Carnage Boxset

by Jones, Lesley

  “Cam, what the fuck are you playing at?” I didn’t wait for his answer, I just turned and headed back over to where I left the girls dancing, grabbing a glass of champagne from a passing waitress as I went. I’d drunk it all down by the time I reached the dance floor, and I spent the next hour knocking back more champagne and dancing.

  While I danced, my mind drifted. The only niggle in my all but perfect life was Cameron King and the unease he caused within me when I thought about him. I had never really come to terms with what I felt for that man. I still suffered from the guilt of the way things had ended and the pain I had caused him. It was always there, constant, floating around somewhere in my subconscious. He even appeared in my dreams occasionally, and that, in turn, made me feel more guilt. I was married. I was a wife. Sean’s wife.

  I thought about the life Sean and I had led over the past ten years. We’d been so lucky to have found our way back to each other. We were happy, content, and still in love. I hated being apart from him for any length of time; mainly when he travelled overseas, and I didn’t go with him. Mobile phones had made things easier, but despite talking to him sometimes five times a day, I still missed him. That was why I usually went with him. I just didn’t fancy the flight that weekend, and he would only be away for one night. It was a small sacrifice for the lifestyle the band’s success had given us. Not just the money and all the materialistic things it could buy, but the doors it opened for us, the places we’d been able to visit, and the people we had met. We’d been to award ceremonies and sat at a table with Jagger and Richards. We’d been to film premiers and been in the same room as De Niro. I had slow danced with the British Prime Minister at a charity event and then spent an hour talking about music to Nelson Mandela. He had the spark and wit of a thirteen-year-old boy, and to this day, he remained my ultimate human being. Sean and I had appeared on magazine covers, both together and apart. We’d been interviewed about our lives, and there had even been rumours that we’d soon be approached to not only write our biographies but also to contribute to a film that was apparently going to be loosely based on us. Why people were so interested in me, I had no idea. Sean I could understand, but I was just his wife. I’d done some work over the last ten years, mainly for various charities, but other than that, I’d simply been at Sean’s side, and I loved every minute. I didn’t need more.

  Despite all of these great and wonderful things, it was nights like tonight that I really missed. Just a plain old simple night out with the girls, as plain and simple as it could be when the wives of one of the world’s biggest bands embarked on a night out. Dave had driven us here and was lingering at the bar, just to make sure we were okay. He had just come over and advised us that because a lot of the celebs were now leaving, the doors would be opened up to the general public and perhaps it would be best if we went upstairs to the VIP area so we wouldn’t be harassed. The weird thing was, I still considered myself part of the general public. . . always got tongue-tied when I spoke to one of my idols. I nearly wet myself when I met Weller for the first time. Sean and Marley have a picture of me staring at him in wonder as he spoke to Lennon about something or other, I couldn’t remember. I’d never fancied the bloke, it was just that his music was something I grew up listening to, and I’d always thought he was one of the greatest songwriters that England had ever produced.

  I was snapped out of my thoughts by a camera going off in my face.

  “Fuck this,” Ashley said. “Dave’s right, let’s go upstairs.”

  I gestured to Dave that we were going to the VIP lounge, and the three of us held hands as Jimmie led the way. We were given wristbands when we first entered the club, so we just walked straight into the floor to ceiling glassed off area. I spotted Cam at the bar straight away and groaned inwardly. I hadn’t seen him once since the day I tried to help him, and yet, he still had an effect on my body. I didn’t like it. I loved my husband. I was in love with my husband, and I hated myself for having this reaction to another man. Bailey told me that Cam rang my dad the morning after he ran into Sean and me at Kings and sold him his share immediately. Further down the track, Bailey told me that he had bumped into Cam and that Cam had asked how I was doing and if I was happy. That information had caused my heart to beat a little too fast for a woman that was married to another man. And now there he was, tall and handsome, leaning against the bar talking to a tall redhead who I thought was an actress or a television presenter. I’d seen her face somewhere before anyway.

  “Shit, G! Mr TDH is at the bar,” Jimmie squeezed my hand as she spoke.

  “Fuck,” Ash added. “He’s still Mr TDH, too. Just look at him George, that man is sex on legs.”

  “Yeah, he spoke to me at the bar earlier. We got pap’d together. That’ll be interesting tomorrow when I try to explain to Sean why I’m all over the Sunday papers with my ex.”

  We were offered more champagne by a topless male waiter, and each took a glass. We found a tall round table and placed our drinks down on it and stood to chat. I asked about my nieces and nephews, who I couldn’t wait to squish, and I confessed to the girls that I was off the pill and that we were actively trying for a baby. They both shrieked with excitement.

  “Well, it’s about time,” Jimmie said. “I thought perhaps there was something wrong and you just weren’t telling us. I was going to offer you my eggs, my womb, even, if you needed it.”

  I was stunned into silence and my eyes instantly filled with tears. “You’d do that for me?” I asked her.

  “Of course, I would. Why have you left it so long?”

  “You can have my eggs,” Ashley added, “but fuck being pregnant again. I wouldn’t do it for myself, let alone any other fucker.”

  I laughed at Ashley’s bluntness. Along with me, she’d rubbed shoulders with the world's beautiful people, but she hadn’t changed one bit from the wild child I’d met at school fifteen years ago. Not even motherhood had tamed her.

  “We waited because we love our lifestyle. No disrespect to you two, but I’ve seen how hard it can be when the boys are on tour and you have to either bring the kids or arrange babysitters. Now that things aren’t so manic with the boys, I’m ready… we’re ready. We got that last bit of the travel bug out of our system by taking this year off, and now we’re ready to be grownups.” I smiled as I spoke, unable to hide my excitement at the thought of becoming a parent. At, the idea of Sean holding our baby in his arms and of a brown-eyed baby boy with a mop of dark hair like his dad’s. I couldn’t wait.

  “Well, I’m really pleased for you. You’ll both be amazing parents.” Jimmie gave me a cuddle.

  “Fuck, a little McBaby running around the place, that’ll be one good-looking kid, G. I mean Maca’s smoking hot, and if I didn’t like cock so much, I wouldn’t kick you out of bed either, babe.”

  “Thanks, Ash. I think.”

  “What the fuck’s a McBaby?” Jimmie asked.

  “It’s what you get after you have unprotected sex with McCarthy.” Ashley winked.

  “And if you’re really lucky, you’ll even get a McGasm,” she laughed as she spoke.

  “Oh, I’m more than lucky girls. I’ve been having multiple McGasms since I was fourteen. I was an underage slut.”

  “McSlut,” Ash and Jimmie said together, and we all burst into laughter.

  God, this felt so good. A girl’s night with my sisters-in-law, who also happened to be my best friends. Life didn’t get much better.

  We all clinked glasses and talked about this and that for a bit longer before hitting the small dance floor, as tune after tune of eighties and nineties club classics were pumped through the sound system.

  “I need to wee,” Jimmie said.

  “I’ll come too,” I added. Obviously, being girls, it was one in, all in, but as we approached the ladies’ room in the VIP bar, we notice that there was a queue. I went back to the bar and asked the barman if there was a toilet nearby.

  “Here. Go out of here, turn left, and use the toil
et in my office.” Cam held a bunch of keys in front of my face.

  I turned and looked at him. “You own this place?”

  “I do.”

  I simply nodded, took the keys from him, and called to Ash and Jimmie to follow me.

  Cam’s office was very similar to the one at the wine bar. Very old-fashioned and gentleman’s club looking and it smelled so much like Cam. We all took turns using the bathroom, and I couldn’t resist spraying a squirt of Cam’s aftershave onto the inside of my wrist after I found it sitting on the edge of the sink. We locked up behind us and started to head back towards the bar. That was when I saw her.

  I felt faint and light-headed at first. It rolled from the tips of my toes to the top of my head, stopping me dead in my tracks. I watched her as she pleaded with security to let her into the VIP bar, and then the light-headedness was gone. I could see very clearly and think and feel even clearer. My rage didn’t even start at red. It was way beyond red. It was white-hot and searing, and I had to get to her. I dropped the keys and my bag, and I thought that for a few seconds, I might actually fly because I moved so fast. I felt that my feet actually left the ground. I was on her in what seemed like a second.

  I vaguely heard Jimmie calling my name, then just a rush of air, and then nothing but the sound of my own heartbeat in my ears. I grabbed her hair with my left hand and punched her with my right. She went down onto the floor, and I threw myself down on top of her, straddling her chest. I hit her again and again, with everything I had. Rage, like I’d never known, propelled my fists forward. I lifted her head by her hair and banged it into the ground. I didn’t see her face. I didn’t see anything. I didn’t feel anything, but I kept punching, clawing, pulling at her skin and hair continuously until I was yanked backwards and felt myself fly through the air.

  My vision came back first. I saw club security leaning over an unconscious woman. Dave had my arm on one side, Cam on the other. Jimmie was in my face telling me to calm down. Ash was just glaring at the woman on the floor, who was now moving. She started to try to stand, and I caught sight of her face and rushed towards her again. I was screaming something, but I had no idea what. I landed a great right hook on her jaw, and she would’ve gone down again if she hadn’t been caught by the bouncer.

  I was once again dragged in the opposite direction and pulled into Cam’s office. I scratched and spat and screamed obscenities all the way. I’d lost it. I ordered Cam to shoot her, to give me a gun so that I could shoot her. My eyes scoured the desk and I spotted a pair of scissors, I made a grab for them, telling anyone that was listening that I was gonna cut the bitches throat. Never in my life had I felt rage like it.

  I was pulled down into someone’s lap. It registered it was Cam’s after only a few seconds. I could smell him. I stopped fighting and tried to calm my breathing. There was commotion going on all around me, doors opening and closing and people talking.

  “I need to get her out of here,” I heard Dave say, “the fuckin’ press are gonna be all over this.”

  “Is there a back door?” I heard Jimmie ask.

  “Where is she, have you kicked her out? Cos if George ain’t killed her, I fuckin’ will!”

  Go, Ash!

  “Let’s just sit tight for a minute. I don’t know what state she’s in and this one still needs to calm down.”

  I heard a door open and someone say, “She’s saying she wants the police called boss. What d’ya want me to do?”

  “For fuck’s sake,” Cam said quietly.

  “Where is she?”

  “One of the barmaids is with her in the staff room.”

  “Keep her there, I’ll go down and talk to her. See if I can change her mind.”

  It was all quiet for a few minutes.

  “If I let you go, do you promise not to go psycho on me again, Kitten?” He spoke very quietly in my ear.

  I nodded and opened my eyes. They slammed into his looking down at me.

  He had a slight smile on his face. “You’re a fucking mad woman, Georgia. D’ya know that? I’ve never seen a girl punch like that.”

  “That’s what happens when you’re taught to fight by three big brothers,” I replied, shakily.

  He loosened his grip on me, and I turned and looked at everyone in the room. Jimmie was sitting on the edge of Cam’s desk, shaking her head at me. Ash was sitting on the leather sofa.

  “Feel better, George? I know I fucking do. That bitch had it coming. If you hadn’t of chinned her, I fucking woulda. Mind you, I didn’t recognise her, she looks about fifty. I’ve only seen the pictures from when she went to the papers, but I swear she looked dog rough compared to then.”

  I looked at Dave, who was on his phone, looking less than happy. “Do none of your husbands’s ever answer their phones?”

  Sean always answered his phone, and before I could speak Jimmie said, “No matter what time it is, Len always answers in case it’s an emergency with me or one of the kids.”

  “Marley never picks up, he’s a fucking nightmare,” Ash complained.

  “Please don’t ring them.” I looked pleadingly at Dave. “It’s the middle of the night, Sean will just go off on one and so will Len.”

  “Georgia, if you’re about to get nicked, I have to call him. He will have my balls if I don’t.”

  “She won’t get nicked, I’ll sort it. Who’s this bird anyway? What did she do to piss you off so much?” Cam asked.

  “Whorely,” we all replied together.

  Ash had never met her, but she knew the name.

  “She accused my husband and brother of rape, and then told my mum a bunch of crap that kept Sean and me apart for four years.” Sadness was the only word I could use to describe the look that washed over Cam’s face. I slid to my feet as he stood.

  “Wait in here, and I’ll get rid of her. Then you can leave out of the back doors.

  Twenty minutes later, he was back. “Fuck, Georgia, her face is a mess.”

  “George didn’t do that. That’s how she looks anyway, ugly cunt,” Ashley piped up, and we all laughed, well, everyone except Cam. He cringed at Ashley’s use of the ‘C’ word.

  “I’ve convinced her to leave the police out of it, and I’ve offered her lifetime VIP access to the club, but I have a feeling she’ll be billing you for a new nose.”

  I shrugged. Adrenalin encouraging the anger that was still pulsating through me. “Well, she can go fuck herself. She’ll get nothing out of me.”

  “Kitten,” Cam said quietly.

  Dave shifted on his feet, overhearing his words, and obviously not comfortable with Cam’s term of endearment.

  “Right, well, I’ll go and pull the motor round the back, you girls come down when you’re ready. Cheers, Cam, thanks for sorting this out. I’m sure Frank or Bailey will be in touch.” He nodded his head in Cam’s direction.

  “You tell my dad or Bailey about this, and I will slap you, Dave,” I told him.

  “Georgia, love, you did it in front of a fuckin’ audience darlin’, subtlety has never been a strength of yours. I don’t think I’ll need to tell anyone about this, the Sunday papers will do that for me. That’s why it’ll be best if you get hold of Maca and tell him yourself.”

  Fuck!

  Shit!

  Bollocks!

  “Yeah, yeah, I’ll ring him. He can ring the label, or speak to the lawyers, whoever, see if they can do some damage control.” I was probably going to cause Sean all sorts of problems with my actions, but I didn’t regret it. I actually understood at that moment, the rage Cam must’ve felt when he shot that man in the pub car park in front of me. If I’d had a gun on me, I could’ve quite easily shot that bitch. I may have regretted it later, but only because of the trouble it would’ve gotten me in.

  I’m not sure if it was the drugs, drink, or adrenaline in my system, but I couldn’t help but feel a little bit of resentment towards Sean. This all started with him, and if he had to clean up my mess and the repercussions of my actions, then, so
be it. I suffered for years because of his stupid, irresponsible actions.

  “Say it was me. I don’t give a fuck,” Ash added, bringing me back into the room. I just shook my head at her.

  Five minutes later we made to leave. The girls say goodbye to Cam and thank him. I went to give him a quick cuddle when he said, “Can you give me a minute, Georgia, and I’ll walk you down in a sec. I just want a word?”

  I made eye contact with the girls and nodded. “I’ll be down in a minute.” They left, and I was alone with Cam and my pounding heart. He’d brought me an ice pack for my aching knuckles earlier. The bitch had a hard jaw, and I adjusted it over the pain in my right hand.

  “Despite the circumstances, it’s been really good to see you, Kitten.”

  I smiled at him. “You too, Cam.”

  He took the ice pack from me and put it on his desk, next to where he was leaning. He then took my hand and kissed my knuckles. “Still an angry Kitten. You really need to learn to control that temper, baby.”

  My heart skipped a beat at his words, at the sensation of his lips on my skin, and I knew it was time to leave.

  “If he didn’t come back, would it have been me? Would you have stayed with me?”

  I pulled my hand from his and shook my head. “I’m not doing this, Cam. It was ten years ago, and I’m married. I’m with Sean.”

  “But I still affect you, don’t I? There’s still something there. I feel it, and you’re lying if you say you don’t.” He was stating facts, not asking questions.

  “It doesn’t matter what I feel. I’m married to Sean. I love Sean. Thanks, Cam, thanks for everything tonight. I’m sorry if it has caused any trouble for the club, and I’m sorry for the past. I have to go.” I reached out for the door handle.

  “Did you love me, Kitten, even a little bit?”

  I didn’t hesitate with my answer. “Yes, Tiger, and I think I still do.” I pulled the door open and jumped when it was slammed shut from behind me.

  He pulled me around by my shoulder, and his mouth was instantly on mine. His tongue seeking out and then almost attacking mine. His hands were over me. They slid up my hips, over my waist, and then they cupped my breasts. I offered no resistance to any of it. I just stood with my arms at my sides. I wasn’t even debating whether what was happening was right or wrong, I just stood and let it happen. I reached for his hair, grabbing at it and attempting to pull him away. He started pulling my dress up my legs, and when his thumb brushed my clit through my knickers, I stopped pulling his mouth away from mine and instead forced it down harder. My dress was up around my waist, and Cam was grinding into me. I was grinding back. Hands, teeth, tongues. We raked, clawed and bit uncontrollably.