Wedding Crashers Pt. 08

This story would make more sense if you read the chapters in order. It is a cuckold tale and should not be confused with my other BTB and romance style stories.

Tags: Jail. Parole. Sex. Cheating Wife.

"She was a fast machine,

She kept her motor clean,

She was the best damn woman that I've ever seen..."

There was a thump on the cell door.

"Jukebox, you're up next." The court room security guard called out.

I stood up and looked at myself in the metal mirror that was screwed to the wall. The suit probably fitted me the best it ever had. I'd dropped a splash under five kilograms in the last six months. Prison food and some exercise had done wonders for me.

"Hey Jukebox, do you take requests?" The guy from the cell next yelled.

"Only if I know the song."

"How about... shut the fuck up next time?"

I heard him and the guy on the other side laugh. It was okay, it wasn't the first time I'd heard that joke. After my new lawyer had arrived and I changed my story they interrogated me for a couple of days in Tamworth before formally charging me with numerous drug and firearms offences. They shipped me to Long Bay Jail in Sydney where they had me locked down in isolation.

Gooses thought shutting me in a room for twenty two hours a day would make me change my story. In my job I regularly spend eighteen hours a day in a machinery cab so I was used to solitude. I was getting a bit sick of it when I remembered an interview I heard with an old guy who'd been kept in solitary by the North Koreans for six months at the end of the Korean War. He passed the time singing show tunes. I updated the idea a bit and 'Jukebox' was born. It was sort of a habit now when I was locked down.

After the stint in solitary didn't work I got shifted around every couple of weeks. Parklea, Silverwater, Lithgow, Bathurst and Goulburn. All for a short duration making me a constant new guy. The Renegades connections worked out for me there. The word was passed around pretty quickly. Mess with me and you have them to deal with. There was still the usual stuff for new prisoners or freshies as we were known. They went through my stuff and took what they wanted but they left me alone.

I'd been back at Long Bay in the remand section for the last five weeks. The detectives were still coming every week trying to get me to cooperate. Prison didn't scare me as much anymore but they were now threatening to take the farm off me through the confiscation of proceeds of crime act. My lawyer said they had no chance of making it stick.

Today was D day. My sentencing hearing. The day before my lawyer had made his pleas, friends had given character references. The prosecution had asked I be made an example of for other offenders. A rich private school old boy who tried to take a short cut profiting from other's misery. As I walked up the staircase that led to the dock I remembered the confidence of my lawyer the previous evening.

"It went well Nathan. I think you might even sneak away with weekend detention."

After all the formalities were attended to the judge asked me to stand. Soon after he started reading his deliberations I knew my lawyer had got the prediction horribly wrong.

"In my twenty five years on the bench I've heard so many stories of a good person making one mistake or error of judgement. They all start to blend into one eventually. The inevitable line up of upstanding citizens willing to vouch for the accused good character. The flimsy excuses of stress or depression. As I sat and listened yesterday I wondered if those fine citizens would be standing behind the accused if their son or daughter was hooked on the drugs their friend had assisted to manufacture."

Yep I knew I was screwed. He droned on for another ten minutes berating me and society for moral turpitude and greed. Then came the sentence.

"I only wish the crown had have been able to prove you had had contact with the drugs, guns or even one of the drums left in your storage. Then I would have been able to put you away for very long time to consider the error of your ways. As it is the import manifest which shows the frankly unbelievable amount of chemicals you had stored there is enough to put you in the higher end of the lesser charges. So it is with some disappointment that I can only sentence you to eight years of incarceration with a non parole period of five years. This sentence will be on top of the six months you have already served on remand. I hope you take this time to reflect on the countless lives your activities will have destroyed. Also perhaps others will read of this judgement and make better decisions than you sir. Bailiff you may take the prisoner away."

As I sat in my cell after my lawyer was let in.

"Well he was a cranky cunt today wasn't he?" He laughed but I didn't. "Look we will appeal and hopefully we might get a year or two knocked off but the old prick didn't leave the appeals court too much wriggle room. Still you'll be looked after."

He patted me on the back and was about to leave when he stopped.

"Oh I almost forgot. Your wife was in this week. We filled out an application for an expedited divorce. If you could sign it then it should be a formality."

He passed me a bulky A4 envelope.

"I thought we had to wait for twelve months separation?"

"You're going to jail for at least five years Nathan. The court will consider that enough of a reason to expedite the process. Claire wants to get remarried before the baby comes."

"But Jim's in the big house as well."

"She's not marrying Jim." The lawyer laughed. "Eleanor would never allow that. No, the new guy was with her..." the guy thought for a bit, "big guy, islander or kiwi, Tiny?"

"Bullshit."

"I'm just the messenger."

"Well tell her this. If she wants me to sign she better have the guts to come and ask me herself. Face to face."

At the end of the day myself and the other souls sentenced or remanded returned to Long Bay. For me I was processed again, this time as a convict. General population has different coloured clothes to the remand prisoners. I was strip searched, appointments made for psychological testing, issued with my bed linen then assigned a cell. For two weeks you are assessed then given a security rating. Either high, medium or low. Where you are sent after depends on your that rating.

I was hoping for low as they usually get sent to prison farms. My cell mates told me no new guys doing more than a 'coat and tie', prison slang for five years, get a low rating. I ended up with medium and was scheduled to be sent to Bathurst. I wasn't supposed to have visitors in the first two weeks but the day before I was to be transferred I got called in. Claire was there to see me.

I hadn't seen her since the afternoon at the Renegade clubhouse. In truth I hadn't seen much of anyone apart from the lawyer. Friends gave character references in court but didn't visit me. My parents pretty much disowned me. Mum died two months after my arrest and my father didn't want me attending the funeral. XX had been arrested with Jim and was currently in prison herself.

I knew enough about pregnancy to know Claire would look different but it was still a shock when she walked into the room. Her face was blotchy and more rounded. Not as rounded as her belly. It looked like she had a basketball under her dress. Then there were the same thin shapely legs poking out below. Her face took on a pained expression as she sat on the chair opposite me and got comfortable. It didn't change very much when she finally spoke to me.

"Well I'm here. Let's get this over with." She said tersely as she passed the papers across for me to sign. "Just sign in the four places the stickers point to."

I picked up the papers and started reading through them.

"Fuck! You don't have to read them just sign them. It's just a request to waive the waiting time for a divorce."

"You know I like to be thorough." I was being an arsehole but I reckon I was due some arsehole time.

"Ohh fuck." Claire grunted clearly exasperated. "Why did I even have to come here? You could have gone through all this with the lawyer."

"Because I think I deserve just a little bit of your time." I slammed my hand down on the table. The prison guard standing close by took a step towards me so I held both my hands up as a gesture of submission and he relaxed. "Six months I've been in jail and you haven't come to visit once."

"Why would I?"

"Maybe to explain how you got Jim's baby inside you."

"You're a big boy Nathan. Well let's see, he got his big cock and stuck it in my little v v and..."

"You know what I mean. How did you even hook up again?"

Claire looked away with a sigh.

"It's history now. There's no point rehashing it."

"I want to know and I'm not signing until I do."

"He was outside the school in the car park the first Friday of the new year."

"So he just fucked you there in the back of the car."

"No, he came to apologise. For the other three..." Claire's voice trailed off and she glanced at the guard. "I asked if he did it. We went for coffee that's all."

"So when did you start fucking him?"

"Do you want me to wait till you get your cock out so you can jerk off?"

"Do you want me to sign?"

I think she genuinely thought about walking out. She definitely shifted in her seat, then rolled her eyes and sighed.

"The next week."

"How many times?"

"Just once that week then two or three times a week after that."

"Where?"

"A motel at first, then the clubhouse. Is that enough now?"

"No. So you deliberately discouraged me from cumming in you so Jim got exclusive access?"

"No, not at first. It just sort of happened that way and I was going to go to the doctors and get another script but, well... I didn't so..." she waved her hand in front of the baby bump. "When I told him he was excited, said he was going to look after me."

"And how did that work out for you?"

"Fuck off Nathan. Are you going to sign or not?"

I relented and signed. I was handing her the papers when I snatched them back.

"Why Tiny? Did he draw the short straw? Going to keep you warm till Jim gets out?"

Claire hard face dissolved and she looked down.

"He got out. He was attacked last week. He's in a coma at RPA."

"Who attacks the boss of the Renegades?"

"He's not boss anymore. Got voted out. It was sanctioned payback for killing the other three. They just went one kick too far."

It wasn't the best news I'd heard. I was supposed to be under their protection. What if they decided to rescind it? I passed Claire the papers. She took the bundle and stuffed them into her bag. As she was about to walk out the door I called out.

"So that's it? No apology? No sorry I wasted seven years of your life?"

"Fucking typical. We got married eight years ago." My soon to be ex wife turned on her heels and left.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"Hey Jukebox? You gonna miss the place?"

"Fuck no. I can't wait to get out."

I hefted the spray pack a bit higher on my back and moved on to the next patch of weeds. It was my last day working in the ground staff crew. A year into my sentence I'd been downgraded to low security and the Kirkconnell Correctional Centre. It was a prison built in the Sunny Corner State Forest. It had originally been a reforestation camp. My previous experience with chemicals and the fact I had a chemcert certificate meant I'd been put in charge of ground maintenance.

As jails go it wasn't to bad. The food was better than Bathurst. Also the open spaces made it more bearable, for me anyway. Yeah there were still fences and guards but on the whole they were less intrusive. I had been warned by my "protectors" that they would have trouble looking after me in low security. Not too many bikers make the low security threshold so I would be on my own.

However in my year in Bathurst I reckon I learnt the secret to survival. Be valued by both the prisoners and the screws. So in my three years at Kirkconnell I'd walked the fine line. I established a reputation as someone who could get things. Using connections with the Renegades, guards got paid and my fellow inmates got contraband.

My appeal had been successful in knocking one year off my non parole period. I'd aced the hearings so I was to be released the next day. While outwardly I was full of bravado about being released, inside I was shitting myself. I really didn't know what I was going to go back to. The government seizing the farm with the proceeds of criminal activity act had failed. Claire taking out her share had not. We'd had 1200 acres. Not a big farm but enough to support one family. The 550 acre back block a couple of kilometres away from the homestead was sold two and a half years ago to pay Claire out. The tractor and harvester had been sold as well to cover the remaining lease payments I owed on them. The land I had left was leased to my neighbour.

The next day I was taken with five others to Lithgow and dropped off at the train station. We were each given an Opel card to allow us on the train and bus network. As well a cash card with one hundred dollars on it. I suppose I was luckier than the rest. Because of the lease payments on the farm I also had money in my own bank account. The others would have to live on the cashcard till Centrelink put another six hundred dollars in their accounts two days after release.

Two guys got off the train at Penrith. The rest continued on with me to central station. I said goodbye to them there and went to the country train section. It was going to be a convoluted trip home for me. The train to Tamworth didn't leave till the next morning so I was stuck in Sydney for the night. I had an appointment with my parole officer in Tamworth the following afternoon. I'd stay in the unit my mother and father had bought tomorrow night. My dad died last year so it was empty and I thought I'd probably sell it. The neighbour who was leasing my place had offered to give me a lift home from there the following day.

I found a hotel close by. It wasn't the Ritz but it sure beat a dormitory with five other guys. After a long shower I ordered in food and a blonde. She wasn't keen on my abode and in the end only agreed to come if I met her in the lobby first. It was quick, clean and so much more satisfying than my left hand. As the train snaked north the next morning I found myself becoming more comfortable. The endless suburbia disappeared and eventually we reached some open farmland.

At Tamworth I caught a taxi to the Community Corrections Office. The driver gave me side eye all the way and seemed almost surprised when I paid him. Inside I handed over the letter I'd been given and was told to sit and wait till I was called. Almost twenty minutes later a lady called him into her office. She was on the hefty side of her ideal body mass index. Mid maybe late forties, probably quite a looker in her day and she still put herself together with style.

Her name was Danielle but she assured me everyone calls her Danni. We went through the terms of my parole. I had to report to her once a week. Each time I would be drug tested. I had to find gainful employment. Danni had been out to the farm and approved my accomodation but would be doing spot checks out there once a month. I wasn't allowed to leave the district without her permission. I wasn't allowed to associate with any known felons. I had to sign a form to allow her access to my bank statements.

Danni bought in another guy. He was a liaison with Centrelink to help with getting a job and organising income supplements. I had money in the bank so I didn't qualify for income support. The jobs were mostly labouring. One interested me, a fencing contractor was looking for someone four days a week. After that Danni made sure I had a way to get home then I was back out on the street.

Mum and Dad's unit was in a quasi retirement village set up. A few curtains twitched when I walked up to the front door and opened it. I'd been allowed out for Dad's funeral but only for the service and internment. Dad's lawyer had given me the key before I was taken away from the graveside. As I looked around I suspected the place was much as it was when my Dad went into hospital for a his knee operation that went bad. It was sad, everywhere I looked reminded me of them and how much I'd hurt them.

My neighbour wasn't going to be in town till the afternoon so in the morning I went to Dad's lawyer. I gave him the key and told him he should get someone to clean the place out and get it on the market. I'd filled a bag with some keepsakes and the rest could go.

"You do remember they didn't name you as a beneficiary. Any money raised from the sale will go to their nominated charities."

"Yeah I know and I understand."

"You could challenge it. I waited because I knew you'd be out soon. Your father, he did it early when he was still angry. He changed..." He pushed through key back towards me.

"No, it's okay." I pushed it back.

I left and went to the machinery dealership where I was meeting Tom. Although he was my neighbour I'd only met him three times. Once at the auction where he outbid me then twice over the fence at home. He'd only bought the block six months before my forced holiday plus he'd still been running another place fifty kilometres away. I was a bit early and Tom was late so I hung around for an hour. Unlike other places in Tamworth I knew people here. I'd bought my harvester here, knew the salesmen and the two guys in spare parts. Today they didn't want to know me.

I ended up sitting outside in the sun. A new Toyota Landcruiser pulled up with all the bells and whistles. Tom got out and gave me a wave. He might have been slightly younger than me but like a lot of farmers his middle showed he spend too much time sitting in machinery cabs.

"I've just got to pick up a couple of belts." He said as he went inside.

When he came out we shook hands and I made for the passenger side front door.

"You're in the back on my side mate. Just picked up my Hayden from the bus for school holidays so Ashley is in the front."

I followed him around and got in. Hayden looked like he was fourteen or fifteen and he had a Kings School football jumper on. Ash was Tom's wife. As I pulled out my seat belt she glanced around. The look on her face was somewhere in between 'oh I've just trodden in dogshit,' and 'I believe in capital punishment for drug crime.' Tom went through the formal introductions. As you would expect the conversation was rather stilted. It's not like they wanted to ask or I wanted to talk about what I'd been doing for the last four years.

When we were driving past Tom's farm I marvelled at the transformation. A water delivery channel ran along the roadside. Rows and rows of young green cotton plants stretched away into the distance. Above them the steel architecture of lateral irrigators. We got to my boundary and the only change was no permanent irrigation infrastructure. The channel was still there but siphons lay on the bank suggesting this was flood irrigated.

"You're irrigating on my place? Must be a good bore." I said.

"It Is a good bore but only enough water for my acreage. Trouble is you really can't just keep irrigating the same country. It needs a break, especially from cotton."

They dropped me off and left quickly. It was a surreal experience walking through the back gate and up to the house. Here it seemed little had changed from the last time I walked the same path except the grass was overgrown. Inside it was a different story. A lot of the furniture was gone. I was relieved to see Claire had left a bed and the fridge but I had to go outside again and drag the outdoor setting inside so I had somewhere to sit and eat.

There were a few old sheets and towels left in the linen cupboard. I had a shower, made the bed. With my work clothes back on I felt almost normal again. I did have to find a belt to hold the pants up. After I plugged the fridge in I sat down and made a list of food I would need. Walking over to the shed I found my trusty old ute parked in the workshop. The bonnet was up as Tom had kindly put a charger on the battery. There was a thick layer of dust over the rest of it. I checked the oil and water then started it up. It started easily and purred as I opened the roller door. The plan was to give it a quick hit with the pressure washer before going to town to get supplies. However it seemed to have gone the same way my furniture had so I just let the drive blow most of it away.