Page 3 of Thick as Thieves
She looks at my face for my reaction and I smile gently at the name knowing she’s looking for reassurance.
“It’s a lovely name. Have you got one for him?” I touch the other boy's hair, just as silky as his brother’s.
“Sorley. I know it means summer traveller, but I like it.”
She bends her head and kisses the boys, snuggling against me and rubbing her face on my arm that’s touching Sorley’s head. It’s a mix of static electricity and a cooling balm. Tingles run up and down my body, and I don’t mind even a little bit that she’s finding comfort in my presence.
“Thanks for staying, Xan.” She looks into my face, her emotions, her love for me and the babies fully on show, and my breath gets stuck in my chest.
“Where else would I be?” I respond, diverting my gaze from hers as I continue to stroke the little boy's head. I can’t look directly at her. I’ll crumble, cave in. Collapse all this on top of us all.
“I know why you like to go back to California at this time of year. For the sun. It’s cold here, although these two are like a pair of heaters.” She laughs, trying to break the tension in the air. Tension I am clearly creating.
“Hey.” Marcus comes in, seeming not to notice the tension swirling in the room. He’s fully focused on Evie and his babies, going round to the other side to kiss his wife and touch his sons.
He’s unrestrictedly transformed into a man in love with his family. Gone is the shallow rockstar, the broken man who was so crippled by the fear that his babies would not survive beyond pregnancy, he needed to numb out life at the bottom of a bottle. The man who tormented both himself and his wife by being photographed with a barrage of women outside nightclubs, even if he never actually did anything with any of them. He’d convinced himself he was so cursed, if he returned home to his wife, something would happen to her and their unborn children. Fear and torment gripping him, he acted out in a despicable way, beating himself up in the process, guilt fuelling every action.
You’d think I’d be amazed by the transformation, but here now, with her, and them, I’m not. I get it.
“I’ve gotten word to Tim. He’s talking about putting out a statement about the children. What do you think?” he asks us both.
Our lives are lived in a goldfish bowl. Marcus and I, being part of the highly successful band Velvet Smoke for the past twenty years, are used to it. Now Evie has been dragged out of obscurity and into the circus. It doesn’t help their cause that their oldest sons James and Bucky are also turning into superstar musicians. They couldn’t escape the spotlight, or the additional glow it creates. It’s simply added to the scrutiny.
Evie looks at me then Marcus. “Do what you think is best, Kellen,” she says, calling him by the name she prefers. One going back to our childhood together.
I remember the first time she called him that. It was spat at him with venomous gusto. A slur. I smirk as I remember them all at it, the Greystones. It soon changed to a term of endearment, a way to separate herself from the hordes that hung off Marcus even then. A connection forged from a different time.
I hardly hear her calling my name until she is practically shouting it.
“Xan?”
“Sooner the better,” I respond, thinking about the hordes who might be turning up to sneak a peek at the rockstar’s newborn children. “Then if you stay up here, it’s hard for people to get around without being noticed. We can see them coming.”
“Are you staying, Xan?” Kellen asks me. “I thought you said you needed to go back to California for label business.”
He’s giving me an out, telling me if I want to go, I can. After thirty seven years of friendship, and being in a band together, we’ve lived through every life adventure. From the ridiculous to the sublime. We can practically read each other's thoughts. He wants me to stay, but understands if I want to escape the baby mania in favour of more adult pursuits.
“Will you come back for James’s birthday? He’ll be with us before he goes to South America, and it’s the winter solstice. Isn’t there a party here for that?” Evie’s cataloguing events for me here, and looking like she’s going to cry. “I’m sorry.” She swipes at her eyes. “These hormones… When Eamonn goes home tomorrow I’ll be like a tsunami. I feel in a lovely bubble now, but it will all come to an end.”
Kell moves towards her, we both do, her emotions pulling us forwards to comfort her.
Both boys have rolled off her breasts, milk-drunk and fast asleep, and Marcus moves her dressing gown to cover her up. “Well look, I’ve got to go to London for a few days soon, and Yorkshire. Mother is not coping well. Apparently the period drama is up for renewal contracts.”
He grins at his joke. It’s his view of his mother’s life. The Lady Rowena Russell. Dowager Countess of Stockton. Living it up at Eastwood, Marcus’s family estate in Yorkshire.
He picks up Lochi, winding the sleeping baby and putting him in the basket at the side of the bed. “And she wants to see the boys.”
“Really?” Evie scoffs, watching him move around the bedroom. “She gave an interview about how they weren’t your children. So I'm not sure why she’s desperate to see them.”
Her voice is incredulous. I smirk at her. The animosity between the two of them is brewing. My money’s on Kitten.
He sighs, frustration coming off him in waves. “I know, and I’ve spoken to her about it, but she is still their grandmother so…”
“I’ll stay here, take care of everyone while you’re in London. Is she coming up here before Christmas, do you know? I think you need to make a decision on where you’re going to live, too. Here, London, Yorkshire, Devon, France, LA? Choices, choices,” I say to them both with a laugh. “We are certainly well-off for homes.”
“I prefer Devon. I need to see Marshall,” Evie states with conviction. “James can see everyone there.”
Marcus looks at me and raises his eyebrows. “He might get a better offer of a party. Don’t get your hopes up he'll be with us for Christmas.”
