Chapter 1

The year Richard Henson turned thirty-one, he decided to get married.

Because his calculations told him that thirty-one years and four months was the optimal point for marriage, balanced against career, assets, and the cost of having children.

He spent half a year screening for a wife.

He said the model had run over four thousand times, and I was the woman best suited to him in all these years. Ranked first. A ninety-seven percent match.

To protect those ninety-seven points, he was meticulous to the point of being disturbing.

I liked soft beds, and his back was bad, so he bought a mattress with different firmness on each side.

Before meeting my parents for the first time, he calculated all six toasts in advance.

Any more would be groveling; any less would be rude.

A week before we were going to sign the marriage license, I really believed I was going to marry him. Until his childhood friend came back from seven years abroad.

Early that morning, I went to drop off the ID card he'd left at my place.

I pushed open the bedroom door and saw him lying there naked with Leah Valdez.

Richard woke up. He didn't panic, and he didn't apologize.

He just picked up his glasses and put them on. "I had too much to drink last night."

I asked, "And then?"

He picked up his phone.

"And then I realized my earlier data sample wasn't large enough. Last night filled in the intimacy data with Leah."

Two numbers on the screen.

Me, ninety-seven percent. Leah, ninety-eight.

He looked at me, his tone still gentle.

"She's one point higher than you. So, Mabel Bishop, if we go ahead and marry as planned…"

He paused. "Is there any way you could raise yourself by one point?"

I laughed. He was still waiting for me to make up that one point.

But the score I'd given him, deep down, had already reset to zero.

…

I didn't cry.

That probably fell outside Richard's calculations.

He watched me stand there for a few seconds, then reached over and pulled the blanket up onto Leah's shoulder first.

The motion was completely natural.

Only then did he ask me, "Don't you start work at nine today?"

I glanced at the bedside clock.

Seven forty-six.

He even remembered my commute took fifty-four minutes.

So thoughtful.

"Your ID."

I tossed it onto the table.

Richard caught it and slipped it into his wallet.

"Thanks."

He even knew to say thank you.

I turned to leave, and he finally sensed something was wrong, threw back the blanket, and got out of bed.

"Mabel."

I didn't turn around.

From behind me came Leah's voice. "Richard, put your clothes on first."

Richard didn't listen.

He only pulled on a pair of pants and came after me, blocking the doorway.

"Give me ten minutes to talk."

"There's no need."

"There is."

He adjusted his glasses, his tone the same calm I knew best.

"Last night was an unexpected variable, yes, but a single event isn't enough to override three years of long-term data. I suggest we push back signing the license by two weeks and leave the wedding plans untouched. Within those two weeks, I'll recalculate."

I stared at him.

"Recalculate what?"

"The three of us."

He almost made me laugh out of sheer disbelief.

"You really don't want to waste anyone."

He frowned.

"Don't twist it on purpose."

"Then explain it."

"Marriage is a major long-term decision to begin with. You're suited for a shared life, emotionally stable, aligned on family values. Leah and I have more similar backgrounds, and our intimacy compatibility is high too."

He paused there.

As if afraid I wouldn't understand.

"There's no reason for one mistake last night to make me immediately lose a high-match candidate who's already been verified over three years."

So it turned out I was a high-match candidate, not a girlfriend.

And certainly not a fiancée about to be married.

I nodded.

"And Leah?"

Richard was silent for half a second.

"She needs to be reassessed too."

I laughed out loud for real.

His expression finally soured a little.

"Mabel, I'm already doing my best to be fair to you here."

"You slept with her, and then you're being fair to me?"

"Last night wasn't planned behavior."

I raised my hand and slid the ring off my ring finger.

His expression changed in an instant.

This was the one he'd bought after looking at forty-seven of them.

Carat, clarity, resale value, even the odds of the setting catching on a sweater. He'd calculated all of it.

He said it was the ring with the highest overall return.

I used to wear it so carefully.

Now I pressed it into his hand.

"Then you go recalculate too. How much you'll lose once you don't have me."

Richard closed his fist around the ring, his voice dropping.

"Don't make a decision in the heat of the moment."

"I'm not angry."

"Your cortisol level is definitely above normal right now. Your judgment is distorted."

I stared at him for two seconds.

"You have to quantify even my heartbreak?"

Before he could answer, Leah coughed from the bedroom.

Richard turned instinctively, just one glance.

Then he looked back at me.

"Eat some breakfast first. I ordered the shrimp porridge you like, no ginger."

The tip of my nose stung all of a sudden.

Three years. He even remembered I didn't eat ginger.

I pushed him aside.

"You two enjoy it."

When I reached the elevator, he still followed a couple of steps.

"Come back tonight."

"For what?"

"To discuss the wedding plans again."

He stood in the doorway, still gripping that ring.

"The direct loss of canceling the wedding is one point eight seven million dollars, and the cost of the guest notifications can't be recovered. Canceling now isn't rational."

The elevator doors slid slowly shut.

Through the last sliver, I saw him frowning, like he was staring at a problem that suddenly wouldn't balance.

But he didn't know.

Starting today, I don't do the math anymore.