Wedding Game: He Picked My Best Friend I Walked Down the Aisle with His Enemy novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Doorway

Tucker and Mallory beg and lie in the hall while Heath stands beside Addie. Tucker whispers that she should ask Heath about the summer she was twenty.

Heath looked at me.

"Your door," he said. "Your choice."

I stood up, put the tea down, and walked to the door myself.

Tucker's fist was raised for another knock when I opened it.

He had loosened his tie, and his hair was pushed back from his forehead.

Behind him stood Mallory, mascara down her cheeks, and Dex, who was looking at the elevator.

Two of the groomsmen hung back by the stairwell.

Nobody was filming now.

"Addie." Tucker smiled, soft and relieved. "Thank God. You scared me half to death."

"I scared you."

"I fished this out of the ice." He held up the ring between two fingers. "Put it back on, baby, and we'll go home. We can laugh about it tomorrow."

"What would we be laughing about?"

"The game. It was a joke." He spread one hand. "You were so wound up about the wedding, I wanted you to loosen up. Mallory was in on it. Right, Mal?"

"I was," Mallory said, and sniffed. "I thought you'd see it and laugh. I swear, Addie, I thought you'd laugh."

I looked at her.

She had changed her shoes since the party. She had her overnight bag over her shoulder, still zipped.

"You brought a bag," I said.

"What?"

"To the party. You came with a bag."

"For the morning," Mallory said. "I told you I was too tired to drive home. Addie, it's me."

"You had it on your shoulder before anybody drew a card."

"Because I always say that." Her voice cracked. "You know I always say that."

I did know it.

That was the problem. I knew everything about her, and I couldn't tell which parts of it were true.

"You said you fixed it," I said to Tucker.

"I did fix it. It was a prank, and I made it look like you were getting Dex so you'd..."

"So I'd what?"

He stopped.

"You looked at her like she was yours," I said. "In front of forty people. You held up her hand."

"Addie, stop it."

"Eight years ago you told me one man ended things with me over text. You told me he was poison, and I should never speak his name." I kept my eyes on Tucker's face. "He's standing behind me, and you're banging on his door at three in the morning."

Tucker's smile slid off.

Heath had come up silently, and he stopped a step behind my shoulder, close enough that I felt the warmth of him without a touch.

"Corbin," Tucker said. His voice dropped into something flat and ugly. "Of course. Of course it's you."

"Good evening, Tucker," Heath said.

"You're in my fiancée's ear. You always were."

"Ex-fiancée," I said.

"She's tired. She's upset." Tucker spoke over my head, to Heath. "Don't think I can't see what this is."

"What is it?"

"You can't stand that I won. You couldn't stand it then, either."

"She asked me a question," Heath said evenly. "I said yes."

"What question?"

"Whether I'm free Saturday week." Heath looked at me, then back at him. "I am."

For a second nobody breathed.

Dex made a small noise.

Then Tucker laughed.

It was loud, and it went on a beat too long.

"The wedding's off, is that it? You're going to marry her in my place? Do you hear yourself?"

"The wedding is not off," I said. "The groom is."

Mallory said, "Addie, please," and put a hand on my arm.

I stepped back from it.

"Go home, Mallory. Take him with you. You both have a lot to talk about."

"Addie." She was crying properly now. "Nineteen years. You can't just..."

"You can't just," I said. "I'm done."

I started to close the door.

Tucker put his palm flat against it.

He leaned in. For a moment I thought he was going to plead.

Instead he lowered his voice, so quiet that nobody behind me could hear, and smiled.

"Ask him what he did the summer you were twenty," he whispered. "He's never going to tell you."

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