Chapter 2 London pov

London

"Hello."

"Hello to you too, sister." I whisper yelled. 

"Lon?" 

"Do you know where I am at the moment, Cath?"

"You should be in your own bed. Cut the drama. Why are you calling me? I'm busy."

I gritted my teeth to keep back the loud tirade that was threatening to burst out. I had told my new fiance that I needed to use the bathroom and had locked myself in here to make this very illicit call to his real fiancee. "Congratulations. You're engaged."

"Excuse me."

"Congratu-"

"No I heard you the first time. I'm just wondering what exactly you mean by that."

"Being engaged means that-"

"London. Cut the sarcasm." It was the first time I had heard any form of emotion in my sister's voice in a while and boy, was she pissed. 

"Anything for you sister dear. I didn't think 'it's simple really, it won't take more than an hour of your night' will involve me walking into a candle lit restaurant and getting proposed to by some guy and then getting guilt tripped and brow beaten into a fucking private plane where my luggage and passport were waiting for me courtesy of some very helpful person named Jules and transported to a cozy vacation spot in fucking Florida that I'm sure costs a month of my rent per night." 

"More like three months."

"Cathleen!" 

She sighed, long and drawn out. "I had no idea about this. It's just a bit of a hitch in plans."

"A hitch is having to change your blouse at the last minute cause it's got a coffee stain. This is a catastrophe. I can't just fuck off for a week with your boyfriend. I have a job. I have a life. You have to come back. We can switch back without anyone knowing and put this whole thing behind us. You can buy me a family sized pizza with extra pepperoni for my efforts." 

"I'm in Tokyo and I can't just leave on a whim-"

"This isn't a whim."

"Look, I think it's best if you continue playing me."

My eyes went saucer wide and my mouth gaped wordlessly. "What.the.fuck!"

"Cath? Are you alright?" My new fiance called out. I bit out a silent curse. 

"Yeah. The water was scalding. I'll be right out." I replied. I waited a minute to make sure he was gone before I put the phone back to my ear. "Are you crazy?"

"His name is Sinclair. Sinclair Donovan-Wells. We've been together for fifteen months."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because if you're going to spend the week with him. You need to know the man's name."

"Uhm. No. I don't. Because I'm not staying. You can show up and switch back or I'll go out there and tell him."

"Ten thousand dollars."

"Fuck you Cath."

"Fifteen."

I closed my eyes. Fury boiling through me. "It's not about the money. I can't do this. It's wrong. I have-"

"A life. A job." She cut in. "You've mentioned. A job as a bartender at a dive bar. A job walking dogs. What else? Oh yeah, your attempts at being a writer. Did I miss any? You're not going to make fifteen thousand dollars even in a whole month and I'm practically throwing it away just for you to lie on a beach and drink Pina coladas. Take it as a job and leave morals out of it."

"You're such a bitch." I sniffed.

She sighed. "Look, everything is my fault, okay? I lied about taking a leave and snuck off to do more work. I've let my friends and Sinclair down way too much, but this deal is important to me. It's really personal to me. I need you to fix this for me. Please." 

"But-"

"It's not for the whole week. Today's Friday, I'll be there by Wednesday. You can pretend to be on your period or whatever. But even if you have sex with him -"

I spluttered. "No."

"Even if you do, it means nothing. Sinclair is an attractive man and-"

"I'm not having sex with your boyfriend. That's all shades of wrong." I snapped.

"Don't be a baby. I'm just saying that if it does happen, don't beat yourself up about it. You have my express permission. Look, I know we haven't had the best sibling relationship but I have always known that I could count on you. For anything. I've got to go now but I'll have Jules text you everything you need to know. Goodluck." She hung up. 

Goodluck? I didn't need luck. I needed a time machine to take me back to this morning. I would never have picked Cath's call in the first place and then maybe I wouldn't be in this awkward as hell situation. 

Fuck my life. 

My face in the mirror was pale and my expression was one of pure horror. I pinched my cheeks to get some blood in them and tried to look excited to be on a surprise vacation with my gorgeous man. 

Sinclair was sitting at the edge of the bed, shirtless. My mouth dried up at the sight. Cathleen would burn in hell for describing this man as simply 'attractive'. Attractive didn't even begin to cut the god-like physical appearance of him. He rose to his feet as soon as I walked in and I lost my ability to breathe. His chest had a smattering of hair on it and a happy trail all the way down to his navy blue and white checkered pajamas pants that sat indecently low on his hips.

I locked my jaw tight to keep back the drool that was threatening to slide out of my mouth. His shoulders were broad. Muscular shoulders and arms and a torso that had visible abdominal muscles. He was a man that definitely spent a lot of time working on his body. My eyes were constantly being pulled to his obliques and I had to physically tear my eyes away everytime. 

I was soooo fucked.

"Hey." 

"Hey." I replied shyly. I didn't know how to act around him. No matter what Cathleen said, I knew the jig was going to be up any moment from now. 

"Are you okay? I've been waiting for you to complain about the color of the curtain or something." He grinned. 

I decided to wing it. "I'm still kind of taking in the whole day. And I guess I'm not as fully recovered as I thought I was. I felt a bit dizzy earlier."

His expression immediately twisted into one of concern. "Do you need to lie down? I'll turn off all the lights and we can just stay in bed."

My phone buzzed. I winced. "Okay, so a little confession. I've maybe been doing some work remotely. Nothing big. Nothing strenuous I promise. I just want to be at the top of things a bit, I need to know that everything I've worked my ass off for isn't currently burning to ashes or I won't be able to relax."

His smile was fond. "I wouldn't trust you if you suddenly turned into someone who wasn't such a workaholic." He stepped forward and brushed his lips against my forehead. "Do your thing. I'll come find you in an hour. And then you have to turn off your phone for the rest of the week. Promise me Cathleen."

"I promise." 

"Good girl." 

My belly swooped, a shiver went down my spine and my vagina sat up and took notice. I waited till he had thrown on a shirt and gone off to explore before I had my two minutes freak out about two simple words getting me more turned on than I had been during my last one night stand. I was in trouble and there really seemed to be no end in sight for how disastrous this was turning out to be. 

My ringtone tore me out of my reverie. I glanced at it to see an unfamiliar number.

"Hello."

"I've been texting you for forever. Why do you have a phone if you won't reply your texts?"a girl's voice snapped at me.

"Uhm. Who is this?"

"I'm Jules. I'm Cathleen's personal assistant and can I just say that I'm not in support of whatever the fuck parents trap esque fuckery is going on here."

"Tell that to Cath." I rolled my eyes. If someone had asked me to envision what my twin sister's assistant will be like, I'd go for a carbon copy of her. Staid, perfect and proper. This cursing person that sounded all of fifteen years old couldn't be in my sister's employ. "You're Cath's assistant?"

"Don't ask. Just listen. I found out scant minutes ago that my boss is in fact in Tokyo and I packed a suitcase and bought sexy underwear for her twin sister. The last thing I want to do is explain Kitty and I's very problematic relationship."

Kitty? Had she just called my sister Kitty? The world was definitely coming to an end. 

"First of all, you have to have your phone on at all times."

"Impossible. I just promised Sinclair I'd turn off my phone for the rest of this vacation."

"Oh God." She groaned. "Can you fake an accident and pretend you just lost all your memory then?"

"I'm a shit actress. Cath's the one who got all the parts in plays."

"You can't see me but I'm ripping out my hair at the moment. Okay. How long do we have?"

"About fifty minutes now." I shrugged.

"Well, let's make this count. Sinclair is the CEO of the Wells company. He's a wall street shark. He's a billionaire or maybe a trillionaire. Who can keep up with these things amiright? His birthday is on the fifteenth of July. You met at a horse race sixteen months ago. Mutual friends...uhm, let me see. Taylor Arnolds; she has an art gallery. Nathaniel Hawthorne. Lucas Armerick. Look, it won't matter. Both of you never talk about people."

"What do we talk about?" 

"Work." She groaned. "This isn't going to work. Fuck. Just act like you hate everything and everybody is beneath you." 

"Very helpful." I chuckled. "I'm way more freaked out than I was before this call."

"You're freaked out? I've known Kitty for three years and I'm just now finding out she has a twin sister. My mind is blown."

I blinked. "Sh-she never mentioned me?"

"Not once." 

If I had had any previous doubts about my place in Cathleen's life, I was now sure. I was less than a dirty little secret. I was just- nothing. No wonder she wasn't scared of her boyfriend being suspicious. Why would he think anything was different? To him, he was with his girlfriend/fiancee who was one person with one face. He had no idea that there was an imposter with the same face. To everyone else, I just didn't exist.