Page 72 of The Spare

I flash her a smile, too, though I suspect it looks as phony as it is. ‘Whatever you can do to make them feel welcome would be much appreciated by the family.’

By the family. Ooh. It has a Mob-like feel, and it’s fucking excellent.

Don’t forget who you all made me get into bed with, sister dearest.

She cocks a perfectly laminated brow at me, like don’t give me that crap. ‘But they’re two years beneath me.’

‘I don’t care. You have sway at that place, and you know it.’ I draw myself up to full height in my chair. ‘Everyone at this table knows the lengths I’ve gone to in order to unite these two families, and you’d better believe you’ll be benefiting for the rest of your life. I’m a de Vere now, and I expect your loyalty to extend to us. Those girls will be de Veres soon enough, and everyone had better start treating them as such.’

My message is clear.

Call off your rabid little dogs, and do it now.

CHAPTER 33

Selena

For five wonderful months, the harebrained stunt Benedict and I cooked up alongside Xav and Ivy has held up in the face of global scrutiny. The first sign that something is amiss comes from an unlikely source: an email from an intern called Laura in Wentworth’s PR team. I don’t know Laura, but the headline of her email grabs my attention: Reddit article about your wedding - Maggie asked me to share this. Maggie is the head of the team. If that isn’t enough, she’s flagged it as important with a red exclamation mark.

The only times I’ve ever braved the cesspits of Reddit have been when I’m rabbit-holing on something (usually characters in whatever TV show I’m bingeing) and a search engine has served its threads up. I’ve never gone looking for anything on it. Still, I click on the link that Laura has shared with the churning mixture of curiosity and dread that was so familiar in the aftermath of the Great Groom Swap and which has faded over the past couple of months.

I click on the link.

The headline reads, THAT de Vere wedding: timeline doesn't add up. Here's what I found.

Fuck. Instantly, my pulse kicks up.

As for the thread itself, it was posted four days ago in the r/UKCelebGossip subreddit. I begin to read, my horror mounting with every word.

TL;DR: I think the de Vere groom switch was a cover-up and I have receipts.

I took these pics when I was on holiday in Venice back in December. I’m a bit of a simp for the de Vere brothers (IYKYK) and I was sure this was Xavier. I followed these guys around for a while (awkward but they were too loved-up to care).

What follows are five dim, grainy photos of Xav and Ivy in Piazza San Marco, both in big puffer coats. He has his arm around her in three of them, and in two, they’re kissing passionately, right there in the middle of the square.

I’ve been sitting on these photos for months but my boyfriend said I should post them here or take them to the press. I was confused because I was so excited for his wedding to Selena on New Year’s Eve, but then I couldn’t believe it when they announced that she would be marrying Benedict instead, and I was even more confused when he announced that he’d begged his brother to stand down, because as far as I could see, Xavier did not need much persuading.

As a reminder, here is the official quote from the press release:

‘I have been in love with Selena Wentworth for as long as I can remember. For years, I have attempted, wholly unsuccessfully, to get my feelings under control. However, as her wedding to my brother Xavier grew more imminent, I accepted that I would have to act urgently or forever live in abject misery.

‘Last week, I threw myself on Xavier’s mercy and begged him to walk away, freeing up the woman I love to marry me. Not only did he acquiesce, but he relinquished his right to the Dukedom of Oxford. We both agreed, after all, that Selena was born and bred to be a duchess.’

I don’t know what to do with these. It feels weird, no? Like they didn’t tell us the whole story. So what are we supposed to believe? That Benedict really was in love with her all along, or Xavier was already with someone else? I’m so confused

EDIT 1:

I took these photos myself on the 13th December. They are legit

EDIT 2:

Thank you to @notannhsworker for the identification of the woman in the pics with Xavier. If you missed her comment below, she said: ‘This woman is called Ivy Cooper. I work at the care home where her mum was living. Her mum died in Feb but Xavier was there with her a LOT last autumn.’ I don’t exactly know what this means but I do know that he was close with this woman before he was supposed to marry Selena.

I stare at the article in horror. In four days, it’s already had over ten thousand upvotes. Right here is an exposé of the entire web of lies underpinning the stunt I thought we had all pulled off at New Year’s. It’s like a time bomb, buried for now in the shallow ground of some Reddit sub-thread, quietly ticking along until it explodes.

I should close my browser and step away from my desk. I should do that right now. But I don’t, of course. Instead, I dig into the comments, my fingers literally splayed over my left eye.

burneraccountlol - 4 days ago: this is everything. ill bring popcorn lol