Double the Trouble

-meeting-

Ashton's POV

"Hurry up guys! The meeting starts in an hour," I yelled up the stairs, annoyed that I've been calling everyone for twenty minutes.

A few seconds later everyone came trudging down the stairs, Emmersyn trailing behind looking quite sleepy.

"What's wrong love?" I asked, wrapping my arm around her shoulders as she passed me.

She looked up at me, her eyes off centered and her head drifted back slightly. Her eyes widened as she tried to steady herself. "Just not feeling to great," She muttered, forcing a half smile onto her face.

"Oh no, I'll just call and postpone the meeting. Go back upstairs and lay down." I began to grab my phone but Em stuck her hand out, shaking her head.

"I'm really fine, I promise, it will go away." She sent me a promising smile, I sighed, only giving in because management made the meeting sound very important.

The boys started heading out to the car, Jack and Em followed, and I locked up the house before chasing after them.

I had absolutely no clue what this meeting was going to be about, but I was praying that it had nothing to do with another tour because with everything going on at home since Em got the concussion a week ago, a tour was the last thing on my mind.

I drove, maybe just a little, too fast to get to the meeting on time. As we walked in I lectured jack about keeping an eye on his sister and calling me if he needed me. When we walked in one of the secretaries rushed us into the meeting room, ordering Em and Jack to stay outside.

As always, the vibes of the room changed when we walked in. It was awkward and quiet, with a lot of tension; which didn't help my nerves.

I looked at the boys before we sat down, none of them were too reassuring.

"Good morning boys," One of our managers spoke, the one who usually did the most talking.

"Good morning." We muttered.

He opened his brief case up on the long table that stood between us, he pulled out a stack of papers passing one out to each of us.

"So, as you may realize, our publicity agreement has come to an end." He spoke again, pausing this time to get a reply from us.

I raised an eyebrow, opening my mouth to speak but was cut off by Calum. "What publicity agreement?"

But as Calum asked, it clicked. Today made a year since we adopted Emmersyn and Jack, which meant we were supposed to give them up and make up some tragic story about why, according to our contract.

I suddenly felt lightheaded, overriding anything management said took a lot of effort.

"The one about the adoption, read your paper, it says it in the bottom paragraph." The manager responded.

"No." Luke slammed his hand down on the table, "That's not happening. Ashton told you right after he adopted them that we were never taking them back."

"Luke, stop yelling," Calum whispered, knowing we were just going to dig ourself into a deeper hole if we got mad.

Luke grunted, leaning back in his chair.