It turned out Cassie Holt had connections beyond the hunky firefighters of Golden Falls. On Friday morning, when Hayley settled at her desk and checked her email, she found a message from Devotion.com, one of the most popular dating websites in the country. Hayley had seen their ads on TV and the internet, and the company had an emphasis on not just dating, but “forever” relationships. The kind Hayley believed in.

The email was from a Devotion.com executive.

Dear Ms. March,

I was sent a copy of the recent local feature on your matchmaking business and your “Bring Your Heart to Golden Falls” campaign by Cassie Holt, who’s an old friend of mine from high school. Are you available today for a phone call? I’d like to discuss a possible partnership with Devotion.com.

Allison Reiss

Vice President of Business Development

Hayley stared at her screen. Slowly, a huge grin spread across her face. This was it. This could be her big break to get the matchmaking business off the ground. She wrote a quick response that yes, she was available all day, and yes, she was interested.

Less than an hour later, she was on the phone with Allison Reiss. The company was looking to expand their business model to include regional and local matchmaking services with a more personalized touch, and with a corresponding increase in members’ subscription level. “For the ones who are really serious about finding love,” Allison explained. Hayley March Matchmaking was exactly the kind of client-focused business they were looking for as a partner, and they loved the Alaska angle.

“So basically,” Allison said, “you would be an independent service that contracts with us. We can offer you publicity, nationwide resources and advertising, and a percentage of the membership fees from clients who want this level of service in your area. In exchange, your ‘Bring Your Heart’ campaign will be our pilot program for this local, event-based segment of our overall business. In the age of social media and too much online choice, we’re finding that a lot of our members want a more personal, and in-person, connection with other singles. It’s authenticity when so much of online dating is misrepresentation.”

“It really is,” Hayley said, almost too excited to speak. “That’s a huge reason why I started my business. I love to see people connecting with each other in an authentic way. And here in Alaska, the demographic imbalance is a real issue—online dating just doesn’t bridge that gap. We need female boots on the ground here, so to speak!”

“I understand your own website is launching in a couple weeks?”

“That’s the plan. I’m doing profiles of some of the most attractive single men in Golden Falls, and the website will launch just after Thanksgiving.”

“Part of our contract with you would mean nestling your website under the larger Devotion.com umbrella,” Allison said. “Would you be okay with that?”

Hayley imagined the slow going of building followers on her own independent website. Then she imagined it as a prominent option on the massive, popular Devotion.com site. It was a no-brainer. “I’d be okay with that.”

“Good. And speaking of profiles, you would be the face of the Devotion.com expansion, so we want to do a profile on you, too. The interview with Cassie was great—you’re definitely photogenic!”

Hayley was grateful that Allison couldn’t see her furious blush. “Thank you.”

“You, Hayley March, will be the perfect proof of concept. We’ll do a profile on you and your significant other—boyfriend? Fiancé? Husband? Anyway, with you and your happy relationship, plus your hand-picked singles profiles, I’m betting the women will want to be you, and want to meet your Alaska men!”

“Er …” Hayley choked. But I don’t have a significant other! “I don’t know, maybe it’s better to just focus on the singles. I mean, I’m not that interesting!” She tried to keep it light so that Allison didn’t suspect she was that old cliché, an unmatched matchmaker.

“Nonsense. It’s important that potential clients see not only who’s available, but what kind of beautiful relationship they could have. Which is yours!”

Hayley remembered that Cassie had cut the question about her own love life, a favor that, as it turned out, had resulted in this misunderstanding. Crap, she thought.

But she couldn’t turn down the biggest business opportunity she’d ever had. This would launch her career as a matchmaker.

“What kind of timeline are you thinking?” she asked Allison.

“We’re looking at two months out. Sometime in January to launch everything, just in time for New Year’s Resolution-ers and, of course, Valentine’s Day.”

Two months to get a boyfriend. Could it be done? Definitely, but Hayley was going to need some serious help.

“Allison, that sounds great,” Hayley said. “I’d be honored to work with you.”

They hung up with an agreement to follow up with a videoconference to go over the detailed contract on Monday. Hayley looked at her phone, allowed herself a tiny squeak of terrified excitement, and then called Claire to tell her the news.

* * *

“Um, no,” Hayley said on Saturday night when her date asked if she wanted to go to a strip club.

Michael Driessner wasn’t a date in the regular sense of the word, thank goodness. As part of her matchmaking business, she offered a service called The Blind Spot Boogie, whereby men hired her as a dating coach to analyze the impression they made on early dates and help them see how they might be getting in their own way when it came to finding love. Just thirty minutes into her date with Michael, Hayley was pretty sure his entire life was one big blind spot.

“Why on earth do you think I’d want to go to a strip club on a first date, Michael?”

“You wouldn’t be going for the boobs,” he said. “You’d be going for the beef. The Dancing Bare has the best steak in town, and you said you liked steak. See, I was listening.”

“Points for being a good listener, Michael, but it’s inappropriate to suggest a strip club on a first date. Has it ever gone over well?”

Michael was Cassie’s co-anchor at KFLS. Cassie had given Hayley’s contact information to Michael and told her to expect a call soon, because he was in desperate need of help. Cassie wasn’t kidding.

Admittedly, Michael was a decent-looking guy. At forty-four, he had no middle-aged paunch, and while his hairline was receding, it didn’t mar his looks. He was unnaturally tan for November, meaning he fake-tanned, which was kind of a turn-off because it indicated self-absorption, but that could be explained by the fact he was on TV five nights a week. And he couldn’t help it if his facial features were the tiniest bit smushed together. Other than the vague douchebag vibe he gave off, there wasn’t a deal-breaking thing wrong with him, physically.

Personality-wise was another story completely. They’d met for their faux date in the piano bar at the Pioneer Hotel for drinks before dinner. Selected by Michael, Hayley felt it was a good choice because of its classy, old-school elegance, but he’d then spent the entire time looking not quite at her but over her shoulder. It was disconcerting at first and then eye-rollingly ridiculous when she realized he was admiring himself in the wall-length mirror behind her.

“Women in Golden Falls are too small-minded,” Michael declared instead of answering whether his strip club suggestion ever worked on a first date. “They don’t know how to have a good time.”

“I doubt that’s true,” Hayley said.

“It used to be easy to get laid. Now it’s like—what the hell? I think they’re intimidated by me because I’m on TV.”

“Mmmm,” Hayley said as she sipped her wine, doubting that was the case. “How do you get to know a woman on a first date? What do you ask them?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Sure you do. Come on, let’s pretend this is a real date. Ask me something.”

“What do you do for a living?” he said, adding, “See, but that’s stupid. I already know what you do for a living.”

“That’s okay,” she assured him. “We’re practicing. I run a matchmaking business, among other things.”

He should have asked what other things.

“How much do you make?” he said instead.

“That’s not something you should ask.”

He pressed his lips together.

“Ask me something else.”

“Will you have sex with me?”

“No! Jesus, Michael—no!”

“I’m paying you,” he said grumpily.

“Which would make it prostitution.” Hayley knew that was a stretch, but she was offended by his nerve.

“You’re not all that, you know.” He crossed his arms. “I could give you a few pointers, too. Such as don’t dress like you’re going to church when a man takes you to a fancy bar for a drink. Show some skin. And don’t criticize him when he makes an innocent suggestion to take you for the best steak in town after you’ve told him you like steak. And don’t tell him everything he asks you is stupid.”

Thank goodness she lived a block away and could get herself home. Michael didn’t just have blind spots, he was a blind spot.

“Lashing out at me when I’m only trying to help—which you paid me to do—isn’t the best idea,” she said.

“I want my money back. If you’re not going to sleep with me, I want my money back. But I think you should sleep with me. You look like you need to get laid.”

She laughed—she couldn’t help herself. It was over; she was done. Spending time with him wasn’t worth any amount he could pay her. “Trust me, I’m not that desperate.”

“You suck as a dating coach,” he said.

“Well, you suck as a human being, Michael. So there.”

“You suck as a woman.”

* * *

That was Saturday night.

Hayley had spent most of the weekend thinking about her Devotion.com opportunity and the dilemma it presented. Her thoughts had touched—more than once—on Josh Barnes and his blazing eyes and wicked smile and observant intensity. But then she remembered he wasn’t looking for a relationship, and that was that.

In the meantime, she had events to run, and she needed to keep up the momentum for Devotion.com. Second Date Sunday arrived with sprinklings of powdery snow, but by noon the sun broke through the clouds, and by the time sunset rolled around, the wind had died down and the air was crisp and invigorating.

Hayley was pleased to see a large group gathered for the Ultimate Frisbee game on the big lawn of the Alaska State University campus. She estimated more than half of the attendees from Singles Night were there, including Maggie Barnes, who excused herself from her date, came up to Hayley, and said hello.

“Hey, Maggie!” Hayley nodded in the direction of her date. “Who are you here with?”

“He’s a respiratory therapist I work with at the hospital,” Maggie said. “He wasn’t at Singles Night, but I’ve liked him for a while, so I invited him anyway. I hope it’s okay.”

“Of course it’s okay! What do you do at the hospital?”

“I’m a critical care nurse. I work in the ICU.”

“Phew. Heavy.” Hayley bowed to her. “You have my total respect. That can’t be an easy job.”

“It’s not, but I’m good at it, which gives me satisfaction.” Maggie studied Hayley for a moment. “So, I realize we don’t know each other very well, but my brother told me he asked you out the other night, and I wanted to tell you how glad I am you said no.”

Hayley wasn’t sure whether she should be offended by the remark. “Do you mind if I ask why?”

Her insecurities kicked in, worries like, What’s wrong with me? Why wouldn’t she want me to date her brother? Aren’t I good enough?

“Because unlike every other woman he’s dated since coming home from the military, when he told you he didn’t do long-term, you took him at his word.”

“I guess I’ve finally realized that when people tell you who they are, you should believe them.” Hayley tugged the knit cap down over her ears. “The last thing I want is to enter into a relationship that’s doomed from the start. I’m curious, though. Do you know why he doesn’t want a serious relationship?”

Maggie shrugged. “Why don’t you want just a fling?”

“Because I’ve been there and I’ve done that,” Hayley said. “Has Josh ever done long-term?”

“Not in the last ten years,” Maggie said. “He had one girlfriend all through high school. They broke up the summer they graduated. He worked on a fishing boat and she moved to Anchorage. That’s it. Unless you count less than six months with Shannon Steele, which I don’t. She was a one night stand he enjoyed too much to end, until she pushed for something more. Besides Shannon, his relationships have all been three months or less.”

“Did something happen in the military?”

“You mean does he have PTSD?” Maggie paused. “I think he came back as whole as a person can be who’s seen what he’s seen. He’s dealt with a lot in his life. Being a medic on the battlefield can twist your heart in ways we civilians can’t even imagine, and even now he deals with life and death every day at his job. I think he prefers no strings attached during his free time. He doesn’t want to have to take care of anybody—well, except his sled dogs, but dogs are different than people. You feed them, you shelter them, you run them, and they don’t ask for anything more. Women? We always ask for more.” She looked Hayley directly in the eye. “So thank you for not.”

“You’re welcome.”

As Maggie went back to her date, Hayley thought about Josh. There was something about him that felt complex to her, if not conflicted. He was intense and yet casual. Closed off to forever and yet open to flings. She could imagine how safe she’d feel wrapped in his arms, and she could equally imagine how fantastically dangerous it would be to fuck him for hours. The man was sweet and spicy, and she wanted him. She wanted him to want her, too.

You suck as a woman.

Shut up, Michael, she thought as the memory of his words swam to the surface, which they had more than once since the previous night.

Michael Driessner sucked. There was no question about it.

But maybe she sucked, too. And even if she didn’t, she certainly had blind spots when it came to dating and love. Everyone did.

She wanted to find real love. Everlasting love. And she needed to find it soon because of the opportunity dangling in front of her that would only come once in a lifetime. At the very least, she needed to be in a steady, healthy, happy relationship by the time Devotion.com made her the “face of matchmaking” in January.

Hayley thought about her Blind Spot Boogie service. What she needed was a man to help her. Someone who could give her advice and then walk away while she implemented it with someone else. No strings, no getting hurt.

Josh wanted no strings.

He couldn’t be her boyfriend, but could he be her dating coach?

A thrill went through her at the thought of Josh Barnes coaching her on everything related to the dating game … and the seduction game. Could she keep it purely educational, purely physical? It would be for my professional and personal development. That’s all. Hayley could be disciplined when she had to be. She’d learned to manage money, to start her own business … there was no reason why she couldn’t successfully figure out the last remaining question mark in her life: Why am I still single?

But would Josh go for it?

She’d have to think about it later. In the meantime, her event was about to start.

Putting Josh firmly out of her mind, Hayley surveyed the people around her, all of them hopeful to kick off a connection over a game of Ultimate Frisbee. Would any of these couples find love? Get married? At a minimum, have mind-blowingly great sex in the near future?

She called to the others, “Gather round, guys! It’s time to get started!”

She explained the rules to the group. Most of the guys groaned when she said it was a no-contact sport, being the tackling fools they were, but the women looked relieved. Besides that, it was similar to football and soccer in that teams had to get the disc into the end zone, but players couldn’t run with it. They could only throw it.

Hayley separated the couples onto opposite teams but instructed them to guard their date, which would allow for flirting and frolicking throughout the sixty-minute game. During breaks they were free to drink whatever beverage filled their Thermos. Alaskans knew well the warming effects of alcohol, and they also knew how to have a good time. Hayley herself had hot spiced cider with rum. She sipped from the sidelines while the others played, cheering on both sides. She felt pleased everyone was having such a good time.

Behind them on the frozen pond, a group of about fifteen college students were playing a rowdy game of croquet. They’d driven metal hoops into various spots across the ice and were whacking brightly colored balls with their mallets. Definite Thermos action was occurring over there as well. They merely served as background scenery until there was sudden screaming.

“Get off the ice!” someone yelled. “Get off right now!”

There was commotion as the group on the pond moved en masse toward the shore.

Hayley’s Ultimate Frisbee players stopped to see what was going on.

Then the ominous sound of a single crack whipped through the cold evening air, and someone screamed.

* * *

It was the engine crew’s turn to cook that night, and Josh was recliner-feet-up in the living room with his crew captain Tom Steele, with whom Josh had pretty much made peace after ending things with Shannon, Tom’s younger sister. They’d just started the latest zombie apocalypse episode when the call kicked out to the Alaska State University campus. The location was in Engine Three’s “first due,” their primary area, and the only reason Ladder One would be called was for a technical rescue situation. Josh glanced at the scrolling red letters on the dispatch board as the dispatcher’s voice boomed throughout the station.

“Ladder One for an ice rescue …”

Josh jumped out of the recliner and jogged out to the bay, meeting the rest of his crew. They turned out and got into the special squad truck which was equipped with the rope systems and cold water suits they would need for a victim-falling-through-ice scenario. It was one that played out at least four or five times every winter.

Nate Halstead, the engineer, drove fast with lights and sirens. Over the headset, Josh listened as dispatch gave more detailed information. A man had fallen through the ice into the pond in front of Armistice Hall. The pond at Alaska State was a deep natural feature, not shallow man-made landscaping. The temperature that day had reached the low thirties in the afternoon when the sun came out; they shouldn’t have trusted the ice. But the victim was visible, his head above water. That was good. They might have a chance.

Josh had seen it before. Every second counted when it came to getting someone out of frigid water. Sometimes the shock alone would cause the victim to panic and drown, or their muscles would stop working, and they would sink into the abyss.

Josh and Troy Garrett, the other firefighter in the backseat, put on their orange exposure suits, preparing to enter the cold, deep water. By the time they were fastened up, the truck was arriving on scene.

From the shotgun seat up front, Tom Steele got on the radio. “Ladder One to dispatch. We have vehicles parked in the fire lane here. Can we get PD to clear the way?”

“What the hell?” Nate said from the driver’s seat. “Why’s it so crowded?”

Josh remembered then. It was Hayley March’s second date thing—the Ultimate Frisbee match. He felt a squeeze of anxiety and hoped it hadn’t been her group on the ice, followed by an odd relief that the victim was male.

Then he looked out the window and saw Hayley herself gesturing at the packed line of parked cars, shouting something. A couple people ran from behind her and got into their vehicles, pulling away, leaving a clear area for the fire truck to park.

Josh smiled. He liked her initiative. He also liked the way her lustrous hair fell in waves out from under her knit cap. It was … beguiling.

Tom came on the radio again. “Dispatch, we have a place to park now, but we still need PD for crowd control.”

Josh jumped out of the truck, shaking away pleasant thoughts of Hayley March’s hair and instead focusing on the task at hand. He and the rest of the crew grabbed their ropes, winches, crampons, and other ice rescue equipment. As they raced across the lawn toward the pond, police and sheriff’s deputies arrived with spotlights to illuminate the area. A light snow began to fall, and in the growing darkness the red-and-blue flash of lights gave an eerie feel to the scene.

Josh and his crew didn’t waste time when they got to the pond’s edge. Cold shock, even cardiac arrest, was a real concern, and every second the man was in the water was one too many. Tom and Nate attached a flotation device to the end of a long pole and pushed it out across the ice to the pitch-black break where the man was treading water. Josh could see his motions slowing down; he was faltering.

“What’s his name?” he asked a bystander.

“Kevin.”

“Kevin, hang on!” Josh shouted. “We’re coming to get you. Grab the life preserver!”

Kevin thrashed suddenly, lunging for the orange flotation device. Panicking.

“Put your arm through!” Tom shouted.

Kevin managed to get one arm through the hole and pushed the rest of it under his chest so that he was resting. While Tom and Nate held the pole steady, Josh and Troy finished roping in to make their way across the ice. Josh had trained for cold water technical rescue, so he knew what it felt like to have ice crack beneath you and to fall into freezing black water. He trusted his gear, trusted his exposure suit to keep him warm and afloat. Even so, there was the element of the unexpected, and his senses were on alert. He slid out on his belly, Troy behind him, and made his way toward Kevin, whose skin was a shocking pale white, lips already blue.

Troy held Josh’s ankles while Josh reached forward to grab Kevin. Kevin was dead weight by this point, his muscles seized up, blood staying in his core rather than the extremities. Josh got his arms under the man’s shoulders and grasped from behind, pulling Kevin towards him and then up and over the lip of ice. The weak spot didn’t spread; there was no telltale crack that suggested the rest of the surface might be compromised.

I’ll take it, Josh thought. “Okay, just a few more minutes now. I’m gonna attach a rope to you so we can pull you to shore.” He secured the harness around Kevin’s chest and gave the hand signal to Tom to go ahead and pull.

Josh waited until Kevin was safely tugged across the ice and on shore before he made his own awkward way back, standing when he was a few feet away from the shore. Kevin was already being rolled away on a stretcher toward a waiting ambulance.

“Nice job, bro.”

Josh turned to see Maggie standing there. “Hey! What are you doing here?”

“I was on the winning team of Ultimate Frisbee until all this commotion.”

Josh looked over her shoulder and saw Hayley approaching.

He’d been thinking of Hayley since they’d met. Several women had thrust their phone numbers at him at Singles Night, but he hadn’t kept them, determined to keep his love life uncomplicated. But despite appreciating Hayley’s honesty in telling him she was looking for more than he was willing to give, hers was the number he would have kept. She was just as sexy as he remembered: skin glowing and flushed, hazel eyes crackling. A snowflake landed on her nose and hovered, then melted, and Josh found himself mesmerized thinking of the warm softness of her skin.

“Hi, Hayley,” he said.

* * *

Hayley spent a couple of seconds trying to bring her galloping heartbeat under control. Josh looked every bit the hero he’d just shown himself to be, and he was looking at her with an intensity that made her feel hypnotized.

Finally, she managed, “Hey.” She mentally kicked herself for not saying something meaningful, like Thank you for saving that guy’s life, but she was too flustered.

Josh gave a “be there soon” wave to his crew. “Did you have something you wanted to ask me?” he said.

“Um …” Hayley’s mind raced. How could he possibly know she was going to ask him to be her dating coach? “Maybe?”

“Cassie said you wanted to profile the guys for some marketing thing you’re doing,” he said. “A modern-day mail-order bride sort of thing.”

“Oh, that! Not exactly.” Hayley giggled. “The women won’t come to Alaska betrothed or anything! They’ll just be single and looking for love. And I’ll help them find it.”

“I don’t know if I’d be a good profile subject,” he said. “You do remember I’m not looking for a relationship.”

“Of course I remember,” Hayley said.

“And you want to profile me anyway?”

“You’ll be like a loss leader,” she said. “If the women ask, I’ll say you’re off the market, but there are hundreds of other guys up here who are looking for love.”

He grinned. “It sounds more like I’m a bait-and-switch.”

“Come on, Josh, do it,” Maggie said. “You can have her out to the house and show her the kennel. Maybe even take her for a dogsled ride.”

“Ooh, yes!” Hayley said. “I could get some good photos, and it would give the piece a true Alaska vibe.”

“It’s fine by me,” Josh said.

“Great!” Hayley said. “What’s a good day? How’s Tuesday?”

“Tuesday’s not so good.”

“Veteran’s Day,” Maggie said. “Josh always takes part in the National Remembrance Day Roll Call. They read the names of every service member who died in Iraq and Afghanistan. It takes all day, and he stays all day.”

It sounded horribly depressing to Hayley. “Where’s it held?”

“Right up there.” Maggie pointed to Armistice Hall.

Hayley looked at Josh. It was obvious now from his posture and general bearing he’d served in the military. “How long did you serve?”

“Five years,” he said, somewhat curtly, as if he preferred not to talk about it. “I was a Corpsman deployed with the Marines in Afghanistan. Anyway, Wednesday works for me if it’s good for you.”

“Wednesday’s great,” Hayley said.

“Explain to me what kind of profile this is?” Maggie said.

Hayley decided against mentioning the Devotion.com deal, for fear of counting her chickens too soon. “I’m starting a web campaign to recruit more women to Golden Falls. More single women, specifically, and Cassie suggested I should make the firefighters the example of why women should move here. I’d like to profile one a month on the website.”

“Oh, here we go!” Maggie moaned exaggeratedly. “You’re gonna make their heads swell.”

“Wrong body part,” Josh said.

Hayley couldn’t help raising her eyebrows, and she resisted the urge to laugh. She liked where his mind was, because hers had been there since he’d first said hello.

“I’m sorry,” Josh said. “I don’t mean to offend.”

“I’m not offended,” Hayley assured him. “Trust me, my mind goes right to the gutter sometimes.”

He grinned. “Good to know.”

“Did you know Josh is training for the Iditarod?” Maggie said.

“No.” Hayley looked at Josh again, with a fresh hit of appreciation.

She loved the Iditarod. The thousand-mile route went through Golden Falls every other year, coming right down Main Street, and she always joined the crowd to cheer on the mushers. The last time it came through, she and Rebecca Miller made a bunch of individual-sized cherry pies to hand out to the participants.

“Ask my brother how well he did,” Maggie said.

As soon as Maggie said it, Hayley remembered a story she’d seen on the news.

“Oh, my gosh. You’re the Red Lantern guy, aren’t you?”

Josh’s cheeks seemed to redden, but with the temperature, it was hard to tell for sure.

“That’s my brother,” Maggie said. “Came in last place. Got lost on the trail. Local boy, doing us proud.”

The Red Lantern Award was given to the musher who crossed the finish line last. The award started as a joke, but over time had become a symbol of perseverance. Hayley got teary-eyed every year when she saw the news story about the last-place finisher. She admired tenacity, the fighting of the good fight.

She remembered the story about Josh in particular because he’d gotten lost. It had been on one of the longest, most remote stretches of the trail, with a full fifty miles between checkpoints. In the endless hilly terrain, which already suffered from a lack of distinguishing features, a snowstorm had blown in and the musher—who Hayley now knew was Josh—had taken a wrong ridgeline, setting him back days.

Hayley had gotten lost before, too. It had been a different kind of wilderness: the sultry oppressive heat of Miami’s worst neighborhood. She’d been eight years old. The memory of her helplessness and terror preyed on her still, and for that reason she tended to avoid the Alaskan backcountry adventures that many people in Golden Falls enjoyed. Like all who lived in Alaska long enough, Hayley knew basic survival skills, but she always hoped she would never have to use them.

She shuddered to think what it would be like to be so far from any human contact in the middle of winter, adrift in a white wasteland. “How did you feel when you realized you were lost?” she asked Josh.

“Incredibly alive,” he said.

That surprised her. “I would have been terrified. You weren’t at all?”

He shook his head. Hayley thought he was a man who could blaze away her fears. As she searched his brown eyes and integrated the new information she now had—about his bravery, his fearlessness, his strength of character, his honest-to-goodness heroism—into the intelligence and decency she’d already seen in them, he searched hers back.

The moment felt as intimate as a kiss.

Josh Barnes, she thought sadly. Why don’t you want forever?