I rip off the ring, practically dislocating a joint or two in the process, and shove it in a drawer, where he can’t see it. He’s beaming and apparently doesn’t notice how frantic I am. Maybe I deserve to have Blake figure me out; maybe I shouldn’t be doing this. Having him here in my space only emphasizes my guilt.

“Hi,” he says in his low, steady voice. He leans a hip against the edge of the counter and peers into the case. “Nice shop you’ve got here.”

“H-hi. Thank you.”

He’s still beaming, like he should get so many brownie points for, what, using Google to find out where I work and bringing me some flowers? I wish he would disappear, because if he’s Googled my company, that means he very well could have discovered my scheme online. I feel terrible for hiding the truth from him. But wait, no—if he stumbled across anything incriminating, he wouldn’t be wooing me with a gorgeous bouquet the size of the Empire State Building. That realization spurs me to breathe again.

“Those are beautiful,” I say, taking the flowers from him.

“They reminded me of you,” he says.

Jess simply stares. “Hi,” she says, wide-eyed. Her dinner date with Greg last night was a bust; low on romance, high on him watching football over her shoulder.

Blake introduces himself.

Sophie, who had been sketching a new collection in the back room, emerges at the sound of his voice. Her eyes glitter in a way that tells me she knows exactly who this is.

“You must be Sophie?” Blake asks, extending his hand to her. “Eliza has told me so much about you. I’m Blake.”

“Hi,” she breathes, still starry-eyed.

Great, even my married lesbian sister thinks my fake boyfriend is hot.

“I should go put these in water,” I say, somehow feeling like I’m interrupting. “Uh, I’m gonna run upstairs for a sec to grab a vase from my kitchen. I’ll be right back.”

I slip past Blake, take the stairs to my apartment two at a time, and proceed to sift through the cabinet beneath the sink, past a clanging, jangling mass of pots and pans I haven’t used since potentially the last presidential administration, in order to unearth the one vase I own. I unwrap the flowers as fast as I can, fill the vase with water, and squeeze the bouquet inside. It’s a tight fit. When I make it back downstairs, Blake, Sophie, and Jess are in a rapt discussion of the shop’s wares, which makes my skin crawl with nerves. They don’t necessarily know every single detail of what I’ve told Blake; they could trip up my ruse at any minute.