Thick as Thieves (The Greystone Family: Stolen Hearts #3)

Chapter 39

39

Xander

Mexico City

The silence is deafening. No babies crying, no laughter. No life. No Evie singing in the kitchen, with all the wrong lyrics. Laughing with Valentina to reggaeton songs, with Evie getting the Spanish wrong. I can fucking smell her. I have her pillow next to my mouth and nose. What if this fades and I can’t catch her scent anymore? Or the twins’?

I’ve not gotten out of bed for four days I think. We have a gig, and I’ve got to move. Tim has been drafted in with Jase to get us all moving.

Mornings are the worst. I always got them up, seeing their little faces sleepy in the morning. Rubbing their eyes, lighting up when Evie came into the room. How they made noises so we knew she was near.

There is no life, no light left. It drained away with every word on that note, that text. I would give anything to keep them with me, with us. But she hasn’t given us a chance to explain. And to be honest, I can’t blame her for that. We didn’t give her a chance to explain why she said no to that test last year. We were not listening.

How did it get to this? Go so wrong so fast. Clearly we hurt her deeply. We took her for granted, took what we had for granted, when we both knew it was so fucking special. We did exactly what her brothers had done. Underestimated her, disregarded her feelings. Too high and fucking mighty.

Tears are leaking out of my eyes. Kellen, who looks as bad if not worse than me, comes into the bedroom. He cannot sleep in here.

He lays down next to me. “I don’t want to sing, I don’t think I can. We need to cancel, go home. We need to try to get them back. We did it before. She’ll come round, she’s a reasonable person. I think. She forgave her brothers. Although I know she’s not speaking to Jonno as he’s the only one speaking to us.” He gulps as he then says, “I know they don’t have the same relationships with her now, but at least she still sees them.”

He’s grasping at straws. “Are you texting her? She hasn’t changed her number, just the handsets. You did before, keep doing it, Xander. She can’t forget us, we love her. We need her to know how much. It was never about trust. I can’t fucking breathe.”

His chest heaves, he looks like he’s having a panic attack. I hold onto his hand and we lay there, trying to catch a whisper of her scent. Praying for a whisper of a chance.

We sit together at the table. The press have gotten wind of the split—God knows how—and we are again surrounded. But there’s no Miguel coming to our rescue. He was there for Evie, he tells Tim, we are on our own. Even Valentina’s family are ignoring our calls. Their solidarity lies with Evie.

“I want to cancel. I can’t sing, I can’t sing that fucking song and not cry. I need a break, we need to go on a break,” Marcus begs everyone, he looks a mess. Haggard and pale. Gabe looks shocked and shocking. Levi looks traumatised by the events and the state of us both.

“She’ll come back though, won’t she?” pleads Gabe. “She has your babies, Marcus, she has to see you. You can get some custody, can't you? To see them? We’ll see them again, won’t we?” He’s looking around at us expecting us to be able to answer him. To agree and try to be positive at the glimmer of hope he thinks he’s talking about.

“Gabe, did you listen to that note, that text? Did it sound like she’s definitely coming back to us? We might have been here earlier and been able to stop her leaving if it wasn’t for you coming into that fucking room with those women.” I’m shouting at him, he needs a reality check.

He ignores my shouting at him and rambles on. “I’m worried about Texas. She’s not eating, she keeps crying, she has a teddy bear of one of the boys’ and she’s sleeping with the damn thing.” He sounds concerned.

“She needs to hand that over,” Marcus grits out, his face as hard as iron, his voice steel. “If she and those girls had not been spouting bullshit, replaying fantasies in that fucking bathroom, she might not have been delayed in there and would not have picked up that call from Jude.”

We now know how the information got to Evie in the first instance. Jude, totally unaware he was letting loose a firestorm, telling her information she didn’t know. He’s in bits. He won’t answer our calls. His sister is the most important person in his life.

“Don’t blame Gabe or Levi. Or those women.” Mick has had enough of us. “You two, for admittedly decent reasons, decided to do that test. You have to face facts, Xander, Marcus. She thinks you don’t trust her. She thinks you needed convincing and confirming that the boys were legitimately yours.”

I go to open my mouth to argue. To contradict that statement. To tell him the truth. But before I can, Tim jumps in. “We know why you did it. But Evie thought it wasn’t necessary. You heard what Jonno said. She doesn’t think there’s any threat. She hasn’t even considered any angles. Yet all this horrendous shit keeps coming out. Filling the internet. If Jonno wasn’t blocking and removing daily, it would be a landslide of hate. A constant barrage aimed at her. But she doesn’t know that yet. You’ve all kept her in the dark, and now you're all paying for it.”

I’m dazed at his words, trying to process them. But my brain shuts off the horrific outcomes before I can take them in. A coping mechanism. My brain protects my heart and soul.

“I don’t want to do this gig either. We need to go home. To explain all this to her,” I tell them all, begging Tim with my eyes to let us go. “My heart won’t stand it.” I don’t know if I can play my guitar with a broken heart.

“Right, well you’re both doing it. It’s the last few, and we can go back to the UK or the US, depending on what you want to do after. We have nothing else scheduled, so we can keep things free for a while. But go and get sorted then. You can give it your all then. If you go now, you’ll have to come back or cancel. And whilst I know you, on occasion, don’t give a shit, I really think you should do as she asked and give her time.”

Tim is like a mother hen, and a commander in chief rolled into one. “You have something to focus on. I know it’s not what you want to focus on, but it’s something. It gives Evie some time. If you go now, you run the risk of steaming in too early and she tells you to fuck off for good. Think, boys, please. Take this time, get a strategy for how you’re going to grovel. Because, believe me, you need to grovel on a grand scale.”

Marcus makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat. Tears fill his eyes. “Fuck me,” he mutters and slumps back in his chair, pondering his hopeless situation. “Let’s get these last few done and I’m off to Devon. Is she in Devon?” he asks Mick. They’ve all been ignoring our calls, except Jonno. We have no idea where they are.

He shakes his head. “She’s in London. Look Marcus, Xan, there’s no easy way to say this, but Marshall has taken ill.” He pauses. “He’s in hospital, in London. He took ill when he flew home. They don’t think it’s serious, but obviously the Greystones are on full alert.”

My breath stutters and I raise my eyes to the heavens in prayer. Christ, if anything happens to Marshall we’re dead in the water. Even more than we are now. She’ll be frantic. Even Jonno hasn’t mentioned that. But he’s terrified of saying or doing the wrong thing as he’s also in the dog house, and being kicked by Evie every chance she gets.

More worrying to Marcus, though, is James and Bucky. Not one word has come from them. Marcus is bracing himself for the onslaught that is James Greystone, but as yet, nothing.

We’re all on stage. I’m clinging to the back near Levi, just about getting through it. My hands are working on muscle memory only as I have absolutely no idea what the hell I’m doing.

Marcus is crouched down at the front of the stage, the crowd lighting up their phones in anticipation of the song we usually sing together for Evie at this point in the show. Tears start running down my face. I know he cannot get his words out. It looks like they’re trapped in his throat.

But all of a sudden he stands up, shouting, “This is for anyone who’s ever been in love.” He’s walking up and down the stage, shouting for the crowd to show their love. “I love my wife, and my heart is breaking. We want you back, baby. Please come back to us. We love you, Evie, this is for you baby.”

He starts to sing with every fibre in his body, every ounce of love he has. The crowd is mesmerised by him. I know she’ll see this due to his words and the story surrounding us. The level of intensity he’s blasting out into the universe. I’m determined to win her back and I can see Kellen is all in. We just need to hang in there, get these shows done, tell her every time we play that we love her, use what we are to tell her. Please, God, let us have a chance.

As we come off the stage, Mick hands Kell his phone. He looks at the screen and his face pales.

I hit the panic buttons. “What? What’s happened?”

“It’s from James.” His voice is full of dread. He doesn’t want to open it, his finger hovering over the message, but he never touches it to open it out. His breathing has picked up and he’s starting to hyperventilate.

I grab the phone from him, touching the message.

James

about fucking time

I grin at Kell, showing him the message. My body flooding with relief.

“Fucking kids,” he gasps out, but he looks like a little bit of hope has entered his eyes.