Double or Nothing Pt. 05

[:::: Authors Note ::::]

Thank you to everyone for walking the journey of Double or Nothing, my first significant foray into the world of writing stories. I have learnt a lot, enjoyed seeing your comments and love the encouragement that many of you have given me. I'm sure we all know that this story will not be everyone's cup of tea, but I enjoyed writing it.

If you haven't read through them yet, please check out Part I, Part II, Part III & Part IV before reading through Part V. It will take a bit of time, but I think it is a good read. And I know once this is published, I will be reading from the beginning all the way through to enjoy reading the story.

This will be the last instalment from me for the Double or Nothing series. Hopefully, we will bring a conclusion to most of the plotlines started. As per previous parts, this will be a long one at over 26k, so make sure you have some snacks and a drink on your bedside table.

To let everyone know, while writing Part III, some personal challenges caused me to rethink how I wanted to end the series and it went a different way to how I originally planned. I will explain more in my author ending notes.

Lastly, I would like to express my gratitude to Kite, who put his hand up to help guide me as an editor after my self-editing of Part I. We can all agree that he has helped fix most of my grammatical errors and smooth, complex plot points, so they flow much better. Thank you Kite!

I would also like to thank a couple of editors who prefer to remain unknown, you know who you are, thanks for stepping in for Part V, as Kite was unavailable for this part due to personal reasons.

Many of you have been asking for it, so now we're heading right back to the beginning. Carol and Mackenzie have turned up unexpectedly to Terry's family BBQ.

I hope you all enjoy the final, Part V of Double or Nothing.

[:::: End of Part IV ::::]

The metal plate hitting the floor brought everyone out from their internal thoughts as they all looked at me.

"Um, hi, Terry," Carol, my ex-wife, said looking at me. She was tired and worn, and over the last few years, she had put on weight in all the wrong places. Her once voluptuous but good looking curves were now well and truly under layers of not so good looking fat. While I was still quite fit and trim. Most likely even more so since we saw each other last if those hungry eyes were saying anything as she looked at me. I'm sure turning up here uninvited; she had no idea what type of reception she would receive from any of us, but she had to know it would not be a happy reunion.

Our second visitor looked at me as well, 'Hi Daddy," Mackenzie, my ex-daughter, followed up before I could respond. Her head slightly bowed, she looked at me from under a worn baseball cap, one that I had given her when she turned thirteen. Mackenzie looked nothing like the girl who had betrayed and thrown me aside years ago. If anything, she looked broken like her mother and just plain frail.

For what felt like almost a minute, we all just stared at each other. The only noise was the kids at the table. But even they picked up something was wrong and started to notice the two intruders stopping them from getting dinner.

I sighed and bent to pick up the tray of meat I had dropped, turned around and placed it on the table. I looked at and signalled to Martha, who knew exactly who they were and was glaring at them. "Martha, could you get the kids some food, I think this may take a few minutes." She stopped glaring at Carol and Mackenzie. Her gaze softened as she looked at me. Martha knew my pain almost more than anyone in the room. She had been there for me during most of what had transpired over the years. And she would have had a fair idea of what I might be feeling at that moment. My mother-in-law was one of the wisest women I knew, and to cross her family would earn you the ire of not just Martha but her network of friends and community groups. I had a feeling that Carol and Mackenzie had been on the wrong end of her temper a few times without my direct knowledge.

Her entire vibe changed to making sure all the kids would get fed, my former family pushed out of her mind for the moment. "No problem, Terry sweetie, you do what you need to. I've got the kids."

I turned back to my ex-family and let my face fall into a scowl. "For the sake of the children that are here, I am not going to say what I want to say right now. However, you need to know that neither of you is welcome here!" I had a hard time keeping my voice calm, and as it was, I almost spat the words. Carol looked upset, but like she expected that kind of reaction, Mackenzie looked like she was about to cry.

Kim had, at this point, had come to stand beside me. Melody and Harmony moved to stand on my other side. Melody grabbed my hand, letting me know she was there for me. Like her sister Harmony, she knew these intruders and had a great idea of what I was likely feeling.

Carol gave a big sigh and looked at everyone in the room before once again letting her gaze set itself upon me. There was a time many years ago when I would adore those eyes and just love to look back into them. Now all I saw was a mask of pain, regret and sorrow, which surprised me. "We know Terry, but we need to talk with you".

Shit!

[:::: Part V ::::]

I never expected my former family to come to my world here in Bathurst. First of all, legal documents required Mackenzie to stay away from me if she wanted to access her trust fund money for university. Next, there was the point that both of these women had continually blamed me for every screwup in their lives when in actuality, they had made poor choices each time I was around them.

As I previously mentioned, Carol wasn't looking great. Unlike my wives Melody and Harmony, Carol looked like she had not been keeping in shape at all. There were long lines on her face, and her body was no longer very attractive. Looking at her now, she looked more like a potato than a shapely mother in her late forties. All in all, she looked like someone that had given up on life.

In contrast to her mother, Mackenzie, my former daughter, had lost a lot of weight. She looked gaunt in a lot of ways, her skin appeared to hang a little from her frame, and each of her movements looked a little forced or painful. She didn't have the vibrancy of a woman in her twenties.

No, despite everything they had done, I doubt either of these women would willingly turn up on my doorstep without warning and not have a valid reason for it. With how they looked and after pretty much every conversation that we have had over the years, I thought they were likely after money.

For the last few years, Carol's new husband, and Mackenzie's adopted father, Stephen Morrison, we called him the dickhead, had been in jail, he had been given thirty years after pleading guilty of aggravated assault and attempted murder on yours truly. I hated the man with a passion, and I understood the feeling was mutual. Though in a way, I felt sorry for him as my family and I believed that he snapped because of the fact that my ex-wife at one point had regular sexual dreams about me while sleeping next to him.

I scanned the room and everyone in it. There were my beautiful wives, Melody and Harmony, my father, John, my sister and her husband, Kim and Paul, my in-laws, William and Martha, and my former family, Carol and Mackenzie. Everyone was looking at me for whatever was going to happen next.

Returning my gaze to Carol and Mackenzie, I let myself contemplate them. Emotions that I hadn't felt in years returned. Anger for their betrayal, how they just left me for another man because I wasn't enough for them. Every interaction was disappointing as they hurled insults. Every conversation displayed hypocrisy as they demanded money from me.

I wanted to throw them out on their poverty stricken asses. But there was something that held me back. Despite my rising emotions, this was my home, and I counted to ten and contemplated my next steps while they looked at me.

I sighed, "Come on, let's go sit out the back and get this over with." I looked to Martha with the kids and then Paul. "Martha and Paul, would you guys be able to get the kids fed while we talk out back?"

"Sure, Terry," Paul said as he sat down beside his daughter, Candice and my son, Adam. Between us, we had seven children. I had two sets of twins, one with my legal wife, Harmony, and one with my assumed wife, Melody. To complicate matters further, Melody and Harmony are identical twins. As far as we knew, twins giving birth to two sets of twins from the same father had never occurred. So, one or two medical journals wrote about us over the past few years. We had consulted but drawn the line at going public and doing interviews, I love my wives and my kids, and I didn't want to put them through the circus that could happen in the mainstream media.

The group of us walked out the back, sitting at the big family table on our back deck. The lights were on through the garden that I had just maintained earlier that day, so it looked great and had that fresh-cut grass smell that eased everyone's emotions.

I sat down on one side of the big table, Melody sitting down on my right, Harmony on my left in their usual spots. On the other side of the table, Carol and Mackenzie sat down, Kim sat down on one of the end seats. A few moments later, dad and William came out with a pitcher of water and glasses for everyone, a Kraken for Melody and I, wine for Harmony, then excused themselves and went back inside to help with the kids. I think they knew that this needed to be private.

Harmony filled glasses, gave everyone a drink that didn't have one, then sat back down and waited. It took a few minutes, but Carol started.

"Terry, you have a beautiful place here. I never expected..." Carol choked back the rest of her reply, realizing she was falling into old habits of belittling my station in life.

Melody looked down her nose at Carol, that look that all women can give someone they don't like, and spoke on my behalf. "Thank you, it's an amazing place, and it's been in the family for generations. Of course, now that Terry is our Husband, he's part of that family now."

Carol and Mackenzie stared at me.

"Our Husband?" Carol asked, not following, "I know that Terry remarried, for which I assume it was one of you two. Which one did you marry, Terry?"

I laughed, "Carol, I would like you to meet my wife, Mrs Melody Other." I gestured to Melody. She straightened up and beamed.

"Congralu..." Carol began.

I interrupted, "Carol, I would also like to introduce you to my other wife, Mrs Harmony Other. And yes, you are hearing me correct I am married to both of these beautiful women."

Carol baulked. Mackenzie just stared. The girls and I just smiled while Kim giggled. Finally, after looking back between the two of us and as the girls grabbed my hands and brought them up together, Carol looked at Kim, who nodded.

"Oh yes, Carol, after you tore his heart out, my little brother saved the lives of both these amazing women getting seriously injured in the process. They fell in love with him, so he married them both. Your ex-husband has been so in love with them that he has twins with each of these women and, as I understand, keeps them both very satisfied." my older sister laughed, and when she said 'satisfied', there was no doubt in anyone's mind what she meant.

Mackenzie found her voice. "You mean you're sleeping with both these sisters simultaneously?" she was trying to wrap her head around it.

"Yes, Mackenzie," Harmony responded, a bit of a giggle in her voice. "Your former father sleeps with both of us each and every night. Neither my sister nor I can bear to be without him, from the very first night, he has given us his love without reservation. He is our rock and gives everything he has, never asking for anything. Neither Melody nor I can understand how either you or your mother would ever have walked away from such a loving man." Mackenzie blushed.

Melody jumped in without a single breath of pause, following her sister. "And as a father, oh Mackenzie, he dotes on those kids like there is nothing more important in the world. Harmony and I could not ask for a better man that will teach our kids the proper respect of people in this broken world. He lives for those kids. We just don't understand why you would have given him up?"

Carol spoke up. The bitterness in her voice could be heard "that's because you have him here." She gestured to the house and gardens, "He has money now, status! When we were his family, he was only a plumber."

Even after all these years, Carol still didn't get it.

Harmony spoke up, venom now dripping from her words, "You really are a stupid bitch, Carol." Carol stared at Harmony like she had physically struck her. "We would love Terry just the same even if he had nothing. Indeed, all our man had when we met him and fell in love with him was what he had in his truck. For Terry, material wealth means nothing. He treats his family like kings because he loves us, and we, in turn, have given him our very souls to hold in his hands. We would gladly have walked away from all of this," she made the same gesture that Carol did, "If keeping it meant we could not have him. We know that this man, our husband, the very same man you threw away, would give his very life for us without hesitation. Indeed, he almost did the night we met.

"But, can you ever say the same, Carol? Can you ever say that you would do anything for your family to put you out of your comfort zone?"

Harmony was staring down Carol, like a bear about to eat a captured meal. Carol looked like she wanted to run.

"You had the love of a man who would have given you anything, and he did." Melody continued, "And we know that you know he is an amazing lover, he knows how to please us together in bed, and my goodness, Carol, you know this man can make you cum." Melody purred, and Harmony joined in a moment later, a soft growl of affection towards me in their throats. Carol went a deep red. Mackenzie was trying to look anywhere, but at us and Kim laughed down the her end of the table.

It was Kim's turn to grab our attention, "Everyone, I know we could talk about my brother's sexual prowess all night long. However, we need to pull our focus back to Carol and Mackenzie." We all looked at the thoroughly embarrassed women sitting across from me.

"There was a reason that you came to be here tonight. However, I guess my first question is how did you find us. This address is not listed, for privacy reasons, and second, how did you get through the gate?" Asked my sister.

"Mum and I drove here to Bathurst a week ago," Mackenzie stated, her expression somewhat muted. "We watched your office to see you come and go over the past few days. Then, when we spotted dad's truck, we followed you back here. Tonight, when we drove up, Pa had just driven in, so we drove in a bit behind him before the gate closed."

"A little unorthodox, but it got you here, however it still doesn't explain why you are here?" Kim asked, then continued. "Mackenzie, the agreement for your trust states no contact with Terry. So, you have to know that Terry really doesn't want to see you. My brother has been rebuilding his life without you two in it, and I think it has been almost a year since he thought of either of you!"

"About eight months, Kim," I responded, my voice cracked just a little. "The girls know I take the afternoon off on Mackenzie's birthday every year and come sit on the deck here to lament what was." I couldn't look at Mackenzie, and as often happened when I thought about her, there was a single tear upon my cheek.

"We let him have an hour or two out here quietly for reflection. He sits with his rum and just stares into nothing. But when the sun sets, he comes back in and looks after us like he does every other day of the year." Melody reported for me, the look she gave Carol and Mackenzie wasn't quite hate, but I don't think it was far off.

I now stole a glance at Mackenzie. She was staring at me, tears threatening to erupt from her eyes. After all these years, despite every effort to move on and deny myself, I felt the embers of love for Mackenzie reignite deep in my soul. I tore my eyes away from her as I couldn't let anything become alive for them. I would not let her nor her mother ruin the life I had built with my girls here. My wives tightened their grips on my hands, knowing my emotions were starting to swirl within my mind.

"So, what are you doing here, Carol, Mackenzie?" Kim asked, also sensing my growing conflict.

They looked at each other.

"We didn't have too much choice," Carol started, her eyes downcast. "Things haven't been great for the last few years. In fact, they have been downright horrible."

She looked back up at each of us for sympathy but found nothing more than blank stares and people waiting for their questions to be answered. She sighed and continued.

"Right after Stephen was sentenced, I knew that we would never be a couple again, he was going to be in prison for a long time, so I divorced him. It took a few months, but his lawyers kicked us out of the house as it was his before we married, we got a little money, but not a lot, and since then, Mackenzie and I have been living in a two-bedroom townhouse on the outskirts of Maitland."

"Are you looking for sympathy, Carol?" Kim asked.

"No Kim," Carol said quickly, sounding contrite, not deceitful. "After that last day in court when Mackenzie heard what Stephen had tried to do to Terry, she fell apart, and I knew that I had burnt every bridge I ever had with Terry. There was no path of redemption for us. I heard that day, he had remarried, but I never expected that he had married both of you." She gave a wan little smile. "Even at my most attractive, I could not compare to one of you, let alone both of you, and let's face it, my better days are behind me." she sighed again for sympathy, receiving none. "After that day, I understood that I had not only destroyed my relationship with a man that gave me everything, but I had done everything I could to destroy Terry's relationship with Mackenzie."

Her little smile became lost as she went blank, staring into nothing.

"Oh, I could try to justify my actions by saying that I was encouraged by Stephen and that he was the true fiend behind it all. But we all know that isn't true. I could have divorced Terry and married Stephen but helped Mackenzie keep in touch with her father, but I knew I had to destroy Terry because if I didn't, I could never fully commit myself to Stephen."

"Why?" I asked, my voice cracked. I was curious for the very first time since this all began. I wish I wasn't, but I was. For the first time in so many years, I felt Carol look at me, not just to assess what she could get out of me, but genuinely look at me as if she cared what I thought.

She sighed, "Because I still love you, Terry. I knew if I didn't destroy you, I would want to get back to you someday. The affair with Stephen was a thrill, but he was only ever interested in himself. He was also sterile and had one of the smallest dicks the world has ever seen."

The wan little smile returned at that admission. But I could feel my wives want to scream, admittedly so did I, but I squeezed their hands as they did to mine, and they said nothing. Carol continued.

"You were right that day in front of the courthouse, Terry, when you told me I dreamt of you. I dreamt of you taking me back and fucking me till I couldn't walk, making my mind blank with the pleasure of your body like when we were young." She briefly looked at her daughter, "Sorry Mackenzie, but it's true, I dreamt that your father would fuck me, forgive me and then make love to me forever. In my dreams, I didn't care that he was a plumber. I just wanted to be loved. Unfortunately, Stephen never did truly love us. To him, we were props to make him look better.