Page 3 of The Spare

He makes an awkwardly apologetic face that makes me want to slap him. ‘Well, not anymore, but I appreciate that the timing is unbelievably shite.’

‘You can’t do this to me,’ I tell him. ‘You absolutely can’t. I won’t allow it. How the fuck would you think you could pull a stunt like this and get away with it?’

I’m assuming this is nothing less clichéd than last-minute cold feet, and I shan’t stand for it.

He opens his mouth to speak. Nope. Not a chance. I have pussyfooted around this guy my entire life, terrified that I’d put him off. Let my family down. Tempt him to call it off. And all for… what? He’s attempting to call the whole thing off of his own accord, and it ends now.

‘You’ve had three decades to pull the plug on this, you entitled, presumptuous shit, and you think today is the right time to do it, huh?’ I straighten up and plant my hands on my hips. I am so fucking furious.

‘Like I said,’ he says mildly, ‘the timing is horrific.’ He twists to put his coffee cup on the mantelpiece, and I realise in an awful flash that this isn’t a negotiation. His decision is a hard line, and he’s planning on hiding behind it as if it were a full-on military line of defence. ‘But don’t you think that’s part of the problem?’ he continues. ‘They’ve had us in this arrangement for so long that we’ve grown up thinking it’s normal. And let me tell you, it’s not normal. We don’t love each other, and⁠—’

So now he plays the love card, after almost three decades of both of us being entirely clear as to exactly what this arrangement is and is not.

‘Who the hell said anything about love?’ I blurt out. ‘This is business.’ Get a fucking grip, Xavier. ‘And you don’t walk out on a business deal that’s been almost thirty years in the making because you’ve got cold feet at the last minute.’

‘I told you,’ he says with that noble, patiently patronising tone that makes me want to grab the poker and ram it between his legs, ‘it’s not cold feet. I fell in love, and suddenly the prospect of sacrificing my entire life’s happiness because our parents hatched some kind of nutjob deal when we were infants seemed a lot less attractive. No offence,’ he adds.

No offence. Of course. He’s rocked up so he can ruin my entire life—but, you know, no offence meant.

‘Who the fuck is this woman who’s made the scales fall from your eyes, then?’ I say in a taunting tone, because I really can’t get on board with this. ‘Do I know her?’

‘No. Not really.’

I absolutely pounce on that last morsel. ‘Oh. So I know her a bit?’ I’m racking my brain as I speak, sifting through my mental Rolodex of society darlings, and in particular those brazen enough to make a play for my fiancé at the eleventh hour. It’s a long list, but no one is as qualified as I am for this role.

No one.

‘You met her very briefly at Harry’s party.’ He pauses, looking as though he would sink through the floor if he could. ‘It’s Flora’s… friend, Ivy.’

Ivy. Ivy. I don’t know an Ivy.

I cast my mind back to the party. Hang on—not the girl Xav left with? The trashy-looking little stunner who had her boobs on a platter?

Her? He’s considering throwing all this away for her?

My laugh sounds almost violent. ‘You have got to be fucking kidding me.’

‘I’m not kidding,’ he says stiffly.

‘That little…’ tramp. I swallow the word down, though God knows I want to spit it at him. ‘The one who was having some sort of crisis?’

‘Yes.’

I can’t hold back this time, can’t keep my pain and my shock and this terrifying feeling of powerlessness inside. To be thrown over at this late date is brutal, but to be thrown over for someone as wholly unsuited to Xavier as she is—that’s an unthinkable humiliation. What the hell will everyone say? The panic twists around my throat, strangling my words when I speak so they sound even uglier.

‘Wow. What a pathetic fucking cliché you are.’ I lick my lips. My mouth is so dry, my pulse pounding in my ears so loudly it’s making my entire head vibrate. ‘Well, she looks like a walking blow job, so I suppose it’s no great mystery, but Jesus, Xavier. You’re willing to walk away from everything for some little gold digger?’

He straightens up, and I catch a glimpse of the man he can be, the man who, like me, has been bred for his illustrious future.

‘I’m willing to walk away for her.’ He states it plainly, and it’s a punch to the gut. ‘She’s not a gold digger, not in the slightest. And, with respect, you have no idea what she and her family have been through. None.’ He pauses. ‘Anyway, if she was after my money, she’d be sorely disappointed, because Pa just cut me off. Full stop. No title. No inheritance. I’m no longer the eligible guy your parents earmarked for you.’

The stupid, stupid man. How can guys be so easily led by their dicks? He’s throwing it all away—all of it? For her? ‘I can’t believe you,’ I say. ‘I thought we were in this together—maybe not in love, but as a team. I thought we had the same values. This is your birthright! How can you just walk away from it?’

‘I think,’ he says slowly, ‘we’ve both inherited our values from our parents, and we haven’t had much opportunity to really examine them. Not truly. I know I’ve certainly been pretty passive around it all, and that’s not okay. I don’t want a loveless marriage, and I don’t want it for you, either. Look at you. You’re beautiful and accomplished and an incredible businesswoman. You deserve a guy who’s absolutely obsessed with you.’

Read the room, Xavier. I don’t want your good wishes and largesse. I’m not one of your subjects.

I scoff. ‘How incredibly noble. And such convenient timing, setting me free.’