“You know, you look familiar, but I can’t place you.”

“Might have been one of the photos at the back of the Finders Keepers brochure. I’m one of the owners.”

“Oh!” Eve sipped her coffee. “I would have thought you had the perfect match already.”

“No time to look. Then I realized if I let work take all the time, I’d be forty and single and no telling how many perfect matches would have passed me by.”

“You think there’s more than one?”

Marissa shrugged. “Maybe for some people. I think that those who are fairly easygoing can be very content with a number of people. I mean solidly, happily content. Not to be confused with settling.”

“But shouldn’t there be more than that? I mean, I can’t imagine living with someone without a strong sense of contentment.” Eve frowned slightly as she chose her words. “But what about that certain zing? The passion?”

“I know what you mean.” She was liking Eve more by the minute, just as she’d liked Cicely and Wyndy when they’d had coffee. The computer had been right about a high-degree of compatibility—all had been in the 96 to 98 percent range. Conversation was easy. She had thought all three attractive in their own way and each had had an engaged intellect she found she could relate with. But her pulse had never risen, not the way a single look from Linda could make it race. If not for Linda, she might easily have found Eve a perfect, comfortable companion. Because of Linda she knew she wouldn’t be happy with that. She didn’t know if that knowledge was a gift or a curse. “Passion matters to me.”

“So,” Eve asked, after another little pause, “another question. What’s your favorite place to go on vacation?”

“Anywhere but work.” Marissa smiled into her cup then added more seriously, “I was in Tahiti last year and I’d love to go again. Preferably without the shipwreck.”

“You were shipwrecked? How thrilling!”

Marissa found herself telling the tale, leaving out the part about Linda, Linda’s hands and mouth all over her and the resulting broken heart. She even chided herself for being on a date with a very nice woman only to think about Linda. “I finally did get the trip insurance money and I bought the books again, all prepared for that next trip.”

“That sounds like the adventure of a lifetime. One I could do without, probably. I want to see Alaska.” Eve shook back her hair, looking as if she was truly enjoying their conversation.

The coffee was long gone when they both gathered their things and walked out of the coffeehouse together.

Summoning her courage, even though she was certain of the answer, she asked Eve, “So, are you feeling any of that zing?”

“I like you,” Eve said immediately. “I’d like to see you again. But if there’s a zing, it’s going to take a while, I think.”

Relieved, Marissa said, “That’s about where I was. I can always use more friends and someone who has read all the Darkover books, more than once, that’s a real treat.”