled out together would help him?”

“It would help me. Blake wants to know if the program behind the app is working. I need to compare your actual answers with the answers your friends gave on your questionnaire. When I’ve identified where the significant differences are, I’ll compare those answers with mine. If the algorithms aren’t working, I’ll need to adjust them.”

“There were more wrong answers than right on my questionnaire.”

Daniel took the box out of her hands and walked toward the door. “Not all of the questions are statistically significant. Some fall into the category of nice to have but not essential.”

“So someone who likes French cuisine could enjoy the company of a man who likes hamburgers?”

Daniel frowned. “You don’t like French cuisine.”

“Exactly. But the program still matched us. I think a person’s favorite ice cream flavor is significant.” Holly closed the classroom door behind them and walked down the corridor.

Daniel caught up with her. “You wouldn’t date a person who didn’t like chocolate ice cream?”

“I’d say it’s extremely unlikely. If I couldn’t enjoy dipping into a tub of chocolate ice cream with the love of my life, it would be devastating.”

“On a scale of one to ten how devastating are we talking?”

“Totally devastating.”

“What if you found an ice cream flavor that you both enjoyed?”

Holly pushed open the front door of the community center. “I don’t know if that’s possible. Agreeing on a different ice cream flavor is very significant.”

“You could be right. Do you still want to try?”

“I could enjoy the company of someone who likes vanilla ice cream if he was honest with me.” Holly was only half-joking and hoped Daniel knew it.

“That sounds reasonable.”

“Good.” Holly pulled her keys out of her pocket and unlocked her car. “I’ve got something for you.” She opened the passenger door and took a brown envelope off the front seat. “These are the answers to the questionnaire we worked on together. I was going to mail them to you.”

Daniel looked at the envelope she gave him. “I thought you didn’t want anything to do with the dating app.”

“I can understand how important this is to your friend.” She moved out of the way so that Daniel could put the box of supplies in the front seat. “I’m available on Friday night if you want to have ice cream for dessert.”

“Friday sounds good.”

“How much work would you have done on the app’s program by then?”

“I should have some preliminary results. It depends on how much work I’ve got to do.”

“I’d say you’ve got a lot of work ahead of you. If you’ve got any questions about my answers, you can give me a call.”

Daniel’s eyes widened. “You’d do that for me?”

“You’re paying for our ice cream, so I’m on my best behavior.”

Daniel leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “Thank you.”

Holly felt her world tilt on its side. She was exactly where she didn’t want to be. Liking a man who was the complete opposite of her was crazy.

Just as crazy as his friend’s app.

***

Daniel looked at the spreadsheet on his computer, then at the paper on his desk. There was no way that Holly should have been matched with him.

Blake’s team of psychologists had used a technique called factor analysis to look at the responses of people to different questions. The big-five factor markers were supposed to explain a lot about someone’s personality. The theory that Blake’s team had been working with was simple. If they could work out a way of matching the five main personality traits of men and women, they could potentially match perfect couples.

He needed to call Blake and find out what the margin of error was in their analysis. Holly’s friends’ answers were so far from his that matching them would have been like comparing an apple with a pear.

What was worse, Holly’s actual answers weren’t much better. His dating technique might be rusty, but he enjoyed her company. If he’d read the theory behind the questions correctly, he should have had less in common with the real Holly, not more.

He picked up his phone and dialed Blake’s number.

“Tell me you’ve finished the analysis,” Blake said from New York.

“How did you know it was me?”

Blake snorted. “For someone who works with computers, you’ve got a lot to learn about phones. I preprogrammed the Star Wars theme into my phone. When you call, I get blasted with trumpets.”

Daniel didn’t want to know why his best friend had chosen Star Wars as his personalized ring tone. “Have I called at a good time?”

“Anytime is a good time when you’re working on my app. How’s it looking?”

He didn’t want to worry Blake at this stage. There were too many variables that he hadn’t investigated. Blake’s team had been using sophisticated algorithms to match the people who had registered for the trial. If he looked only at the personality traits, Blake would end up with useless data.

Daniel picked up a sheet of paper. “I’ve gone over the markers your team used for comparing personality traits. Holly and I were polar opposites when it comes to three of the five traits.”

“You weren’t totally polar opposites. You had enough things in common to have an interesting conversation. Was I right?”

“That’s an impossible question to answer. The Holly I was originally matched with doesn’t exist. The real Holly, however, is a known quantity. And before you ask again, yes, we had enough in common to have an interesting conversation.”