Man Talk
Kiefer paced his bedroom furiously as his brother leaned against
the windowsill overlooking the garden his face grimly set.
“He’s unbelievable.” Tadgh complained.
“He gave her a key to lock us out of her room. How are we supposed to fix things with her if she’s able to lock herself away from us?”
“I didn’t think he meant it when he said he wanted her for
himself.”
“He very clearly did. His hands were all over her at dinner.” Kiefer grunted, “and I know the look on her face. She liked it. She liked his touch.”
“I figured. She wasn’t asking him to stop, but maybe she was doing it to fuck with us, specifically you. I mean we both know she’s flirting with me to hurt you. I’m hoping to make her fall in love with me while she’s trying to screw you over. Maybe she’s going to use Dad to mess with you.”
“I love her,” Kiefer said quietly.
“What if she goes with Dad’s offer to divorce you and marry him.
and be his wife?”
Kiefer exhaled loudly, his nostrils flared and his fists clenching, “we both know I can’t go against his orders, Tadgh and if he orders me to divorce her, I will do it As much as I love her, it’s
Man Talk
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to divorce her it isn’t only for her good or his but for mine and you know it.”
“It’s bullshit,” Tadgh whispered, his own fingers in a clench.
A knock on the door made them both look towards it as their father pushed into the room with a glint in his eye.
“Dad.”
“She loves you.”
Kiefer frowned at his father’s words. “I don’t think so.”
“I do. She loves you but you’re not enough for her. She loves you but she can’t trust you because you hurt her. She needs to feel safe. I make her feel safe.”
“You do?”
“I’m the one she’s allowing to sleep in her bed tonight.”
“Fuck, Dad!” Tadgh threw his hands up in the air furiously. “You kicked us out of her bed so you could climb in it?”
“She doesn’t want me to have sex, at least not tonight.” Lorcan smiled at the confusion on his son’s face. “She wants me to keep her safe and to keep you both out. You forced yourself on her in a way which doesn’t make her feel safe. There is a difference between being dominant and being an asshole. You need to respect her boundaries, her limits, and her words. She hasn’t felt safe in years. She’s been looking over her shoulder, hiding, running and scared. She woke up to you the other morning. spooning her Tadgh and she didn’t invite you into her bed. You,”
Man Talk
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bed with her and Egan and refused to give her space. Do you really think this makes a woman who is terrified and angry with you want to be with her more? You’re both idiots.”
“What do we do? I can’t lose her again Dad. Even if she’s just living where I know she’s safe, I’ll take it.” Kiefer rubbed his hand over his face frustratedly.
“She is willing to try something,” Lorcan said seriously, “but you two need an open mind.”
“What do you mean?” Tadgh frowned.
“She’s going on a date with Kiefer tomorrow night. Just the two of you. I suggest you stop putting up walls and let them fall for
once.”
“Wait. What?” Kiefer looked at his father in confusion.
“Your wife is a complex woman, Kiefer and she misses her first love. She misses the way you chased her all over the world to be with her. You chased her and then you caught her and then you forgot her here in this house. Chase her again. You are her first love, but she is also yours. Do not lose sight of this.”
“Yet, you’re the one crawling in her bed tonight.” Tadgh complained.
“I am.” Lorcan grinned, “because Genesis also very much wants to be Daddy’s girl.”
“Ew.”
“Fuck off,” Kiefer made a gagging noise.
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give her the thing she needs in the way of an older man who gives her love and an affection and safety she needs as a girl who grew up craving the attention of a male figure in her life. Kiefer will give her the first love rush her heart still craves.”
“And I’m to be left on the side?”
“Tadgh,” Lorcan laughed, “you are going to give her the bad girl vibe she needs fulfilled. She wants you. She will fall in love with you. You make her feel like she’s being naughty and in control of her life. When she is with you, she feels she is living out a fantasy. Between the three of us, we’re going to give her the safety she craves, the sweetness of her first love and the naughtiness of what should be forbidden. Also,” he wiggled his fingers between his sons, “you two can share her or whatever it is you intend to do with her in your bed, but I don’t ever want to see it and you are never allowed in my bed with her. Understood?”
“You actually think she’s going to agree to this?”
“Yes. I do. If you want your wife back, Kiefer, open your fucking mind.”
“Dad, this is not even close to normal. Do you understand this? It’s bad enough Tadgh is wanting me to bring him into my relationship with Gen. I’ve been with other women with Tadgh. before. He is my best friend and my twin and frankly there isn’t much on this planet we haven’t done together and having sex. with the same woman is one of them, but this is different. She is my wife, and I love her. He loves her too and I can’t keep hurting him and driving this wedge deeper between us when I know he can bridge the gap between Gen and I.” He waved at his father, “but this is highly irregular and weird. It’s weird.”
Man Talk
“It’s only weird if you make it weird.”
“Do you hear yourself? You want to be in a poly relationship with your sons and my wife.”
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“No. I don’t. I want to be in a relationship of my own with your wife. I don’t want a relationship with either of you. There will be times I’m gone for chunks, back to Ireland or dealing with business in Europe or the west coast.”
“And will you keep lovers?”
“No.” He answered Tadgh’s question. “I intend to be completely devoted to Genesis. There will be times I want her to myself the same way you both will want her to yourself. I don’t care about your relationships with her. Do it separate or together, I’m not bothered. When we are intimate, when I’m with her and she is with me, it will be only us.”
“I think you’re wrong,” Kiefer said suddenly.
“About?”
“She doesn’t need a daddy. She’s a strong independent woman who took on the Irish mob to demonstrate exactly how strong she is. She doesn’t need some old man making her call him sir or Daddy the way you like your lovers to do.”
Lorcan gave a laugh, “is this what you’re thinking? Kiefer, ten minutes ago, I was in her room, cuddling her on my lap and told her if she was daddy’s good girl I’d come back and sleep with her and do you know what she asked me?”
Tadgh grimaced, “I’m afraid to ask.”
Man Talk
“If I promised to keep her safe.”
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“So, she doesn’t want sex from you then, only an ogre to protect her.” Kiefer grunted and waved at his father size.
“Tell that to the wet spot on my pants from where she was sitting.”
“This isn’t our decision,” Tadgh suddenly chimed in. “It’s hers.”
“You cannot be going along with this!” Kiefer’s mouth hung open at his brother’s sudden switch.
“Look, as long as I don’t ever have to be in the room when the old man is getting his rocks off, I think I can deal with it. I love her and part of loving her Kiefer is giving her what she needs. Fuck. I stepped aside eight years ago because all I wanted was for her to be happy. If Dad makes her happy, I’ll step aside because I want her happy. If it’s all three of us she needs to make her feel safe, loved, protected and like the desirable woman she is, then I’m on board. So long as Dad isn’t sabotaging
us.”
“I’m not sabotaging any of you. I’m trying valiantly to save your ass,” he pointed at Kiefer, “especially yours because you’re going at her like a freight train, full steam ahead and trying to bully her into reconciliation when she needs care and a deft hand. She isn’t one of your men to order about.”
“I know this!”
“Do you? Because from what I’ve seen and heard from the staff,
from
, from my informants who saw you with her and the surveillance I got back from the mall, the aquarium and
my men,
Man Talk
trying to help a woman heal.”
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“What the fuck did I do in the toy store?” Kiefer asked of the trip. they’d taken after the aquarium.
“She reminded you how you did not need to buy the boy’s affection and to not spoil him with every toy under the sun. What did you tell her, Kiefer?”
“She was undermining me.
“What did you say to her?”
“I told her I was his father, and she’d robbed me of six years of his life and if I wanted to buy him a few things to make up for the Christmases and birthdays I’d missed then I would.”
“What else and you know exactly what I’m talking about.”
Kiefer looked away from Tadgh’s curious gaze and then shrugged, “I told her she better get used to me being the man in the relationship and to stop arguing with me all the fucking time.”
“Idiot,” Tadgh threw his hands up in frustration.
“Agreed,” Lorcan folded his forearms over his beefy chest.
“You’re going to steal her from me!”
“We can’t steal what you legitimately don’t have, Kiefer. I love you son. I love you more than anything and if I thought for a singular second allowing you to take the reins here and be the only person in Genesis’s life would be what is best for you, then
Man Talk “Then go.”
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“You are not what is best for her, and she is not what is best. for you, not the way you are now.” Lorcan said bluntly, “you hurt her deeply and your personality isn’t built for remorse or handling guilt with any kind of ease. You also are a workaholic, and you left her alone before and I know for a fact you will again. unless you make a conscious effort to change. With three of us rotating through her home, she won’t be alone. She shouldn’t be. Her whole life she was alone. She deserves to have her family with her at all times. Between the three of us, she will have it.”
“Fine but I swear to God if Jerren suddenly pops up and wants at go at her I’m shooting him in the face.”
“Jerren doesn’t want her. He’s more into his admin assistant at the company. He’s been banging her for two years. I’m surprised he hasn’t put a ring on it yet.”
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“How do you know this stuff?”
“There’s a reason I’m still the head of this family and all our businesses boys,” Lorcan smirked as he backed out of the room. “Now I’m off to cuddle my girl and keep her safe. Sweet dreams!”
Kiefer flung himself down on the bed, pressed his palms into his eyeballs to stem the rise of tears he’d not shed since he was four years old and wondered how the hell, he’d wound up here.
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