Page 62 of Matched By Mistake
“Oh, come on. You don’t need him. The only reason he even thought there was a problem was because he’s too pigheaded to see beyond a petty family feud. That isn’t your problem.”
“But I can’t have Trey telling everyone in Royal that there’s something wrong in the app. I figured that if he’s helping me with the app, it’ll help keep his mouth shut.” She paused, unsure whether or not she should share her next thought. “But that’s not all. Ialsohad some questions about the app.”
“What are you talking about? What kind of questions.”
“There have been emails,” she started. “User complaints telling of inappropriate matches since the Surprise me! function went live at ByteCon. Sometimes the algorithm doesn’t get it right.”
“That doesn’t mean there’s a problem with the app.”
“It’s in the way that the user application is designed. There are specific questions that people would answer and cause them to be paired in a way that their politics, lifestyles and beliefs align. That hasn’t been happening. Imagine setting up a date with someone with whom you have nothing in common. What if the stranger they’re meeting isn’t safe? Or if someone used the networking option and their work or privacy is compromised? All because they trusted our vetting process when admitting new members.”
“That’s a good point.”
She told him about the woman’s stolen purse. The lady couldn’t prove it was her date. Maybe it wasn’t. Who knew? “But what if something even more horrible happened on one of our dates or meetings? I could never live with that.”
“I couldn’t, either.” He paused. “Does this have anything to do with Maggie and her match with Jericho Winters? What do you think about what happened there?”
“I love Maggie. She’s my best friend, and I know she’s been happy with Jericho on their first few dates, but there was something with their match that didn’t feel right with me at the time. Especially with how public the reveal was. You should have been in the room. Everyone was stunned. So, my question is—despite the family feud, whywerethey matched? They’re so different. It felt weird, and even though I trusted the algorithm, it feels wonky. Like it was set up to happen that way.”
“You have all these concerns and the user complaints. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Because I don’t want it to be true,” she confessed. “I know there’s something going on, but I’d buried it deep, trying to ignore my gut instinct. I just can’t fail, Nico. I put everything I have into k!smet.” It wasn’t just her own personal pride at stake—she saw untold pressure being a woman in tech. She had already had to work so much harder to get a place at the table with thebig guys.If k!smet failed, there would be no coming back. And that was why she would take all the help she could get, even if it came from an unlikely source. “Having Trey come in here and tell me he also thinks there’s something weird going on, maybe I should have trusted those instincts.”
Nico paused before speaking. “That makes sense. It’s good that you’ve got him to help, but when it comes to Trey Winters, just be careful.”
Misha felt the heat rise in her cheeks. There was no way her brother could have known the way Trey’s appearance had affected her. “Be careful of what?”
“I know he’s one of your investors, but that isn’t set in stone. He could be grifting you. Using the promise of an investment to get close. If he starts examining and playing with the code, he could cause any kind of damage to the app. Maybe he has his own agenda to make the app exactly what he wants.”
“He wouldn’t do that,” she said. But what did she know? She only knew Trey in passing. The conversation they’d just had hadn’t exactly been a positive one. He’d shown himself to be domineering and interested in his own personal gain.
“No?” Nico asked. “He’s already claimed there to be a problem with the app. Even if he’s an investor, if he doesn’t like that his brother matched with a Del Rio, then he’s got an ulterior motive for compromising its integrity. If he can make it look faulty, he won’t have to invest, and he can show that the match is illegitimate.”
“Do you hear yourself? That’s ridiculously convoluted.”
“Probably, yeah.”
“Why would he do that? His brother built the Expo Center to prepare for Royal becoming the next tech hub. He’s put a lot of money into the app itself. Trey needs k!smet to succeed as much as I do.”
“If you say so,” Nico relented. “Just be careful giving control of all of your hard work to an outsider.”
“I will.”
“He is a Winters, after all.”
“Oh, God, not you, too. Didn’t you call the feud BS?”
He chuckled. “And if you’re really that concerned about the app—even though you have no reason to be—I’ll help you out with it, too.”
“You’re so busy with your own company,” she told him. “But I appreciate it. Thanks.” She paused and drew her bottom lip between her teeth. “If you’re concerned about me being careful around this guy... You could always come home,” she said carefully. Nico had been away from Royal since he went to prison. He’d taken the fall for a close friend, after a bar fight had accidentally injured the nephew of a. After getting out, Nico had kept a low profile and hadn’t yet come back to their hometown.
“I wouldn’t hold my breath, if I were you.”
“That’s what I thought.” Misha looked at the time on her laptop. She only had a few hours before Trey returned, and so many things on her to-do list. “I’d better go and get back to work,” she told her brother.
“Yeah, I guess you should. Love you, sis.”
“Love you, bro.” Misha hung up the call and turned her attention back to the email complaint. No matter what may happen to her code and programming, she had to get to the bottom of what was happening to her users. And if Trey was the man to help her, then so be it.
