My Work Rival Dragged Me to Her Family’s 4th of July BBQ… Then Introduced Me as Her Boyfriend…

Her grandmother looked me up and down like I was a used truck with suspicious mileage.

“This is him?” the old woman asked.

Clare hooked her hand through my arm. Smooth. Casual. Like we’d practiced.

“This is him,” she said brightly. “My boyfriend, Ethan.”

I coughed hard enough to make a toddler near the sprinkler stop eating watermelon.

For the record, I was not Clare Bennett’s boyfriend.

I was barely her friend.

I was her rival.