The Spare - Part One (The Kings & Queens of St Augustus Book 1)

by Gemma Weir

  As I push open the heavy wooden door, I exhale a sigh of relief. The moment I step into my room, I feel the instant calming effect and I close the door behind me as a layer of stress dissolves. My room is the only space in this world that is solely mine. When I was a little kid, I used to watch a TV show about twins who shared a room and would snuggle together in one queen sized bed to share secrets. Back then I’d thought how wonderful that would be. Carrigan and I have had our own rooms since we were born. Even when we were little, she never liked me being in her space and the one time I tried to climb into bed with her, she screamed so loudly she woke our nanny who quickly escorted me back to my own bed and warned me not to do it again.

  Now I’m glad that she’s not allowed in my room, almost as much as I’m glad I’m not invited into hers. These four walls are my solace, my inner sanctum where I’m Tallulah Marie Archibald all of the time, where no one mistakes me for my sister, and I never have to pretend to be anyone else.

  Dropping my backpack to the floor at the side of the door, I kick off my navy-blue patent leather pumps and pad over to the bed. The dark purple color on my walls always makes me smile, and for the first time today I don’t feel burdened.

  It’s probably childish to love my bedroom as much as I do, but last year in an act of rebellion I’d had Greg drive me to a hardware store and then push the cart as I picked out everything I needed to change my bedroom from the neutral creams and pinks that perfectly matched Carrigan’s, to the deep purples and silvers that now grace the walls.

  Mom lost her shit when she saw the shoddy paint job I did, but when she’d threatened to punish me, I’d asked what she could possibly do to me that was worse than forcing me to lose my identity and sacrifice my education to make sure Carrigan passed all of her classes. I think it’s the first time I’d ever seen her speechless.

  Almost a year later, I still love the color and the moment of freedom it represents.

  Stripping out of my school uniform, I drop the clothes into my hamper and pull out a baggy shirt and a pair of cotton boxers from my dresser. Pulling my hair up into a knot on top of my head, I grab a wipe and remove all of my makeup, until my skin is bare and finally able to breathe.

  Unlike Carrigan, I hate wearing makeup. I hate fiddling with my hair and looking perfect just because that’s what’s expected of me. You’d think that considering most people don’t even know I exist it wouldn’t matter what I look like, but since we started this whole charade, neither my parents or Carrigan will let me leave the house looking anything less than catwalk ready. Because if I’m mistaken for my sister, God forbid there be a blemish or a hair out of place.

  A soft knock on the door pulls me from the maudlin thoughts that seem to fill my head all of the time recently. Climbing off my bed, I cross to the door, turning the handle and open it to see Mrs. Humphries carrying a tray laden with a steaming bowl of soup.

  “Thank you,” I say, reaching out to take the tray from her hands.

  “You’re welcome, Miss Tallulah,” she replies softly, and I hate that I can see the sympathy in her eyes. Both she and Greg know something is wrong with our family, but they don’t know the whole truth, no one does. No one can ever know. She opens her mouth to speak, but closes it again, then nods once and turns to leave.

  Closing the door, I climb into bed juggling the tray and trying not to let the soup spill as I settle back against my pillows. Reaching for my remote, I turn on my TV then press play, lifting a spoon full of hot rich tomato soup to my lips as the familiar credits of Dirty Dancing start to play.

  Right here, right now, in my space all alone, I finally relax and eat my dinner, allowing myself to just be me, just Tallulah, and no one else.

  “No,” I cry, my eyes wide and horrified.

  “I’m not asking you; I’m telling you there’s no other option,” Mom says calmly, almost dismissively.

  “No, I can’t do it. It’s bad enough that you have me pretending to be Carrigan to get her through school. I’m not pretending to be her at a party. It’s insane, no one would believe it,” I cry.

  “Well then you had better be believable, because you will be attending our dinner at the Lexington’s tonight in your sister’s place. Do you understand me?” Her cold, emotionless voice is more familiar to me now than the soft way she used to speak to me before the weight of this inheritance ruined our family.

  “Why can’t Carrigan go?”

  “Because your sister is unwell and she can’t be seen with bags under her eyes and a green tinge to her skin,” Mom snaps back at me, rolling her eyes like this is the most obvious thing in the world.

  “So why don’t you just tell the Lexington’s that she’s sick? It’s hardly a crime. People get sick all the time,” I cry, throwing my hands into the air to emphasize my words.

  Mom’s stony glare lands on me, her eyes narrowing with barely restrained anger. “Do you want this family to be ruined?” She hisses at me. “Do you want us to lose everything? Do you want to be the reason why your sister’s future is destroyed?”

  I’ve heard this speech so many times now I could probably recite it back to her. When this all started, I used to feel this huge responsibility, like Carrigan not getting her inheritance would actually be my fault if I didn’t comply. But all that guilt has faded over the years to a bitter resentment for my parents almost more than for my sister.

  I feel their betrayal even more deeply than hers, because at least Carrigan is the one who will be directly affected by the loss of the money. My parents are just greedy. Being rich isn’t enough, they want to be part of the mega wealthy and having a mega wealthy daughter who gains control of everything is the only way for them to get there.

  “Well?” Mom demands, tapping her toe impatiently against the floor, her angry twisted face close enough to mine that I can smell the wine on her breath.

  “Would it make a difference if I said I didn’t care?” I ask quietly. I know I shouldn’t bait her, it won’t end well, but this is taking things too far. It’s bad enough that they hide me away so people don’t remember Carrigan has a twin, that they force me to miss my own classes to make sure my sister passes hers, but now they want me to pretend to be her at a party. No, this is a step too far, it’s too much and she needs to realize that.

  Her palm hits my cheek and the crack of her skin against mine is so loud that it seems to echo around the room, ricocheting off the perfectly decorated walls and around the luxurious soft furnishings.

  My head flies to the side and I close my eyes, biting the inside of my cheek to stop the tears that are filling my eyes from falling. When my parents can’t force me to do what they want with guilt and coercion, they revert to physical violence to ensure my compliance.

  Inhaling slowly, I press my lips together and let my eyes open. I want to see some remorse in her gaze, something to show that she cares that she just slapped her daughter, but instead all I see is a stranger looking back at me. Someone that I don’t even recognize as my mother.

  Because she isn’t really my mother anymore and I’m not her daughter. I’m just a puppet who looks like her cash cow.

  “Go upstairs and begin to get ready. I’ll bring you an appropriate dress to wear,” she says, dismissing me. “And make sure you cover that blemish on your cheek,” she snaps, walking away without a backward glance.

  My mother, ladies and gentlemen, a grade A bitch.

  The door closes with a barely audible click and I inhale slowly, hoping to calm my rapidly beating heart. I knew this day was coming. The day when I ceased to exist as anything other than a stand in for my sister.

  What normal loving parent would do this? Allow this pressure and expectation to ruin everything good about their family, their children. Before the will, we were a normal family, or as normal as the truly wealthy ever are. My sister and I were home schooled by a series of tutors who taught us from five all the way until we turned fourteen and started high school. My parents have never been the loving, doting pa
rents I’ve seen on movies and TV, but they were distantly attentive, ensuring we had everything we needed.

  Now, I don’t even recognize my mom and dad as the same people who smiled and brought us gifts from their travels and kissed us goodnight whenever they were home. Those people are gone, ruined by the dangling carrot of money and power. Now all that’s left are their empty husks with only one focus, one agenda, and as the spare I have no value.

  Forcing myself to move, I leave the room and pad silently up the stairs to my bedroom, my bare feet not making a sound on the cold marble stairs. Apparently it’s uncouth not to wear shoes on one’s feet, even in your own home, but I don’t care, no one ever sees me anyway.

  The first thing I notice when I walk into my room is the dress hanging from my closet door. Demure and conservative, I hate everything about it, from the A-line skirt to the pale pink color that I know my mother picked to emphasize how blonde my sister’s hair is.

  She’s even left a pair of nude, patent leather Louboutin’s on the floor beneath the dress, as if I don’t know how to pair shoes to an outfit. Anger wells up inside of me and suddenly all I want to do is find a match and burn the dress to a pile of ash, then throw it in my mother’s face.

  How can she expect this of me? Carrigan is ill and it’s hardly a cardinal sin to let the Lexington’s know that she can’t attend, but no, she’d rather take the spare as a stand in.

  Arlo Lexington’s name is number one on my parents list of suitable husbands for Carrigan. His family have the right kind of money to keep the bloodlines clean and untainted by ‘new’ money. God forbid she marry someone she loves.

  I can’t do this. I can’t be Carrigan in a social situation. I’m not my fucking sister.

  Full of righteous indignation, I stomp across the landing to my sister’s room, throwing open the door without knocking. I scan the room for her, but it’s empty, her bed tightly made with crisp sheets, the lights off.

  “What the hell?” I hiss, taking another step into the room, flicking on the lights as I pass. She’s not here.

  “Why aren’t you ready?” My father’s brusque voice questions from behind me, making me jump and spin to face him.

  “Where’s Carrigan?”

  “She’s Ill,” he states, completely unemotionally.

  “If she was ill, she’d be here, but she’s not, so where is she?”

  His eyes flash with fury and without a word his hand snaps out and latches around my arm. He hauls me from my sister’s room in one fluid movement that almost knocks me off my feet and then drags me across the landing, pushing me into my own room with enough force that I fall forward, hitting the carpeted floor on my hands and knees.

  “We’re leaving in thirty minutes. We will not be late. Get ready. Now,” he snarls, his lips twisted into an angry line as he glares at me. Pulling the door closed, it slams into the jamb with so much force that I flinch from my position on the floor, my heart racing, adrenaline coursing through my veins.

  Dragging myself slowly along the floor, I stare at my closed door, unsure what the hell is happening. Carrigan is gone and apparently my parents are angry enough about it that my mother has slapped me and my father has literally dragged me to my room and thrown me in here to get ready.

  My legs are shaking as I sink down onto the edge of my bed. What the hell is going on? Glancing to my window, I wonder if I could run; if I could leave and never come back. Change my name and forget I was ever Tallulah Archibald, the twin born second. But where would I go? My parents would freeze my trust fund the moment they realized I had gone and I’m only eighteen, I haven’t even graduated high school yet.

  Sighing resignedly, I turn my head to look at Carrigan’s dress, then I push myself upright and start to get ready, because tonight at least I don’t have any other option.

  My parents don’t utter a single word to me in the car on the way to the Lexington’s house. Greg keeps flashing me concerned looks in the rear-view mirror, but wisely, he doesn’t speak either.

  The Lexington estate is only a ten-minute drive from our house, and when we pull up to the security gates, Greg winds down his window and looks into the small camera. A second later the gates slowly open and we roll forward down the gravel driveway toward the unfamiliar house. Carrigan and my parents have been to dinners and events here countless times before, but the twin that no one remembers has never been invited.

  You weren’t invited this time either, I remind myself as our car slowly winds along the road that’s bringing us closer and closer to the imposing white mansion. When we slow to a stop mere feet from the white stone steps that climb to the front door of the house, I have to remind myself to breathe. Our house is large and in some ways beautiful, but this place is stunning.

  The building sprawls to the left and right of the elaborate front door, with its marble columns that seem to soar upwards so high I have to tip my head back to see where they end.

  “Don’t gawk, it’s so common.” My mother hisses, venom lacing each word. “Remember what family you belong to and act accordingly.”

  Chastised, I force my eyes away from the house and onto my hands in my lap. For a moment I’d allowed myself a moment of excitement, but her words have reminded me that I’m only here because my sister isn’t. I’m her, not me, and I need to focus all of my little acting skills on making this as believable as possible.

  The rear door opens and Greg’s hand appears in the open space. I take it and let him help me from the car, swinging both my legs out at the same time and rising gracefully to standing. “Thank you,” I whisper. He squeezes my fingers comfortingly for a second, before loosening his grip and allowing me to step forward and toward the stairs that lead to the front door.

  Sooner than I’d like, my parents are flanking me, forcing me up the stairs and toward the house. “It’s just a quiet dinner with Mr. Lexington and Arlo tonight,” my father says quietly. “Remember who you are.”

  Somehow, I manage to swallow down the laugh that threatens to burst from me. Remember who I am. I know who I am; it’s them who have forgotten. I open my mouth to tell them exactly who I am, but before I can speak, the front door opens and a liveried woman stands in the doorway, a fixed polite smile on her face.

  “Good Evening Mr. and Mrs. Archibald, Miss Archibald, please come in,” the woman says, holding the door wide to allow us entry.

  “Thank you, Susan.” Dad says, so cordially, I almost turn to check it was him that spoke.

  “Can I take your jackets and purses?” Susan asks, the consummate professional.

  We hand off our things, then follow her as she leads us through a rabbit warren of corridors and into a room so white that I almost shield my eyes. The room is modern to the extreme and completely devoid of all character beyond that of a terrible interior designer.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Archibald and Miss Archibald,” Susan announces, then immediately turns and exits the room, closing the door behind her.

  A man that I’m assuming is Mr. Lexington rises from the uncomfortable looking white couch and crosses the room, greeting my father first. “Freddie, did you see those share prices?” He says, reaching for my father’s hand and slapping him cordially on the shoulder as they shake.

  “Don’t get me started,” Dad replies, rolling his eyes and smiling widely.

  Mr. Lexington releases my father and immediately moves to my mother, leaning down to kiss her on the cheek. “Vanessa, I swear you get more beautiful every time I see you.”

  Mom’s laugh is tinkling and light as she playfully swats at his arm, grinning widely.

  Then he moves to me, spreading his arms out widely and smiling brightly as he closes the distance between us and scoops one of my hands up, lifting it to his lips to press a soft kiss against the skin. “Carrigan, sweetheart. You look a picture of beauty. Arlo can’t wait to see you. He’s been so looking forward to this intimate dinner.”

  “Hello, Mr. Lexington, it’s lovely to see you again,” I say politely, hop
ing he won’t try to engage me in any real conversation.

  “Where is Arlo?” Mom asks, pulling the attention from me.

  “He’ll be down in a minute; he’s just getting dressed. You know what teenagers are like. It takes them forever.” Mr. Lexington says with a laugh that sounds forced.

  Mom immediately steps forward, looping her arm through his and letting him guide her over to the couch. They sit and start to talk between themselves, ignoring both me and Dad. Glancing around, I move toward one of the empty couches and sink down onto it. I know who Arlo Lexington is, but to my knowledge he and my sister are barely acquaintances, despite my parents’ obvious hope that he’ll become their new son-in-law.

  There are ten old money families listed on great-grandfather’s will who have sons he deemed suitable to run his empire. All but three either attend our high school or did attend and have now moved onto equally prestigious colleges. My great-grandfather was a stickler for tradition. Every member of the Archibald family has attended St Augustus Prep since the school opened and will continue to attend for the rest of eternity if he has his way, and given the ten thousand clauses in his will, he probably will.

  Harold Archibald the third wasn’t a stupid man. He discussed his desire to form an alliance with each of the families listed on his approved husband material list. What each family didn’t realize, was that they weren’t the only ones he’d had that conversation with.

  For the last three years, Carrigan and my parents have been living the longest running series of the bachelorette, with weekly parties and dinners with the families who are all competing for her fortune.

  Most of the time, my sister doesn’t even really need to attend. These shindigs aren’t about her connecting with the guys she will potentially marry, they’re all about the families negotiating. Everything about the will is archaic, right down to the fact that my sister has to be a virgin when she gets married, so she’s never even allowed to be alone with the guys just in case anyone gets tempted. The really sad thing is that no one cares if she likes the man she marries, or if they like her, because that’s not what’s important. This is a business decision plain and simple.