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“Thanks, Jack.” I glared pointedly at Robbie.
“But in all seriousness,” he said. “How’s your quest to win the heart of Mr. Hotpants? Are the other guys getting in your way?”
Even though Robbie was my friend, I still felt weird discussing the arrangement out loud. Like I was literally whoring myself out for a room in a nice neighborhood. Jack’s encouragement helped me get over it, though.
“Honestly? I kind of like all of them.” I spent the next few minutes going over everything that had happened: temp work with Dorian, my date with Andy, and a vague glossing-over of what Ryan and I had been doing. Robbie narrowed his eyes when I skipped over the fuck-buddy details of Ryan, but didn’t push me for juicy details.
“But you’re no closer to figuring out what’s up with Braden?”
I sighed. “I pushed him for an answer last night. He told me that he doesn’t know what he wants.”
“Aside from a fake girlfriend to convince his parents,” Robbie muttered.
“Oh! Speaking of that, I had my first trial run. We had brunch with his sister, Candy.”
“She sounds delightful. How’d it go?”
Jack raised his head. “She sniffed you out almost immediately, didn’t she?”
I whipped my head toward him. “How’d you know?”
The old man grinned widely, which sprouted wrinkles all over his face. “Because it’s a stupid plan that was bound to fail.”
Robbie pointed. “He’s not wrong, honey.”
“It’s not my fault!” I said. “Apparently I’m not the first girl Braden has tried that with. But we’re still going to work on convincing his parents. Braden wrote six pages of backstory for our imaginary relationship.”
Robbie held out his palm. “Well now I have to see that.”
I handed him my phone and we spent the next few minutes laughing about all the little details Braden had written. He went into the minutiae of each date. How many drinks we had, what appetizers we ordered, how often I laughed at his jokes. It was as thorough as a script for a movie.
“Huh,” Jack said when we reached the end of the notes.
“What?”
He shook his head and hunched back over his beer. “Nothing.”
“It doesn’t seem like nothing,” I said.
Robbie snatched Jack’s half-finished beer off the bar counter and held it away. “Tell us, or I’m cutting you off. I don’t care if you are the best customer we have.”
Jack laughed along, and gave me a wry look. “It’s just that—in my broad experience—a guy doesn’t go to that much trouble for something he doesn’t care about.”
“You think the detailed backstory means he does have feelings for me?”
“All I’m saying is he’s put more thought into your fake relationship than a lot of guys put into real relationships. Almost like it’s something he’s been fantasizing about.”
“I doubt he’s fantasized about me…” I began, but he had a point. These date descriptions were unlike anything else I’d ever seen. If they had come from any random guy, they would have been creepy.
Since they were from the guy I was crushing on…
“When do you meet his parents?” Robbie asked.
“They’re on vacation, so in a week or two when they get back.”
“Good.” He handed back my phone with the document on it. “Because you’re going to need time to rehearse that.”
“And we’ll give you a pop-quiz every time you come in!” Jack said cheerfully. Then he reached toward Robbie. “Hey, am I going to get my beer back, or what?”
