THE MATCHMAKER’S BOOK CLUB #2
“A woman who draws villains with that much raw feeling has a private sketchbook somewhere full of the tenderness she won’t let anyone see.” Gerri sipped her champagne. “It’s not a guess, Ozara. It’s a certainty.”
Ozara stared at her for a long moment. Then she laughed—short, startled, edged with what might have been relief.
“You’re terrifying.”
“I prefer ‘perceptive.’” Gerri finished her champagne. “But I’ll accept ‘terrifying.’ Now. Stay close. There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”
Revka Axan arrived the way a former art history professor entered any room—like she was about to deliver a lecture that would change your understanding of beauty and she expected you to keep up.
Tailored charcoal dress. Dark hair streaked with silver at the temples, swept back from sharp features that broadcast intelligence before warmth.
She carried herself like a woman who had commanded lecture halls for decades and still expected the world to raise its hand before speaking.
Her eyes missed nothing—they swept the room, catalogued the art on the walls, assessed the champagne vintage from across the room, and landed on Gerri with the precision of a hawk finding a branch.
“Gerri.” A nod. Spare and elegant. Revka didn’t waste words.
“Revka, darling. You look magnificent. Charcoal suits you. Come. Have a cookie.”
Revka accepted the cookie with the gravity of someone accepting a diplomatic offering.
She did not eat it immediately. She held it and studied Gerri the way she had once studied attribution questions on disputed Rembrandts—with suspicion, respect, and the expectation that the truth would be layered.
“You already know why I’m here.”
“I know you didn’t come for the champagne.” Gerri gestured toward the window alcove where Ozara stood pretending to admire Central Park. “You’ve met Ozara Stone?”
“We serve on the same museum board.” Revka’s gaze tracked to Ozara and back. Calculating. “Art consultant. Former gallery owner. Her daughter is the comic artist.”
Gerri smiled. Of course, Revka had done her research. Revka did not arrive anywhere unprepared.
“Tell me about your son.”
Revka bit into the cookie. Chewed. Swallowed. The ritual bought her three seconds of composure—a woman accustomed to controlling the pace of every conversation.
“My son publishes villain stories that make readers fall in love with the bad guy.” Her voice was measured, precise, alive beneath the control.
“He builds these characters—ruthless, brilliant, terrifyingly capable—with lore so deep and ideology so sharp that readers root for them despite knowing they shouldn’t.
He understands darkness better than anyone in the industry. ”
She paused. The pause was different from Gerri’s—not for dramatic effect, but because the next words cost her.
“And he hasn’t been on a second date in three years.”
Gerri’s eyebrows rose. A fraction. Controlled. “Is he—”
“No.” Revka cut the question in half before it finished forming. “He’s not. He’s just...” She searched for the word. Found it. Delivered it like a diagnosis. “A lot.”
Gerri bit down on the inside of her cheek. A lot. The understatement of a mother who loved her son enough to see him clearly and despaired of anyone else doing the same.
“Zeir inherited the alpha mantle young,” Revka continued.
She moved to the window alcove, and Gerri followed.
The park had gone dark, the skyline a jagged constellation against deep blue.
“The pack elders—Brenn, specifically—ground the art out of him. Convinced him that creating made him weak. That an alpha’s role was martial, strategic, protective.
Not creative.” Her gaze drifted toward the Rembrandt print on the dining room wall.
“His father went through the same thing. Soren was an architect before he was an alpha. The elders told him beauty was frivolous. He gave it up. I watched it happen.”
The chandelier light played across her features. For a moment, the composed professor disappeared, and Gerri saw the woman underneath—the one who’d watched her husband surrender his passion and would burn the world before she let her son do the same.
“Zeir channels everything into the business now. Axan Dark Publishing. He builds worlds for villains to live in and can’t build a life for himself.
” Revka’s voice dropped. “He creates in secret, Gerri. Late at night, when the office is empty. He has a locked drawer in his desk. Sketches. Beautiful, vulnerable work. And he hides it like it’s something to be ashamed of. ”
Gerri let the silence breathe. Somewhere behind them, Zy was spinning Ellie on the makeshift dance floor, her laughter bright enough to cut glass.
A tiger shifter who’d needed a push and a woman who’d needed to stop running.
That match had taken six months. Gerri had a feeling this one would take longer.
“Does Zeir still keep that locked drawer in his desk?”
Revka’s chin lifted. The same crack that had split Ozara’s composure—brief, hairline, devastating in its honesty.
“Every night.”
“Every night.” Gerri repeated it softly.
Not a question. A confirmation. She turned to the window and studied the dark sweep of Central Park below.
Two people. A woman who poured every ounce of tenderness into villains that made strangers weep, and a man who built villains with intellectual depth so precise it made readers root for the monster.
A woman with a private sketchbook full of tenderness she’d never show, and a man with a locked drawer full of softness he’d never admit.
Two sides of the same dark coin.
Gerri steered them toward the orchid arrangements.
Ozara and Revka studied each other the way two chess players studied an opponent across the board—with respect, wariness, and the mutual recognition that they were both far too intelligent for small talk.
“Revka Axan,” Gerri said, as though the introduction were casual and unrehearsed.
“Former art history professor. Current patron of everything beautiful and dangerous. Her son runs Axan Dark Publishing.” She turned.
“Ozara Stone. Art consultant to collectors who can afford to be obsessed. Her daughter is the artist behind Nightbloom.”
She watched them shake hands. Watched the mutual assessment—Ozara’s warm directness meeting Revka’s cool precision. Two mothers of emotionally stubborn creative geniuses. Two women who understood art and artists and the particular ache of watching your child choose isolation over risk.
“Nightbloom,” Revka said. The word landed with weight—she’d read it. Of course, she’d read it. “The Sable character. The villain ideology is sophisticated. Unusually so for independent work.”