CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

Present

I wake to the sensation of a weight being lifted from my chest and being replaced by a pair of warm thighs straddling me.

I open my eyes to see my wife looking down at me. “I was just dreaming about you.” I tell her with a smile.

“Yeah? Was it a hot dream?” she asks before leaning in and kissing me, her breath tasting of mint, coffee, and Ashley.

Sexiest breath ever.

“You was in it baby, of course it was hot.” She reaches behind her and slides her hands inside my boxers, giving my morning wood a tug.

“Hmmm. Well, if you would’ve come to bed last night, I could’ve dealt with this for you,” she says while giving me a delicious little stroke.

“You were out cold and I need to get this book read and make a decision.” That ends her attention to my dick.

“How’s it looking?” She turns back to face me and asks.

I slide my hand up her T-shirt and give her tits a squeeze.

“Not as good as these.” I tell her honestly. We’d had a massive argument about these after she had George and Cam’s twins.

Cam had paid for her to have a tummy tuck, which I wasn’t entirely happy about, but as she’d done something so life changing for them, I kept my mouth shut and went along with it. But then once that was done, she started going on about a boob job and there was no fucking way that was happening.

“Your tits fit my hands so fucking perfectly.”

“Don’t change the subject. What’s going on with the book.” She slides her hands up my T-shirt now and rakes her nails over my nipples.

“Ouch.” I whine.

“Book, Rock Star. Talk to me.”

“Ow.” I almost screech as she does it again.

“All right, all right. Yeah, it’s ... I don’t know. Some of it’s too personal and needs to be taken out, but I wanted it all in there to start with so I was clear in my head what should or shouldn’t stay.”

She looks at me with a frown.

“If you know what I mean?”

“Not really,” she replies honestly.

“Nah, me neither.” I admit. “I’ll just read it till I’m done, take out what I think should be taken out, and then let you have a look.”

“Why don’t you read it, then let me and I’ll tell you what I think needs to come out. Wouldn’t that be a more objective way of doing it?”

“Maybe.”

“When will you be done?”

“By tonight if I spend today on it.”

“You not rehearsing?”

“Nah. Tomorrow and the rest of the week, but today I’m free.”

“Wanna start it with a bang, Rock Star?”

My dick gets harder when she calls me this, and as ever, my heart and insides do strange things. “That sounds like a plan.”

“I need to go have a quick wash first. I didn’t shower last night.”

“No ya don’t. Apart from the fact that you’re wearing too many clothes, you’re perfect as you are.” I tell her, whilst trying to lift her T-shirt over her head.

“I don’t feel fresh,” she complains.

“You feel fucking fine to me, baby.” I tell her while sucking on a mouthful of tit. “How many times do I have to tell ya, I like your fanny smelling like a fanny, not like gooseberry and dandelion, or whatever other shit you shower with.”

“Patchouli and saffron,” she says on a groan as I rub my thumb over her clit.

“Whatever. None of it smells as good as Ash fanny eu natural. If only we could bottle that, I’d be wearing it on my fingers, tongue, and around my neck all fucking day.”

I slide her down my body, lift her by her hips and slip inside her.

“Fucking perfect,” I tell her.

“Make me come, Rock Star.”

“It’ll be my pleasure, baby. My absolute fucking pleasure.”

Being the dutiful husband that I am, I make my wife come more than once, and then we shower together and I make her come again.

We enjoy a lazy Sunday, reading the papers, answering emails, and I spend a bit of time on a conference call with my sister and brother, discussing the upcoming Triple M charity concert.

G has liaised with Josh from Dig It Promotions, who would be running the event for us. All of the staff were now hired. Cam gave us as many of his staff as we needed, free of charge, but we always needed more.

Len had confirmed with the management of every act performing or hosting, as well as all the television companies that would be televising the event. We didn’t have a single slot left to fill. In fact, we were using some A-listers just to present as we just couldn’t fit them into the show.

The event had gone from strength to strength and now raised money the entire year, but the concert was still our biggest fundraiser.

The donations that came in went to the charities that were closest to our hearts. Myself, Len, Jimmie, Cam, George, and Ash, all picked charities linked to things that had impacted on our lives, and which we thought Maca would be proud to be associated with.

Georgia and Cam were passionate about helping low income families obtain fertility treatment, helping young drug users rehabilitate, and bereavement counselling aimed specifically at sole survivors of accidents or trauma.

Len and Jim had started their own charity that built recording studios in inner city and rural areas, which were available, free of charge to anyone that wanted to come in and lay down tracks. CC music, mine and Lens label, had now signed five acts that had made demo’s using these facilities, and it was something that I too had become equally passionate about. We were lucky when we were starting out, my dad believed and invested in us, helping to get our first demo out there.

Ash and I were patrons of a lot of the charities the foundation supported, but the closest to our heart was one that ran respite care, provided emergency accommodation, counselling and anything else that was needed for the children of substance abusers.

I had eventually found out from Ash, the reason she had no contact with her parents, and her story was truly horrifying, and sadly, not uncommon.

It was the night that we’d brought Joe home from the hospital. She stood watching over him as he slept in his Moses basket in our front room. I was enjoying the sight when I realised Ashley’s shoulders were shaking.

“Ash? Baby?” She turned to look at me, tears streaming down her face.

“What if I’m no good at this? What if I turn out to be just like my parents?”

“No baby, no. You’ll be great—fucking amazing. We’ll learn together. We’ve got this, baby, we’ve got this.”

I wrapped my arms around her and held her tight. When her tears slowed down, I moved us over to the sofa and sat with her in my lap.

She’d still never told me much about her home life. I knew she would when she was ready so I’d left it alone. That night she was ready and I couldn’t believe what she told me.

“My parents weren’t nice people, Marley. My dad’s a junkie, my mum an alcoholic, who’s been on the game my entire life to support both of their addictions. They had my brother serving up for them from the time he was eleven to help bring in more money to feed their own habits. He was jacking up heroin by the time he turned thirteen. He did it to try and forget what he was, what they’d turned him into.” She cried hard and pushed the heels of her hands into her eyes and my heart just broke for her.

“A dealer?” I asked.

She shook her head and cried even harder. “No.” She almost choked as she struggled to get the words out. “They had him working the streets with my mum. He was eleven years old the first time they sold his arse.”

“Oh fuck, Ash, fuck, baby. You never said. Why’d you never tell me?”

Her whole body was shaking from her sobs, and as much as I wanted to hold her, I needed to hold my son. I sat her on the sofa, fetched Joe from where he was sleeping and placed him in Ashley’s arms, then I wrapped them both in mine.

“He was a great brother, Marls. I know what everyone thinks because of his habit, and the fact that he’s always in and out of prison, but he did what he could for me. They would’ve had me go the same way as him, but he put a stop to it. He was already sixteen when I turned thirteen, and they tried to get me on the streets. Ryan went mad and threatened to call the police and social services. He was making good money from dealing and was able to go rent a one bedroom flat from a mate. I went and lived with him, the problem was he was always going missing, going on benders, and getting himself locked up. Just before I left school, we’d had to go back and stay with them, my parents, for a week as we’d been kicked out of his flat and had nowhere to go. I came home from school to find a strange bloke in my bedroom. He was someone they owed money to, and they’d sold him my virginity to settle the debt.

I was just so unbelievably lucky that Ryan heard me scream as I tried to fight the bloke off. He had to fight both my mum and my dad to get into my bedroom, but he did it. Then he stabbed the bloke in the shoulder, who at that stage had me pinned underneath him on the floor as he tried to rip my school uniform off.”

I felt like I was gonna pass out as she told me her story. I stroked the soft dark hair on my little boys head and kissed Ashley’s temple, breathing her in, both actions calming me down.

“We got out that night and slept in someone’s shed that we broke into. I had to go to school the next day to do an exam. I was still in the clothes I’d worn the day before. I looked a fucking mess. Jimmie found me crying in the toilets.” That memory brings a smile to her face. “She lent me some make-up and I felt a bit better. I went and stayed with her for a few days and then Ry managed to get somewhere else for us, so I went with him.”

She brings Joe up to her chest and we both breathe him in. “He tried, Marls, he really tried, but they’d ruined him.” She cried again as she looked up at me. “The drink and the drugs were the only way he could cope with his demons. He just kept getting banged up and he was always nicking money off of me, so in the end I moved out. That place you found me was all I could afford.”

“Fucking hell. I’m so sorry baby. So sorry.”

Joe made a little noise and we both studied him for a while. It was all we seemed to do since he’d been born, just looked at him in wonder.

“Ash, I swear to you that we’ll give this little boy everything that you never had. We’ll give him so much love, we’ll all be falling over it. He will never spend a day of his life not feeling loved, safe, and protected.”

“Will you help me be a good mum?”

“No, baby, I won’t need to. I already know that you’re gonna be the best mum there ever was.”

“Can we call him Joseph Ryan?” She asked quietly ... hopefully.

“Yes, we can.” 

“Thank you.”

“I love you baby.”

“I love you too Rock Star.”

We both looked down at Joe, who was then wide eyed and staring up at us.

“We love you baby rock star.” We both tell him.

Did I mention that Marley and Ash love Joe?

She was one of the lucky ones. She’d got out and stayed first with Jim, then her brother.

We’d tried our best to help Ryan over the years. We’d payed for rehab and even had him living with us, but he still managed to get himself into trouble, despite us paying for the best lawyers to get him out of it.

Ryan died in prison on his thirty-second birthday. He committed suicide in the most horrific of ways, which I won’t go into.

“I’ll set up a rehearsal timetable for everyone else, but Cam’s people have said you can have access any time this week.” Len states, interrupting my thoughts.

“Yeah, I’ve spoken to Reed. He has shit to do tomorrow, but we’ll be there every day from Tuesday.” I tell him. “We just need all of the staff sworn to secrecy. I really don’t want this getting out. The event is already a sell-out, so we can’t increase sales and I think it’ll be a show stopper if we can just get up on stage unannounced and play songs from both bands.”

“It’s gonna be epic,” Georgia states.

“Epic? Fucking epic? You’ve been hanging with Paige and Harley too much, Porge. That’s their word of the moment.” Len said.

I can’t help but laugh as he takes the piss out of her.

“Fuck off, Len, there’s nothing wrong with epic,” she tells him.

“There is when you’re forty-six, dude.”

“I’m a dudette, and still eighteen in my head.”

“Ah, God no. Not eighteen-year-old George. I wouldn’t wish her on anyone. Even Paige and Harley are better behaved than she ever was.”

“I wasn’t that bad. Big brother Marley, back me up here.” She demands.

“Drop me out of this one, Porge. Let’s just say dad’s right on this one and you got the daughter you deserved with Lula.”

“I was never as bad as Lu. I blame Ash. I swear her genes filtered through the placenta and corrupted my perfect child’s DNA.”

“Then how come Kiks is such a good girl?” Len asks.

“Coz she’s only got mine and Cams genes. Ashley’s crazy DNA was all absorbed by Lu, making her extra naughty.”

“I can hear you.” Ash sticks her head into my office door and shouts.

“Hey, Fag.” Jimmie calls out from Lens end. “I’m with you on this one, boys,” she adds.

“Tallulah is all George. You seem to have a very selective memory of what a diva you were.” Jimmie tells her.

“What d’ya mean was? She’s still a fucking diva.” I add.

“Shut up, Butt. I thought I could at least rely on you for backup. T, my brothers are picking on me.” She calls out to Cam in her best whiny voice.

“Don’t call me Butt.” I tell her through gritted teeth.

George and Jimmie thought they were hilarious one drunken Christmas when they called Ash, Fag ... Fag Ash, geddit? Yeah, I didn’t laugh either, and because of my lack of humour, they christened me Butt ... Fag Butt. The three of them ended up on the floor laughing at their own very unfunny joke.

We were now entered into everyone’s contacts list as Fag & Butt.

The following Christmas, Jimmie had gone to a local retirement home and asked the old dears to knit us a couple of jumpers with our names on. Then offered to donate one thousand pounds to a charity of our choice if we wore them all day. Len and Cam also adding a thousand if we went through with it, leaving us with little option but to agree.

Hilarious ... Not.

The amount of times we’d been in the company of Americans and had to explain that Fag Ash and Fag Butt had nothing to do with neither very burnt, or the backsides of homosexuals.

“Children, children, back to the matter in hand. I’ll email you a rehearsal schedule as soon as it’s done, that way you’ll at least know when to expect others to be turning up. The riggers and electricians will be in and out all week, so they may need the power switched on and off at various times too. Anything else?” We all remain silent.

“This year’s event is bigger and better than any other. We’ll be able to add at least ten more charities to our books next year. Goes without saying that whoever we choose, we’ll bear in mind where Maca would’ve liked the money channelled.”

Ashley comes and curls into my lap as Len talks.

“He’d be so proud of what you’ve achieved with this, so fucking proud.” Ash states, loud enough for the others to hear on their ends of the phone.

I hear Len clear his throat, but George remains silent.

“Porge?”

“Don’t, Marls, don’t.”

“All right. Well, that’s it for now then, boys and girls. I’ll be at the offices all day tomorrow. I’ll see ya there if you’re about.” He hangs up. I hear George sniff and then she’s gone so I disconnect from my end.

“Wanna watch a film or SamCro with me?” Ashley asks.

I slide my hand under her vest and love that she’s braless. So much so, that I have to give her nipple a little suck.

“What, so you can sit and get all wet and excited over Jax?” I ask.

“Well, come on. Even you get a hard-on over Jax.”

I throw my head back and laugh as if she’s being ridiculous.

“Seriously, you know full well that its Bobby my heart belongs to.”

“Whatever. You watching or not? I have the whole of season six to get through. I’m sick of avoiding spoilers everywhere.”

“Put it on, but d’ya mind if I read?” I question. I feel guilty that I’ve done nothing but read these last few days.

“Go for it,” dhe tells me before kissing my mouth, sliding off my lap and heading out the door.