Nicky Wake, 55, from Bury, launched a dating app for widows after her husband Andy died of Covid in April 2020. The app, Chapter 2, now has 25,000 members. In July 2025, she matched with Dan Smith, 52, a widower from Saddleworth, and after seven dates they fell in love.
How the apps came to be
Nicky lost her husband Andy, 57, to Covid in April 2020 after he had been in a care home since 2017 following a catastrophic brain injury. Six months later, she tried dating but found it hard to connect with people who understood her loss. So in November 2022, she launched Chapter 2, a dating app for widows. However, she struggled to find matches on her own app because she was still in love with her late husband. In June 2023, she created a second app, Widow's Fire, tailored for widows seeking hook-ups. The name refers to the sudden surge of sexual desire many people feel after losing a spouse, according to Nicky.
Meeting Dan
In July 2025, Nicky matched with Dan Smith, 52, whose wife had passed away five years earlier. She was instantly attracted to him. After seven dates, they decided to make their relationship official. Nicky said: "Dan's profile immediately caught my attention because he's a silver fox. After seven fiery dates, he said to me, 'This isn't Widow's Fire; this is Chapter 2.' We fell madly in love, and I wouldn't be disappointed if he got down on one knee. I fully anticipate that happening; I've been dropping hints."
Dan's perspective
Dan said: "My wife died five years ago; we were together for 26 years. I'd tried dating before, but people didn't understand what it was like to be a widow. I liked the idea of the Widow's Fire app because you could have a physical relationship without enormous emotional investment at the start. Nicky and I have great communication, and we're very experimental. We're so close as a blended family and operate as a five. We're just coming up to a year together, but it feels much longer as we've done so much together."
First date and beyond
Last summer, while on an Alaskan cruise, Nicky received a message from Dan that caught her attention. They flirted and arranged to meet at a local pub after her return. Nicky said: "The chemistry was instant; we were holding hands after about 10 minutes, and after an hour we were kissing. It was the best first date ever." Since then, they have attended a festival, spent a weekend at an Airbnb in Krakow, and are about to go on a blended family cruise from Venice to Barcelona. Their children get along brilliantly, and Nicky's son Finn, 18, even babysits Dan's children, aged 16 and 14. The couple do not plan to live together until their children leave for university, after which they intend to 'grow old disgracefully' and relocate to Barbados.
