They Swapped Brides At The Wedding, I Swapped Grooms Chapter 09

They Swapped Brides At The Wedding, I Swapped Grooms Chapter 09

A month later, Bryce and I came back.

That month, I felt like I’d found myself again. Every day was genuinely happy.

But the moment we reached our front door, we saw an unwelcome guest.

A month apart, and Rowan had lost weight. He looked thinner, frailer.

He gazed at me with longing.

“Lillian, I know everything now.”

He tried to step forward and pull me into a hug, but Bryce blocked him.

Bryce stood on guard, glaring at Rowan.

“She’s my wife. If you want to hug someone, go hug Lorinda. Running into you the first day back is totally a

downer.”

Rowan was even more furious at the sight of him.

“What gives you the right to talk to me like that? I trusted you as my best friend, but you turned her against

me and stole her away!”

I let out a cold laugh and squeezed Bryce’s hand reassuringly, though my words were aimed at Rowan.

“Still as shameless as ever. You never see your own faults.”

Rowan’s eyes stayed locked on our clasped hands. His voice cracked as he tried to explain.

“Lillian, I know now that Lorinda lied to me. About the job… I was too stupid, too quick to believe her. I swear

from now on I’ll believe you. I’ll never let anyone hurt you again.”

“But the hurt always came from you.”

I didn’t bother pretending I hadn’t seen his crumbling expression. I laid it all out without mercy.

“Is that all Lorinda told you?”

The confusion on his face told me she’d left out the rest.

“The job. The ring. The wedding shoes. And the brideswap tradition. You had a hand in every single thing that

hurt me. You were the one who made those choices.”

Rowan’s hands flew up, desperate to defend himself, but the words caught in his throat.

“Let me explain it for you.”

Even recalling it now made my chest ache for the person I used to be.

Bryce pulled me close, his hand warm and steady over mine.

I took a deep breath.

“You were going to say it was tradition, that you had no choice, weren’t you?”

He nodded eagerly.

“Yes. That wasn’t what I wanted. If I’d known the price would be losing you, I never would’ve done it.”

I looked at him with disgust and took a step back, pulling Bryce with me.

“Wrong. You pushed me away every single time. If you’d bothered to check even one detail back then, you

would’ve believed me.”

Rowan froze, like he was about to shatter.

“What do you mean?”

I casually played with Bryce’s fingers.

“When we exchanged rings at the engagement, didn’t you notice how hard it was to get it on my finger?”

“I thought you were just nervous. That you hadn’t slept all night and your fingers were swollen.”

I shook my head at his ridiculous excuse.

“The ring size you ordered was for Lorinda’s finger.”

He shot back without hesitation.

“Impossible. I would never get that wrong.”

But he was smart enough. He’d figure it out soon enough.

I didn’t linger on that point.

“And the wedding shoes. You knew I can’t wear a size 5, yet you still agreed to swap Lorinda’s size5 shoes

with mine. But did you know? Lorinda wears a size 7 too.”

I didn’t need to say anything more.

Rowan was speechless for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice was hoarse and strained.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay.”

For a split second, hope flickered in his eyes.

Then it vanished.

I continued, “I gave you so many chances. You never took one. The bride swap was just the last straw. By then I was already done with you. And I gave everything back.”

My tone shifted.

“I used to resent you. I hated you. But now? You’re not even worth hating anymore.”

I turned to the man who’d always stood by me.

“I’ve found the right person now.”

Then I looked back at Rowan, my eyes cold and contemptuous.

“So stay out of our lives. You’re nothing but a mistake I already left behind.”

I walked inside, pulled out that illfitting engagement ring, and tossed it onto the ground in front of Rowan.

“I don’t want this thing anymore either.”

Chapter 10

Bryce led me inside and shut the door behind us.

Outside, Rowan stared at the ring on the ground for a long time before he finally bent down and picked it up.

Our initials were engraved on the inside.

But I was already gone.

He drifted back to the house we used to share, hollow and lost.

The moment he opened the door, he saw the pot of bluebells by the entrance had withered.

I’d grown them myself.

I remembered holding that pot and telling him once,

“Rowan, the bluebells are what I’ve always wanted to say to you.”

“No matter what happens, I’ll always love you.”

But now the flowers were dead, and the house was empty.

The kitchen, the closet, the vanity, every trace of me was gone.

I’d taken everything that belonged to me. I hadn’t left him a single thing to hold onto.

Rowan finally understood. I really didn’t want him anymore.

He collapsed to the floor and sat there, unmoving, for what felt like forever.

After a long while, he scrambled like a madman for the fertilizer, knelt beside the dead bluebells, and stubbornly watered and fed them.

“Lillian, if the flowers come back, will you come back too?”

But dead was dead.

The more he rushed, the faster the stems broke.

Then Lorinda’s message popped up on his phone.

And it hit him that if she hadn’t meddled time and again, things never would’ve gotten this far.

He had her investigated immediately.

The results came back fast.

The ring size had been switched. The shoes had been tampered with.

Every single thing I’d said was true.