Page 4 of Thick as Thieves
She snorts at him. “Don’t be ridiculous. The only reason he wasn’t with me last year is because he wanted to get to know you better. He’s already done that,” she pokes at him.
I start to laugh. “Jesus, I hope never to experience anything like that again. He was like Genghis Khan, smashing through everyone.”
“Well don’t piss him off then,” says Evie. “You know what he’s like. He’ll be with us. He won’t want to miss the twins' first Christmas,” she says with total conviction as she passes Sorley to Marcus to wind.
I look over at the thirty-seven-year-old rock star and grin. “Rock and Roll brother.” And laugh at his face.
“I’m a pro,” he says, and gently swings little Sorley round, grinning, looking so pleased with life.
Himself (one of the names my dad is known as) comes in with itchy hands to hold the babies, or the newest members of his Clan, as he calls them. He shoos us out so he can have quality time with his ‘grandbairns.’
“So where are you really off to?” I ask Marcus, when we’re out of earshot of the Fairy House.
“I really have got to tie up some legal stuff, and my mother, but I want to go see a doctor,” he states, his face a mask of seriousness.
“What the fuck for? Are you ill?”
“No, the old snip-snip.”
I start to laugh. “Really now?” He’s lost his mind. It’s still rolling about in the bottom of a bottle of whiskey.
“Yes, now. I can’t do it again Xander, I just can’t. I feel like we got lucky this time, and I just can’t go through it again.”
His face is a picture of panic. He’s clearly not showing Evie what he really feels. But his worries are not unfounded, his fear based on tragic experiences. I know the four inexplicable miscarriages he went through with his first wife are playing heavy on his mind. Four little funerals over the past eighteen years drove him to the point of madness. He nearly didn’t make it here to see these two beautiful boys being born, such was his turmoil. He spent the majority of Evie’s pregnancy numbing out life by whatever means necessary so he didn’t have to relive every haunting moment. I’m convinced he lost his mind, and all reason, for a while, his despair driving him to make incredibly stupid decisions. Those decisions nearly cost him his family.
But his wife is an amazing woman. Her capacity to love him transcended his behaviour. Her innate understanding of her husband, his fear, his despair, engendered her to love him regardless. Forgive him fully, and move forwards. He is one lucky man to have that in his life.
“You never did anything other than hang onto Evie. I was at the business end and Eamonn did everything else.” I keep things light, try and drag him into at least acting rational. But mostly he isn’t.
He starts to laugh. “I know I was useless, but she wouldn’t let me go, still won’t. Do you think she’s okay? She’s clinging onto us both for dear life.” I can see the same concerns in his face as are on my mind.
“She says it’s her hormones, they’ll settle. I’ll watch her, you go get sorted if you need to. Are you telling her what you’re doing?” I know the answer before he states it.
He scowls at me. “No chance. She might say no. But once it’s done, that’s it. I can’t go through it again, Xan. You saw the state of me.”
I nod at him. It is true he was a total mess, a wreck of a man.
“I don’t want to go, to leave. It’s the weirdest feeling. I can’t stop touching them.” He looks at me, a dazed expression of love on his handsome face.
I smile. “I know, they’re like magnets, everyone’s at it. It’s Kitten. She has that tractor beam on full blast. Everyone within a ten mile radius is being dragged in. Even Bug won’t want to go home.”
“Are you alright, Xander? You know I don’t want you to go, but if you need to, I’d understand.”
I look at him, his emotions not normally on show are clear for me to see today.
I nod. “I’ll stay as long as I can,” I tell him as we move back towards the house.
I’m drinkingwhisky in Himself’s study when Dad walks in after his fix of holding the babies for the day.
He sits in the highly worn, incredibly comfortable leather office chair behind his desk. Light streams in through the large windows. Pouring whisky into a glass, he keeps his eyes on me as I lounge on his settee.
“How long have I got before you bolt?”
I pull a face at him, smirking, faking humour.
“I see your face everyday, son. Just give me a bit of warning if you can. Will you go to Devon with them?” He tips the glass towards the Fairy House. “It sounds like Marcus is intending to do a tour of Britain to get home.” He shakes his head. “Here to Edinburgh, drop off in Yorkshire, London, then Devon. Why doesn't he just wait another week? Then he can fly them all straight to Devon. Or at least London then Devon.”
He rolls his eyes. His highly logical brain never has understood the chaos that is Marcus Henry James Kellen Russell. Earl of Stockton.
