Seriously? Who was this guy? And Evan needed to shut up. I narrowed my eyes on Pete, suddenly wondering if his problem with me was more personal than I’d realized. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had taken a dislike to me because I came from a privileged background and a well-known family.

Still, Evan, the little gossip, had said Rhys seemed into me but I wasn’t into him? All this time I was worried Rhys would let me down and it was me who was screwing up.

A knot tightened in my gut. “I’m just very private,” I replied. “Rhys and I are still together.”

“Pete, don’t you have other things to do?” Jackson’s voice cut through the room as he strode out of his office toward us.

Pete jumped off my desk. “Of course, sir.” He threw me a look, as if I were the reason he got caught not working, and hurried across to his side of the room that I would now refer to as the Creepy Pete Department.

Jackson wound around the desks and stopped in front of mine. He smiled down at me. “I’m glad to hear you and Rhys are still together because we’ve booked a paintball tournament. Everyone in the office is going and they’re bringing their partners. You should bring Rhys. I have no doubt he’ll make things interesting.”

Confused, I asked, “Paintball?”

“A team-building exercise. I’ve done it before, and it works great in bringing a team together. Even when you’re on opposite sides.” He flashed me a cheeky smile. “A little competition is invigorating and since you’re new here, I’d really like to see you there.”

“Of course.” Paintball. My idea of hell. Yay. But wait! “Is it environmentally friendly?”

Jackson grinned. “The shells and fill are biodegradable, yes.”

“Okay.” Damn it. “I’ll be there.”

“And Rhys too?”

I nodded. “I’ll ask him.”

The rest of the day I’d spent worrying instead of focusing on work, and then I’d come home to Zoe, still agitated.

As I told her about Pete, I realized I couldn’t keep up the Rhys charade. I was a terrible liar, my colleagues already didn’t believe in our relationship, and they were really not going to believe in it if we joined the paintball tournament.

My other option was to give into the inevitable and start looking for a new job.

An ache flared in my chest at the thought.

“The solution is staring you in the face,” Zoe said.

“It is?”

“Call Rhys, explain the situation, and tell him you need to arrange a fake date, just the two of you, so you can work on the intimacy thing.”

My cheeks flushed at the thought. “What does that mean exactly?”