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He Bet on My Wedding, So I Changed the Groom
Novelix
Completed
One week before my wedding, my fiancé Ryan changed the venue behind my back. Worse, he made a bet with someone about how long it would take me to notice. I found out only when my friend Vivian called. “Amelia, don’t tell me you still think the wedding’s in Ireland.” I froze. “Isn’t it?” “Ryan, I won!” she cheered on the other end. “I knew Amelia still hadn’t figured it out. Don’t forget what you promised me.” Ryan gave a low laugh and took the phone from her. “Babe, you did it again. You just cost me another bet.” “The wedding’s in Iceland now. We changed it a while ago. Change your flight. You don’t want to miss your own wedding, do you?” In that instant, my blood seemed to turn to ice. A sharp ringing filled my ears. I could barely hear what else he said. All I knew was that the two of them were laughing on the other end, and somehow, I was the joke. After the call ended, I didn’t change my flight. Instead, I opened a message thread I hadn’t touched in a long time and typed: “One week from now. Markree Castle Chapel in Ireland. Are you coming?” It took a while before the reply came. “As a guest? I might be busy.” “No. I need a groom.” A second later: “I’m in.” I stared at those two words for a long time. They loved making bets, didn’t they? Fine. This time, I would make one of my own. How long would it take them to realize I had replaced the groom?
Chapters (3)
第1章
One week before my wedding, my fiancé Ryan changed the venue behind my back.
Worse, he made a bet with someone about how long it would take me to notice.
I found out only when my friend Vivian called.
“Amelia, don’t tell me you still think the wedding’s in Ireland.”
I froze. “Isn’t it?”
“Ryan, I won!” she cheered on the other end. “I knew Amelia still hadn’t figured it out. Don’t forget what you promised me.”
Ryan gave a low laugh and took the phone from her.
“Babe, you did it again. You just cost me another bet.”
“The wedding’s in Iceland now. We changed it a while ago. Change your flight. You don’t want to miss your own wedding, do you?”
In that instant, my blood seemed to turn to ice. A sharp ringing filled my ears.
I could barely hear what else he said. All I knew was that the two of them were laughing on the other end, and somehow, I was the joke.
After the call ended, I didn’t change my flight.
Instead, I opened a message thread I hadn’t touched in a long time and typed:
“One week from now. Markree Castle Chapel in Ireland. Are you coming?”
It took a while before the reply came.
“As a guest? I might be busy.”
“No. I need a groom.”
A second later:
“I’m in.”
I stared at those two words for a long time.
They loved making bets, didn’t they?
Fine.
This time, I would make one of my own.
How long would it take them to realize I had replaced the groom?
...
This wasn’t the first time they had turned something of mine into a game.
When I closed the message thread, my wedding planner sent me a photo.
It was the welcome portrait they planned to display at the venue.
Vivian wore an elaborate vintage wedding gown, her fingers intertwined with Ryan’s as they smiled into each other’s eyes.
Meanwhile, I was in a plain sweater and slacks, crouched beside her to straighten the train. I looked less like the bride and more like an assistant.
My phone rang almost immediately.
Emily, the wedding planner, sounded deeply apologetic.
“Miss Hayes, I’m so sorry. Mr. Prescott specifically told us not to tell you about the venue change.”
“He had us notify the guests and rebook their flights and hotels. Yours was the only itinerary he told us to leave untouched because he said it was part of a bet.”
“And just now, he asked us to replace your original welcome portrait with this one. He and Ms. Sinclair wanted to see how long it would take you to notice.”
“I really think you should speak to Mr. Prescott as soon as possible.”
Every word felt like another slap across my face.
I stared at the picture of Ryan and Vivian holding hands.
“Don’t change it,” I said quietly. “Use that one.”
“And from now on, just do whatever Ryan wants with the wedding.”
“But—”
“It’s fine.”
If they wanted to be the stars of that wedding, they could have it.
I was stepping out of the picture.
Emily hesitated for several seconds before finally falling silent.
After hanging up, I pulled the original Ireland wedding plan from my bookshelf.
I had spent months putting it together.
From the castle chapel to the white roses and lilies of the valley on every table, all the way down to the pieces the string quartet would play, every detail was covered in my handwritten notes.
A month ago, the last time I’d gone over the plan with Ryan, he had pinched my cheek and laughed.
“What? Afraid I’m going to make another bet with Vivian about the wedding?”
“Relax. A wedding is serious. I’d never actually let you get hurt over it.”
I believed him then.
My project at work was also nearing completion, so I stopped checking every little detail.
I never imagined every humiliation I would suffer would come from him.
I picked up a pen and slowly crossed Ryan Prescott’s name off the cover of the wedding plan.
Then I wrote another name in its place.
Liam O’Connor.
I had barely finished when the apartment door opened.
“What are you doing?”
Ryan came up behind me, wrapped his arms around my waist, and rested his chin against my shoulder like he always did.
I lifted the wedding plan and slipped out of his embrace.
“The groom’s name was wrong, so I fixed it.”
“They got the groom’s name wrong?”
He blinked and reached for the folder, but his phone buzzed on the coffee table.
His hand changed direction without hesitation.
He picked up the phone instead.
It was a voice message from Vivian.
“A bet’s a bet. Don’t even think about backing out.”
Ryan chuckled and sent back, “I know.”
When he looked at me again, there was a small red jewelry box in his hand.
“For you.”
Inside was the Cartier bracelet that had been sitting on my wish list for almost a year.
Every time I passed the boutique, I looked at it a little too long, but I could never bring myself to spend that much on myself.
So he had noticed after all.
“Thank you.”
The words had barely left my mouth when he took my left hand and slid my engagement ring off my finger.
The sudden emptiness around my ring finger made me go still.
“Glad you like it. I’m borrowing the ring for a few days.”
When I didn’t react, he bent and kissed the back of my hand.
“Vivian won the venue bet. The ring is what she asked for as her prize.”
“Relax. She’s only going to wear it for a few days. I’ll make sure you have it back before the wedding.”
The living-room light fell across his face.
For a moment, I saw him as he had been four years ago, the night he proposed.
He had pointed to the words engraved inside the ring and grinned like a boy who had just been handed the entire world.
“Love of my life.”
“Amelia, this isn’t just a ring. It means you’re the one and only love of my life.”
So even the love he once called his one and only could be loaned out this easily.
I gave a quiet laugh.
“No need to give it back.”
Not the ring.
Not the man either.
第2章
Ryan frowned and studied me in silence, as if he had finally realized something in my voice was different.
He was about to speak when I heard the keypad at the front door.
“Amelia, I brought your favorite matcha cake.”
Vivian walked in barefoot like she owned the place.
She winked at me, then nudged Ryan lightly with her foot.
“Give me your slippers.”
Ryan sighed, crouched down, slipped off his own house shoes for her, and neatly set her shoes aside.
“There are guest slippers in the closet. Why do you always insist on wearing mine?”
He sounded annoyed, but his movements were so practiced it was obvious he had done this countless times.
I watched without saying a word.
Ryan was mildly obsessive about cleanliness.
Even I had never been allowed to wear his shoes.
Vivian, however, had always been the exception.
I had complained about it once.
He told me they had grown up together and that habits like these meant nothing.
But that wasn’t true.
When Ryan and I first started dating, Vivian had been happier for me than anyone.
She even warned Ryan to keep proper boundaries with every woman who could possibly cause misunderstandings—including her.
When the three of us ate together, if Ryan casually passed her a dessert, she would laugh and push it away.
Then the Sinclair family’s investment firm collapsed.
Vivian lost the privileged life she had always known, and Ryan arranged a job for her as an events manager at the Prescott Foundation.
Somewhere along the way, the boundaries between them blurred.
So much that sometimes they looked more like the couple than Ryan and I did.
“Amelia.”
Vivian’s voice pulled me from my thoughts.
She had slipped my engagement ring onto her finger and was holding it up to the light.
“You don’t mind me wearing this, do you?”
I looked at her and caught the smug little glint she failed to hide.
I smiled.
“It’s just a ring. Why would I mind?”
“We’re best friends, right? If you want my fiancé too, take him.”
The smile vanished from Vivian’s face.
A second later, her eyes turned red.
Ryan immediately stepped in front of her, his expression hardening.
“Amelia, that was out of line. Apologize.”
I had said nothing but the truth, and somehow I was the one who owed an apology.
They had made games out of my boundaries over and over again, yet not once had either of them said they were sorry.
I ignored him, walked straight into the bedroom, pulled out a suitcase, and started packing.
Ryan followed, his frown deepening.
“What is this supposed to mean?”
I didn’t turn around.
“It means you can have the Iceland wedding.”
“We’re done.”
His breathing stopped for a beat.
Before he could say anything, Vivian hurried into the room.
“Amelia, you can’t threaten to break up with Ryan every time you’re upset. That’s not how adults handle things.”
“I’ll give the ring back, okay?”
“No need.”
She started to take it off, but Ryan caught her hand.
The brief flash of panic in his eyes disappeared almost immediately, replaced by that same confidence I knew too well.
“We’ve been together for ten years.”
“You’re really going to throw away ten years over a joke?”
“Don’t do this, Amelia.”
“And what about your mother? She’s been looking forward to this wedding for so long. What are you planning to tell her?”
His words landed exactly where he knew I was weakest.
My mother had raised me alone.
Her health had never been good. Her greatest wish wasn’t to see me marry into money. She only wanted to know I had found someone who would truly cherish me.
Ryan knew that.
Once, standing beside her hospital bed, he had promised her solemnly:
“Mrs. Hayes, I’ll give Amelia the wedding she actually wants.”
“And I’ll spend the rest of my life taking care of her.”
That moment still felt like yesterday.
But the man who made those promises had already broken every one of them.
When I stayed silent, Ryan seemed to think he had won.
He stepped closer and stroked my hair like I was a child throwing a tantrum.
“You know the venue now. There’s still time to change your flight.”
“We’ve got the joint bachelor-bachelorette party tonight. You hate crowds anyway, so Vivian and I are heading over.”
“Stay here and cool off.”
With that, he left the apartment with her.
The door slammed shut.
The cake Vivian had brought tipped off the entryway console, smashing onto the floor in a mess of cream and crumbs.
It looked exactly like the relationship the three of us had destroyed beyond repair.
I closed my eyes for a moment, took hold of my suitcase, and left the apartment I had called home for six years.
第3章
I had just gotten into a cab when a new message appeared on my phone.
Vivian had sent me a video.
A group of people were crowded around a table in a dim private bar, playing a card-passing game.
Each person had to hold the playing card against their lips with suction and pass it to the next person without using their hands.
By the time it reached Vivian, the card was damp and barely clinging to her mouth.
She leaned slowly toward Ryan.
The card slipped.
He could have pulled away.
He didn’t.
Their lips brushed.
The room erupted in whistles and suggestive cheers.
“Vivian wins again,” someone laughed. “Look at the way Ryan’s looking at her. You’d think those two were the ones getting married.”
The speaker was one of Ryan’s closest college friends.
Just last week, he had raised a glass at dinner and wished me a lifetime of happiness as the bride.
“They do look good together,” Ryan’s cousin chimed in.
“Honestly, when we were kids, I always thought Vivian would end up marrying him.”
Six months ago, when her own fiancé cheated on her, I had helped her gather evidence, find a lawyer, and sat beside her through an entire night while she fell apart.
Back then, she had hugged me and said I was the only woman she ever wanted to see Ryan marry.
“Ryan, are you seriously going through with this?” another man asked from the couch, his voice loose with alcohol.
“Amelia’s smart, sure, but she’s not from your world. She doesn’t have family connections, she doesn’t have money behind her, and she hates half the social events you people live for.”
The room gradually fell quiet.
Everyone looked at Ryan.
And from the other side of the screen, so did I.
He lazily swirled the whiskey in his glass and was silent for several seconds before saying,
“Marriage is marriage. At this point, does it really matter who I marry?”
The video ended there.
But his voice kept playing in my head.
Ryan and I had met at a national college programming competition.
I beat him in the finals and took first place.
After that, he pursued me relentlessly.
At first, I couldn’t believe the heir to the Prescott family would be interested in a girl who survived on scholarships and worked after class to pay her bills.
Then one night, a group of drunk men harassed me off campus.
Ryan stepped in and was shoved down a flight of stairs. He broke two ribs protecting me.
Sitting outside the ER, I had looked at him and asked,
“Was that really worth it?”
“It’s just dating. Wouldn’t it be the same with someone else?”
He had been pale with pain, but he still smiled.
“No.”
“I only want you. I only want a life with you.”
“No one else would be the same.”
Those words had felt heavy enough to last forever.
I carried them with me for ten years.
Ten years later, he was the one saying it didn’t matter who he married.
I calmly saved the video.
A second later, Vivian’s clumsy little test appeared.
“Oops, wrong chat. You didn’t see that, did you?”
My fingers had gone cold.
“What did you send?” I typed back.
The message box showed that she was typing for what felt like forever.
I didn’t get her reply until the cab stopped.
“Nothing.”
“Ryan’s drunk. I’m not bringing him back to the apartment tonight. No point waking you up.”
I stared at the message for a long time.
Then I replied with one word.
“Whatever.”
After that, I opened the Dublin transfer offer my company had sent six months ago.
It was a three-year assignment.
If I completed the systems overhaul for the European division, I would return home as Director of Technology.
Six months earlier, I had almost accepted.
But Ryan had wrapped his arms around me and said he didn’t want us living an ocean apart. He said he hated the idea of me carrying all the pressure of a promotion alone in another country.
He told me he would support my career.
He told me he could take care of me forever.
I had never planned to depend on him, but his reluctance to let me go had still moved me.
Originally, I had planned to visit the Dublin office while we were in Ireland for the wedding, just to see the opportunity I had given up.
Now there was no reason to leave that regret behind.
I tapped Accept Transfer.
