Lane shrieked. I cringed. How in the hell had Hillary found out? I’d barely had time to come to grips with it. And Lane hadn’t actually agreed to it yet.

“It was soooo romantic, Laney!” Hillary ran over to us. “I cried when he asked. Honestly, sobbing, ugly crying!”

Wait. She’d cried. When he’d asked. “Eric asked you to marry him?”

She stopped her happy dance to look at me in silence for half a second. “No, Carson. I’m talking about Prince Harry. Yep, it’s true. He dumped Meghan, and now we’re engaged.”

I had no idea who the hell she was talking about, but Hillary’s dramatic sigh conveyed the message.

“Uh…right,” I said intelligently. “Guess my brain shut off for a second. Because…I’m so excited for you.”

They both seemed to accept my excuse, so maybe my luck was turning. If I could just grab the cup and what was under it without either of them seeing anything, I’d consider it a good day. Not the colossal failure it would be if Lane found out how unromantic I was. A ring shoved under a coffee cup wouldn’t make her ugly cry, unless it was from disappointment.

Hillary half-sat on the arm of Lane’s chair. "I was just sitting there, regular boring day at work, when in walks this line of delivery guys with more flowers than you've ever seen. Seriously, Eric must have bought out the entire flower shop.”

“Were you freaking out?” Lane asked.

“A little, but I think I was in shock.” Hillary looked so happy I almost forgot how much she disliked me. “So these delivery guys are setting the flowers down on my desk and leaving without saying a word, and everyone in the office is crowding around me, watching me open each card. The other women were so jealous—I could totally tell."

"Are you kidding? Of course they were!” Lane said quickly. “So what did the cards say?”

"They didn’t say anything, at least not in words. They were pictures. Eric put together a bunch of the pictures he'd taken of me over the years we've been together. How sweet is that?"

"Soooo sweet."

Yeah, that was so sweet. Damn him. Eric was a good photographer, too. He could probably even make Hillary's scowl look good. Or maybe it was only me she scowled at.

"Then, the last one was a picture of him holding a sign that said: Will you marry me?" Squeal. "Isn't that incredible?"

"So incredible." Lane was bobbing her head.

Yep, so incredible. And I was so stupid. A ring under a cup was literally the opposite of incredible.

I’ve never moved as fast in my life. I lunged forward, my arms outstretched, my eyes on the prize.

Snag! And hallelujah! The ring was back in my hands and the only evidence left behind was a brown ring of coffee on the table. I shoved the proof of my stupidity into my pocket and slipped out of my chair just in time for Hillary to slip into it and shove her hand in Lane’s face.

“Oh my God, Laney! Look!” Then lots more girlie squealing, so much that Lane had to join in. "Look at it! Isn’t it beautiful?”

“Oh my God, Carson?”

No, please no. Don’t bring me into this. “Yeah, babe?” Oh, fuck. Hadn’t I just said my luck was turning? Yep, it just did a 360, or maybe two 360s. Crap.

“Check out Hillary’s engagement ring!”

Hillary held out her hand toward me to show off a ring with a diamond so small I had to squint to see it. But the girls were freaking out as if it were the most beautiful thing ever. Was that all it took to make them happy? I’m not a snob, but it looked like something a kid would get after turning in their tickets at an arcade or slipping a quarter into a slot and turning the knob. I’d been in enough jewelry stores in the last month to know that guys in New York didn’t bother with stones that small.

“Nice rock, Hillary.” I was pretty sure that was an adequate response. I am a man, after all.

“Nice rock?” she said.

Lane looked at me disappointedly.

Okay, maybe it wasn’t adequate. But I wasn’t going to lie and say it was the most beautiful ring I’d ever seen, especially not while I had a way better one in my pocket at exactly that moment. So I went with the all-occasion, girls-eat-that-shit-up response of, “Almost as pretty as you are.”

The cheesy comment seemed to appease both of them, since they went back to their intense discussion about how Eric had proposed. Small rock or not, it sounded a lot better than slipping the ring under a coffee cup. Damn it.

“Hey, Carson,” Eric—the motherfucking traitor—said from a few feet behind me. His arms were resting casually at his sides, but he wasn’t even trying to hide the shit-eating grin on his face. What the fuck was he so happy about? He’d just ruined my entire day. Maybe my entire life.

Granted, Eric and Hillary had been together for a couple of years so it wasn’t a total surprise. But when you’re surrounded by engagement rings, wedding preparations, and prenuptial joy, and you’re the only guy who hasn’t slipped a ring on his lady’s finger, you automatically earn the title of World’s Shittiest Boyfriend.

“Seriously, man. You trying to make me look like an asshole?” Hell yeah, that was whiney. So what? I was stressed out as fuck.

“Yeah,” Eric grumbled. “I asked Hillary to spend the rest of her life with me just because I wanted to make you look bad. Working great so far, right?”

“Sorry.” I blew out a breath and stuck out the hand that wasn’t holding Lane’s lukewarm coffee. “Congrats. You guys were meant to be, so…um…yeah, congrats.” I didn’t know what else to say. Was there some kind of official man protocol in situations like this? If I ever figured it out, I’d give classes—no man should have to go through this unprepared.

Lane was saying something unintelligible to the male ear, so I only got bits. And glares. How could two small women throw that many glares? Pointy ones too, like Samurai stars.

“I need a drink.” I said it without thought, but it was a great idea. “Champagne!” I looked at Lane and Hillary for confirmation. “This kind of news deserves to be celebrated with something stronger than coffee, doesn’t it?”

Hillary squinted and looked up to the left. Nope, definitely ceiling there, no answer.

But I got her hesitation. She was probably thinking about their finances and how expensive weddings were. “Our treat.”

“Then hell yes!” Hillary squealed. No judgment behind using the word to describe almost everything she says—she’s just easily excited. Whenever I see her, at least. And I don’t think it has anything to do with her and my unfortunate past. That no one was ever going to mention again.

“It’s a little early for Champagne, isn’t it?” Eric asked.

“True.” It was probably the first time Hillary’s smile had fallen all day. “And I was so excited, I didn’t even eat lunch.”

“I guess we should get some dinner to go along with the Champagne.” Then I added, “Also our treat.”

“Double yes!” Hillary jumped out of the chair, went to Eric, and whispered something into his ear.

At the same time, Lane mouthed, “Our treat?” to me.

I shrugged. “Think of it like our engagement gift to you.”

Hillary’s carefree, “Our first engagement gift!” completely covered Eric’s shy, “Thanks, Carson.”

Lane’s gaze didn’t move—it intensified. She knew me too damn well. But she didn’t call me on it in front of her friends. Our friends, I guess.

One of the most bizarre parts of being in a relationship was everything and everyone had become ours. Friends, apartments, family. Although why anyone would want to claim partial ownership of my family, I’d never understand. For the most part, I didn’t mind it. Occasionally I liked it. Especially when referring to our bed, our bathtub, or our favorite position.

Lane just didn’t like to think of my money as ours. She didn’t want to feel like a gold digger or something equally stupid. What I tried to explain to her, and what she never understood, was that I was the one getting the gold. I didn’t care about money. I cared about the feisty little pot of gold I went to sleep with every night and woke up next to every morning.

I shrugged and went to go dump Lane’s cup in the trash, wondering what I would’ve done if she’d picked it up like I’d expected her to.

Would she have squealed when she saw the ring I’d spent weeks searching for? Just to make sure it deserved to be worn by my amazing woman.

Would she have said yes?