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poor you! Guess where I am?’
    ‘In bed?’
    ‘Try again.’
    ‘Still at work?’
    ‘No,’ she replied and then sent him the photo she’d taken.
    Bethany’s heart raced at a speed of knots as she awaited Kevin’s text. Instead, the phone rang.
    ‘Surprise!’ she squealed.
    ‘You shouldn’t have come, I’m sorry,’ Kevin replied curtly and then hung up.

CHAPTER 14
     
    NICK
     
    ‘Don’t open it!’ Sally had yelled down the phone to Nick. 
    She sounded anxious. ‘Wait until you get home and we’ll do it together.’
    Sally admitted to Nick that from the moment her smart watch had indicated an email had arrived from Match Your DNA, her stomach had felt like it was trapped in a lift and had dropped twenty flights. She’d called him immediately and after checking his inbox while she remained glued to the other end of the line, he revealed he too had received a notification.
    The rest of her day at work in the press office of the homeless charity had dragged on longer than she ever thought possible as she became increasingly preoccupied with Nick’s results. When the clock reached 6pm, Sally made an excuse to avoid Billie’s birthday drinks in the Malmaison Hotel. Instead, she hurried to the bus station to make her way home.
    Meanwhile at the media agency where Nick worked, he’d given his results equal amount of attention. While he was supposed to be thinking of snappy, original ways to promote a new brand of intimate wipes for women, he was instead wondering what the contents of the email might reveal.
    But it was Sally’s insistence on taking the test in the first place that really concerned him. He’d assumed they were content and in agreement that their future was together, but her need for scientific confirmation tapped into a recurring worry that he wasn’t good enough for his wife-to-be; that their five-year age gap was too big and that he was, and always would be, too immature for her.
    When Nick finally made it home thirty minutes after her, Sally was already clutching her second glass of red wine and sitting on the kitchen island with her legs dangling over the side.
    ‘Sorry I’m late,’ he began, ‘I got held up in a meeting…’
    ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Sally interrupted and took an anxious swig of her drink. ‘Can we get this over with?’
    ‘May I say one thing first?’ Nick asked, and perched on the island next to her. ‘I don’t care what these results say. I could be Matched with Jennifer Lawrence as far as I’m concerned and it wouldn’t make the blindest bit of difference. You are the one I’m destined to be with, no matter what these emails tell us.’
    Sally smiled and felt her eyes well. Then she picked up her phone and pressed the email icon, scrolling down and opening the message. She began to read it out loud. ‘“Sally Brooks: Ref 4156745246BAW. No designated Match”.’
    A foreboding silence filled the room as neither knew what to say to one another. Eventually, Nick wrapped his arm around her shoulder.
    ‘We’re going to make it work, I know we are,’ he offered. ‘Millions of couples have and we’ll be no exception. Just because we aren’t biologically matched doesn’t mean we aren’t meant to be together. You still love me right? After reading that, you still love me?’
    ‘Of course I do.’
    ‘Then who cares what a bit of chemistry or biology says. Nothing is going to change that.’
    Sally swallowed hard and began to weep. ‘I’m sorry,’ she apologised. ‘I just wanted to make sure we stood a chance … that we were pre-destined to be together.’
    ‘Fuck that, let’s take a punt instead.’
    Sally smiled and ran her fingers through his thick, dark hair, and drew his lips towards hers before they rested their foreheads against each other’s.
    ‘Let’s go out and get an early dinner,’ he continued. ‘That new Turkish restaurant has opened on the high street. My treat.’
    Sally nodded as Nick hopped off the island and made his