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Adie flies in to surprise Nick
“Act like a fucking grown up Nick, your twenty seven years old,” Alex hissed after Nick threw the water bottle at him. The accusation had been fair he had been behind in the routine they were currently rehearsing, it was noticeable and if he was honest with himself he wasn’t even trying, he was exhausted, his knees were killing him but he was mostly pissed off about having to work on his birthday.

“I’m twenty eight now,” he retaliated as he stormed over to the table where his phone was, picked it up and then continued to storm towards the door so he could exit the studio, ignoring the yells for him to “get your ass back here now.”

He made it outside quickly and when he knew he was far enough away from the rest of the guys he let out a strangled cry and began to kick the wall in frustration. It was stupid really, he was acting like a spoilt child, just because things hadn’t gone the way he had wanted. But after all it was his birthday, sure he was only twenty eight, it wasn’t like it was a big deal like A.J’s had been but he still managed to get the day off, still got to spend the day with Rachel like he had wanted. Hell it had even been planned that rehearsals wouldn’t start till the following week. Nick wouldn’t get that, no he wouldn’t even be getting to see his girlfriend because of the stupid airline and its stupid crappy broken aeroplane.

“You know if you break your foot by doing that they would still make you rehearse,” Leigh told him as she leant against the wall.

“Who gives a shit,” he whined.

“It can’t helped Nick these things just happen,” she shrugged.

“Easy for you to say, you and Howie have never spent more then five seconds apart,” he sighed as he leant back against the wall.

“You’re impossible to reason with when you’re like this, do you know that?” She asked and he just shrugged. “She’ll get a later flight,” she tried to rationalise.

“Be too late then,” he whined again.

“What are you planning on dying at midnight or something? Stop being an immature brat, you are twenty eight today no?” she asked and he nodded, “Well stop taking your frustration out on the others, you’ll only have to go back in and apologise for acting like a jerk and we all know that you don’t like doing that.”

“Stop picking on me, its my birthday, Alex got his birthday off,” he pointed out.

“He was on the fifth day of his honeymoon!”

“I haven’t even had cake,” he groaned.

“Pouty boy,” she said grabbing his cheek to give it a pinch.

“I miss her,” he admitted.

“You’re so smitten,” she laughed as she leant back against the wall, bringing her hand up to shield her eyes from the blazing sun.

“I haven’t seen her in two weeks and it’s killing me, I don’t know how we are going to last this tour. I think this is the first time in my life where I feel torn, I love being on the road but at the moment I really don’t want to go.”

“She’s coming to Japan right?” Leigh asked.

“Yeah then she flies back after we’ve done Australia and I won’t see her for weeks,” he whined.

“It’s not weeks it’s like two then your home for a bit, it will work out Nick, people have to make sacrifices and compromises everyday, even with normal jobs. You guys love each other and it will just make the time you do get together that more special and enjoyable. Now are you going to come back inside?” She asked.

“Do I have to?” he groaned.

“Yes, there may even be a surprise for you,” she added knowingly.

“What, cake? Where’s the surprise there?” He whined as he followed her back in, avoiding eye contact with Alex as he passed him.

“Jerk,” he heard him mutter under his breath.

“Asshole,” he mumbled back nudging him.

“Immature brat,” he said more loudly as he pushed in retaliation.

“Bastard,” Nick giggled pushing him again.

“Prick!” he yelled right in his ear.

“Tattooed freak!” Nick yelled at an equally high pitch.

“Yeah that’s original, pills brie dough boy,” he laughed.

“Can’t call me that anymore,” he said as he lifted his shirt to show off his trim figure.

“Nick no matter how many pounds you shed you are still going to have the dough belly,” Brian replied as he slapped his friend in the stomach. “And if your that concerned I’m guessing you don’t want cake.”

“Hell no if I can’t have my women then cake will have to do.”

“Nice to know I’m so easily replaceable.”

His head snapped round when he heard her voice, his whole face breaking out into a huge grin before he made his way to her, picking her up and spinning her round once in his excitement before he placed her back to the floor capturing her mouth with his. They broke apart after the few cats calls.

“What are you doing here?” he asked a bit breathless from the kiss.

“You want me to go home?” She asked pulling away from him in a fake attempt to leave.

“I just meant…I thought your flight was cancelled,” he said still grinning like a Cheshire cat, squeezing her hand in his.

“It’s fun to mess with you,” she shrugged and that’s when he knew, they had all been in on it, purposely winding him up, picking on everything that he did just to piss him off that bit more.

“You bastards,” he scowled turning round to playfully glare at all of his band mates.

“Lets just say payback is a bitch Nicky,” Howie replied with a wink.

“Oh Jesus the wink’s not back is it?” He groaned.

***

He sighed breathlessly as he fell back against the pillow’s exhausted from their third round of love making. He wrapped his arm around her when she snuggled into his chest and sighed again, contently this time as he felt her draw lazy circles on his chest. This was how you were supposed to spend your birthday, in bed, in the middle of the day, with the one that you loved, having mind blowing sex.

It had been obvious that rehearsals were not going to be able to continue as planned after Adie had shown up, the sexual tension between the two of them had just been too much and they had actually ended up sneaking off to bathroom during a quick drink break for a quickie. They thought that they had been sly about it, that the others wouldn’t have known but they couldn’t have been more obvious when they returned and after much teasing the others had allowed Nick the rest of the afternoon off while they stayed and worked on vocal practises of their solo sections for the new tour.

“Please tell me we don’t ever have to leave this bed,” he joked when he caught his breath and his heart rate had returned to semi normal.

“I’d love too but I’d be lying,” she giggled as she rolled onto her stomach so she could look up at him.

“Just lie to me,” he shrugged through a grin.

“Well if we can’t leave the bed then that means you can’t have your presents birthday boy!” she said smacking his arm playfully.

He studied her closely for a moment before lightly trailing his hand down one of her arms and saying innocently, “I’m sure exceptions to the rule can be made for things like that.”

“How did I know you were going to say that?” She said rolling her eyes at him.

“UH! You can’t roll your eyes at me, you can’t be mean to me I’m the birthday boy after all, now where are my presents?!”

“Act like a spoilt brat and you can have a time out,” she warned jokingly.

“Can I not just have a spanking?” He asked arching his eyebrow at her along with throwing her a devilish smirk before he pulled her towards him. She smiled into the kiss that they shared and began to giggle when she felt him start to grow hard beneath her. “Why are you laughing?” He asked indignantly when she pulled away from the kiss.

“You’re like a horny school boy.”

“It’s your fault, you’re there all naked and shit!” he exclaimed moaning incoherently when she started stroking his shaft.

“Like that?” She asked smiling at the expression on his face, his eyes were closed, his mouth slightly parted, his breathing becoming more rapid the harder she stroked. He couldn’t even talk now and just nodded his head in affirmation she smiled knowingly, he was at her mercy now, she knew that he would promise her anything as long as she kept touching him. His moans grew louder as he started to move his hips in time with her pumping hand as his own gripped the sheets beneath him, his knuckles turning white. She moved slowly, not wanting him to realise what she was going to do next and if his next actions were anything to go by she had been successful.

“Fuck baby doll,” he whimpered when her lips encased his swollen member and she began swirling her tongue around the head. “Yeah,” he mumbled, his hips involuntarily thrusting towards her, making her take more of him into her mouth, she ran her hands up and down his thighs before a hand moved to cup and gently squeeze his balls. “Feels so good,” he told her as she felt his hand massage the back of her neck, something he always did right from the beginning.

The first time he had done it she was sure that he was going to grab her head, force her to take more of him, that’s what most guys she had been with before had done. The majority of the time they had been caught up in the moment, wanting more but just couldn’t verbalise it, she understood that but she still hated it, it made her cough and gag and loose her confidence in giving head. He had been different though, his hand had snacked round her neck and she was sure that at any possible minute she would be gagging on his cock, it didn’t happen. She felt him slowly start to rub her neck in small circles, adding a hint of pressure the closer he got, it was nice, relaxing even, and she didn’t mind giving him head when he did that.

She felt the muscles in his thighs start to tighten, and sure enough when she looked up to him his eyes were scrunched shut, he was concentrating so hard in putting off the inevitable, trying to make the moment last but he was so close. A loud moan escaped his lips followed by a blissful sigh as he spilled everything he had into her warm waiting mouth, all the while still massaging her neck.

She swallowed what he had to offer before swiping her hand across her mouth and crawling back up to him, leaning her head on one hand as she slowly stroked the few loose hairs that covered his eyes away while he came down from his high. After a few seconds he opened his eyes and threw her a lazy smile.

“You’re amazing,” he whispered.

“It was just head Nick,” she told him, shaking her head at him.

“You give like the best head, you should put it on your CV,” he said quite seriously.

She burst into laughter at his statement before laying down on his chest, “My CV? What section would that go in?” She asked.

“Special skills,” he said immediately making her laugh even more at him.

“You are crazy!”

“That’s why you love me,” he shrugged. “Hey where are you going?” he asked when she slipped from his arms.

“Do you not want your birthday presents?” She asked raising an eyebrow to him.

“You may leave the bed,” he said gesturing towards her holdall in the corner of the bedroom.

“I’m glad I have your permission old wise one,” she saluted as she walked across the room, knowing full well he was checking out her naked form, that being the reason he hadn’t picked up on the old comment. She bent over and wiggled her ass, eliciting a small groan from him. He had been so horny, the quickie in the bathroom at the studio had been exquisite but had left them both craving more and she was thankful when they guys had let them leave. It had taken everything they had not pull the car over and just go at it in the back seat, they didn’t quite make it to the bedroom when they reached Alex and Rachel’s though, the floor of the foyer had worked just as well as bed. She pulled out the neatly wrapped gifts and made her way back to him, all the while thinking how sexy he looked sat in the bed of messy sheets, his hair every which way, the truly just fucked look.

“I could get used to this,” he told her taking one of the presents from her hands.

“What presents in bed?”

“You naked, offering me presents in bed, what more could we want?” He shrugged.

“Food maybe? A bathroom?” She offered leaning across him so she could pick up his t-shirt that had been quickly thrown aside earlier. She quickly pulled it over her head and pulled the duvet up over he legs as she leant back against the headboard so she could watch him open his presents but he had stopped tearing eagerly at the paper and was pouting at her.

“What?” She questioned.

“I just said that I like having you naked and you go and cover up,” he told her.

“I’m cold,” she whined.

“I know a few ways to warm you up,” he leered leaning in to kiss her put she pulled away quickly.

“Okay I have been trying to get you to open your presents for the past two hours now, so get to it,” she sternly told him but then broke into laughter.

He shook his head at her before he continued to tare in to the brightly coloured paper and that’s when he realised that it was indeed Christmas paper, just as it had been for the previous two years. He remembered how she had apologised profusely the first year, she had his present and had meant to go out and get some normal paper but what with work and him flying in early she just hadn’t been able to and the left over paper from Christmas had been her only option. He looked over to her and she smiled brightly at him quite clearly remembering the same thing he was.

“Why break the habit of a lifetime?” She shrugged answering the question he never actually asked. He laughed at her comment before pulling the red t-shirt out of the paper and when he realised what it said he began to laugh profusely.

The t-shirt was plain but written in the centre in big white words were “WHILE YOU WERE STARING AT MY BUTT I FARTED!!”

“You like it?” she asked laughing at his infectious giggle.

“I love it and the best part? It’s so true,” he laughed even more and then lent in to give her a kiss.

“That’s the beauty of it,” she agreed as she handed him the small gift bag.

“Cool, how did you know I was out of this?” He asked pulling the bottle of Hugo Boss aftershave out, spritzing a bit on himself.

“Cause I have nostrils,” she deadpanned.

“I told you no being mean to me today I’m the birthday boy!” He pouted.

“More like old man!” She teased before screeching when he grabbed her in a headlock and roughed her hair up.

“Now who’s an old man?” He asked when he finally let go.

She sat back up and looked slightly dazed as she tried to brush her now frizzy hair back down so she might resemble someone slightly normal before shoving the next present into his hands.

“That hurt,” she complained.

“Big baby,” he retaliated as he began tearing into the next present and when he pulled the box out he looked at her, his expression difficult to read, almost as if he wanted to scold her but also happy from the gift. “You shouldn’t have got me this,” he told her.

“Why? You said you wanted it,” she shrugged.

“I never told you that,” he said confused.

“I have my sources,” she smirked.

“Aaron?” He asked and she nodded. “This is a lot of money, you didn’t have to get me this,” he told her again.

“I wanted to, it’s your birthday. Plus you can write lots of amazing love songs about hmm…” she pretended to think for a minute, her gaze drifting up to the ceiling as she her index finger patted at her lips, “…oh yeah ME!” She exclaimed making him laugh.

“Your sure you can afford this?” He asked.

“Yeah I’ll just live off beans while your away, and plus I work at a hospital I can steal the food we get for the patients,” she joked. “Happy birthday,” she said as she leant in to give him a kiss on the cheek.

“Thank you,” he smiled back as he looked at the box in his hand, studying the back contents carefully, reading what the programme had to offer, already thinking ahead of all the writing possibilities he would have when he was touring and they were so far apart.

She took the time to rest back against the pillows and close her eyes, the mixture of physical excursion with Nick, the flight and the fact that she had flown straight after a night shift were now all taking their toll of her extremely weary body. She knew that if she was going to make it through the rest of the night which would more then likely consist of dinner either with Rachel and Alex or the rest of clan, then onto a bar and maybe even a night club or late night poker game, she was definitely going to need to get a quick cat nap in.

She heard the knock at the door and felt Nick climb beneath the covers making a smile creep to her lips but she just couldn’t be bothered to open her eyes.

“Are you decent?” She heard her brother in laws gruff voice ask.

“Yeah,” Nick called back but as soon as he started chucking like a school kid who was up to no good she opened her eyes and found that he had rolled over so he was laying on his stomach, the covers completely off, revealing his bare ass to the world.

“Put your fucking ass away Carter,” Alex said as he walked in, completely unfazed by Nicks actions.

“Jesus I think I’m going to be scarred for life,” Rachel teased as she walked in behind her husband before she plonked herself down on the bed next to her sister. “Tired baby sis?” She asked when Adie leant her head against her sisters shoulder and closed her eyes. She only nodded her response. “Well if you didn’t use all your energy in boinking the afternoon away then maybe you wouldn’t be.”

“I did a night shift before I hopped on the plane here, thank you very much,” she retaliated.

“Well you know what it doesn’t matter anyway because you’ll be able to get plenty of sleep now you’re a logic 8 widow,” she replied seeing what Nick was holding in his hands.

“I am not that bad,” Alex told her.

“Oh please, ever since I made the colossal mistake of getting you it for Christmas the earliest you have come to bed is past two am,” she argued.

“That’s where you’re wrong, I’ve come to bed earlier with you for relations,” he said making Adie crack up at his camp voice, “I just got back out again after!” he shrugged.

“Yeah way to make me feel loved,” she argued back teasingly.

“Five minutes after the deed is done you’re drooling on my shoulder anyway!” He exclaimed, she watched the playful exchange before her but as soon as he whispered the next words in her ear her good mood was dampened a little.

“Bet you’re glad we’re not married now.”

It was meant as a joke. It wasn’t meant to be hurtful, to rub salt in her already deep wounds on the subject but that’s just what it did. Luckily enough she was spared having to react when Rachel caught her attention.

“ANYWAY…” she said loudly making sure Alex understood the queue to stop, “We have something we need to tell you guys,” she said taking her husbands hand and smiling at him as she found the words to say.

“Oh my god you’re swingers!” Nick exclaimed. “And you want to swap?”

He received a firm slap on the arm from Rachel before she continued, “No we are not swingers and even if we were there is no way I would sleep with you!”

“Your sister doesn’t seem to have a problem with it!”

“What were you going to tell us?” Adie asked but she already had a huge inkling as to what the “announcement” was going to be and she mentally braced herself.

“Well…” she paused for a few moments, just like they do on those TV programmes so for dramatic effect, “…we’re going to have a baby!”

***

She was sat in the booth at the club, watching him from a distance noticing how he seemed to be enjoying himself when she was doing anything but. The dimly lit, Smokey, loud, stale smelling club was doing nothing to lift her out of the mood she was in and if she wasn’t careful people were going to start realising that she wasn’t herself, they would start asking questions.

She watched as Nick danced with her sister, spinning her round on the floor, his substitute for her when she had refused, claiming that she was a tired and just needed to sit down for a while. He accepted her excuse, after all he knew she had worked a shift the previous night and maybe the alcohol in his system also had something to do with it as well. She kept finding herself staring at Rachel wondering why everything seemed to be working out so well for her sister when she seemed to be stuck in this part of her life with no way out, no sense that things were ever going to change the way in which she wanted.

The news of the pregnancy hadn’t come as much of a shock, it was inevitable really, her sister was married, she was happy and Alex had made it clear on more then one occasion that he couldn’t wait to start a family. It still stung though, for they both seemed to be living the life that she wanted and she found herself wondering if she was actually with the right guy. It was a horrible thing to think, and she felt awful about it but she seemed to be asking herself that more and more. They were so different, polar opposites, he was a live for the moment kind of guy, made decisions based on limited information, could be really spontaneous. She was anything but.

She liked to know where she was headed, always needed to be achieving a goal of some sort, she would ponder over her decisions for days, making sure to research every aspect carefully before she made up her mind. But their relationship had seemed to work, they seemed to balance each other out well. He had taught her to be a little more care free, while she had taught him that although spontaneity was great, he did need to think about the ramifications of his actions a bit more. These differences however were starting to rear their ugly heads again and really it was only a matter of time until one of them was going to have to change for the other, or things were going to crumble.

She didn’t want them to, she loved him, really loved him. He was kind, caring, romantic, funny, sensitive at times and most of all she knew with all her heart that he loved her with all of his. He had demons though, lots of them and she knew it was them that were holding him back, stopping him from being completely open with her something she had struggled with in the past. He didn’t like talking about his feelings much, well the negative ones anyway, he was good at hiding them and at first it had hurt, like he didn’t trust her enough. That’s when she had learnt from Alex that he had been hurt really badly in the past and she started to understand but now? It had been three years since they had been together and he was still reluctant to let her in to that part of his life.

She sighed deeply trying to shake the thoughts from her head and spotted Angel dragging what looked like a heavily intoxicated Aaron towards the exit of the club, she didn’t look to happy to be doing it either. She knew that feeling all to well, she had been the one to drag her sister from a club when she was just about to hurl, or do something that she would quite possibly regret when she was sober and therefore Adie knew that Angel would want someone else out there with her.

She managed to push herself through the throng of people, and shivered slightly when she made it out of the door and into the cool Floridian air, wrapping her arms around herself when her jeans and silk tank top did nothing to keep the chill away. She found them both a few yards from the club, Aaron sat on the side walk, leaning back against the wall, his eyes closed, trying to control the nausea that was sweeping through his system.

“You do this every time!” Angel chastised as she looked down at her brother in disgust.

“Don’t waste your breath honey, he aint gona remember this in the morning, trust me,” she said as she made her way towards them.

“I’m so sick of this, every time we go out it’s like I’m chief babysitter,” she moaned walking away from Aaron.

“I know the feeling, I used to be Rachel’s babysitter,” she shared. “After the thousandth time of managing to pull her out of the club before she hurled I realised something though.”

“Yeah? That you were adopted?” She asked as she squeezed her eyes shut when she heard the all to familiar sounds of Aaron start to heave.

“No. That she never asked me to do that for her and that by constantly looking out for her I was seriously decreasing my chances of having a good time. I used to get really pissed at her as well and she had no clue as to why I wouldn’t answer her calls, or make catty comments because she had been so out of her face.”

“I just don’t want him to embarrass himself,” she sighed.

“Maybe that’s what he needs, then maybe he will lay off a little bit. It took Rach getting arrested for her to see that she didn’t need to get totally trashed,” she told Angel spilling one of her sisters biggest secrets.

“She got arreseted?” Angel asked intrigued.

“Yep she got so wasted and of course I wasn’t there to pull her out of the club or into the bathroom before she hurled. Well it ended up hitting the wrong girls new Prada suede shoes and uh lets just say she wasn’t impressed to have my sisters barf all over her feet,” she remembered.

“What happened?”

“Well this was in London in a pretty dodgy area so of course it turned into a major cat fight which ended in Rachel sitting on top of the girl hitting her over the head with what was luckily a plastic bottle.”

“Oh my god! Rachel? Alex’s Rachel?” She asked stunned, laughing at Adie’s confession.

“Yeah,” she confirmed nodding her head, “She was lucky it was plastic and not glass because she could have been charged with GBH. But anyway the shock of the night in a cell made her realise that maybe she needed to back off a bit. Don’t you dare tell anyone I told you, she’ll kill me,” she added.

“My lips are sealed,” she told her, zipping them shut with her fingers.

“You go back inside,” Adie told her.

“I can’t leave him out here by himself,” she said shaking her head at her brother who was still leaning against the wall feeling sorry for himself.

“I’ll stay with him,” she offered.

“You sure?” Angel asked wanting so desperately to go back inside and start having a good time with her other, more then likely, drunk brother but also feeling guilty about the one who was a mess on the floor.

“Go I won’t offer again,” she said more sternly pointing towards the door.

“Thanks Adie,” she smiled as she turned to walk away.

“Hey I’m a nurse I live for vomit!” She joked trying to be enthusiastic.

“I didn’t mean for this,” Angel said stopping and turning back to face her. “You’re good for my brother, I know he can be a pain in the ass and he comes from a slightly crazy family but you’ve shown him that life isn’t all doom and gloom. He needed that, he hasn’t had that in so long and I know he’s really happy with you, I just wanted to say thanks for making him the old Nick again, like he was when we were kids,” she told her, throwing her another smile.

She didn’t know what to say to that, and even if she did she would probably have cried if she even opened her mouth so she just smiled back before she leant down to Aaron and when she heard Angels heals clack along the sidewalk and disappear into the club again she let out a sigh. She was the second person in as many months to tell her that, she made him happy trouble was he didn’t do the same for her.
Chapter End Notes:
Please review and let me know what you think. This story aint getting much love at the moment :(