The Wrong Twin at the Wedding novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Wrong Groom
At my own wedding the man who says 'I do' is not my groom, I let him, and in the car I tell him a lie about a baby.
The groom at my wedding read his vows off a note on his phone.
I knew he was not my groom by the third row of chairs.
My real groom has never stood still for two minutes in his life.
The man under the white arch was standing with his back perfectly straight.
Two hundred guests watched me walk the aisle.
Half of them held up their phones.
In the front row, the groom's mother was crying into a napkin.
His father, still recovering from his stroke, sat in a wheelchair beside her and smiled with half his mouth.
"Doesn't he look serious today," his mother whispered as I passed.
"He's nervous," I whispered back.
He was not nervous. He was Anders.
Anders Carrow, my groom's identical twin, had been first in our grade at school.
He had never looked at me for longer than a hello.
I took my place on his left, because I always stand beside the one I want.
In my clutch, my phone buzzed twice against my hip.
The officiant cleared his throat. "Do you take this woman?"
Anders glanced at his phone and read his answer off the screen.
"I do," he said. "Babe."
A few guests laughed.
His mother whispered, "Oh, he's so sweet."
From where I stood, I could see the note. It was titled Instructions.
Line one said: Smile.
Line two said: Say babe.
Line three said: Do NOT say indeed.
I gave him a B minus for the smile. It was tight at the corners.
The officiant got to the part where he said the groom's name.
He looked at Anders, who had met the officiant at a dozen family dinners, and said "the groom" instead.
"And the ring," the officiant said.
Anders slid the ring onto my finger with a perfectly steady hand.
"With this ring," he said, and stopped, and checked his phone again. "Babe."
The second babe got a bigger laugh than the first.
Then came the register, a leather book on a small table beside the arch.
The bride signs first, so I did, with my pink pen.
I do not like going first.
The officiant offered Anders a black fountain pen.
Anders looked at it, then took his own pen from his jacket and signed with that.
He wrote slowly, once, and capped the pen before anyone could read the page.
Everyone clapped, and Helen Carrow, the twins' mother, cried harder.
I smiled for the cameras, because that was the plan.
At the reception I slipped behind the cake table and took out my phone.
The messages came from a number I did not know.
I'm back. Pack your things and leave now, you imposter.
The second one said: This wedding was only something Tobin staged to bring me home. If you have any self-respect, you'll get lost on your own.
I did not need a name. Bree Bohan had been Tobin's girlfriend until she left two years ago, and she typed the way she talked, in orders.
I stood beside a three-tier cake with T and N in blue icing and felt delighted.
Seven years ago I moved into the Carrow guest house as Tobin's fiancée, so I could eat breakfast in the same building as his twin brother.
In all that time Tobin had not gotten one kiss from me, and he had never noticed.
Now Tobin had sent a stand-in to his own wedding, and the stand-in was Anders.
I typed back: Thank you for the notice. I'll be gone tonight.
Then I put the phone away and went to find the groom.
"Take me home," I said, and held his arm in both hands.
"I have a few things to deal with," he said. "You should go to the house first."
"Absolutely not."
I pulled him past the cake, past his mother and into the back seat of my car.
Then I climbed into his lap and put my arms around his neck.
He went completely still.
"Honey," I said into his ear. "We made a deal, remember? Tonight is the night."
"Leonie," he began.
"I want to give you my first time. Let's have a baby."
His whole body went rigid. "Your first time?" he said, in a voice I had never heard from him.
I nodded.
"That was the deal. I know she's back. You wouldn't break your word for her, would you?"
I let my eyes fill for good measure.
There had never been a deal. I had invented it ten minutes ago.
I slid off his lap and dialed my mother.
"Mom, the girl Tobin likes is back. I'm coming home with you tomor..."
His large hand took the phone gently out of mine. "She's joking," he said.
"Leonie, you brat!" my mother yelled from the speaker, and hung up.
I put my head on his shoulder. "Let's go to a hotel. I'm a little scared."
I was only scared that Tobin would turn up and spoil it.
Anders breathed out slowly.
"All right," he said.
Then the phone in his pocket lit up with the name TOBIN, and kept lighting up.
He looked at it for a long moment, declined the call, and turned the phone face down on his knee.
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