A Meal Together
Entering the dining room, Genesis was surprised to see how many people were sitting around the dining room table.
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Several of the O’Reilly soldiers, many of them who were in the warehouses the night before both at the dock and the training center, were all around the late afternoon lunch table. It smelled
more like breakfast than lunch and she noted the table was
indeed set as if it was for breakfast.
She stumbled a bit as the entire tableful of men, including her six–year–old son got up on his feet to welcome her into the room. Egan was beaming at her, his smile wide and he raced to pull her chair from the table so she could take her seat.
“What is going on?” she asked him as she sat down.
“Everyone says you’re a hero,” Egan whispered, his cheeks turning red. “It’s really neat.”
She looked around the table and gave an appreciative nod and waved at everyone to sit. “Full house in here this afternoon?” she questioned changing the subject to hide her embarrassment as she took her seat at the table. Her cheeks felt they were on fire.
Kiefer came up behind her and dropped a kiss to her head. “We have a bunch of men making renovations through the house and clean up. Egan mentioned how he’d like to have breakfast for dinner but since we won’t be here for dinner, we’re doing it for a late lunch carly dinner. Everyone though wanted to join us, and
A Meal Together
I think it’s a good idea. The team is impressed and wanted to show their appreciation.”
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Allan nodded, “despite how precise your shots were some of the others weren’t so there are holes and such we needed to get patched up from their wayward shots.” He grinned at her, “remind me not to piss you off ever because,” he gave a long whistle, “you could give an Olympian a run for their money at target practice.”
“My instructor back in Calgary was amazing.”
“It’s not all the instructor,” Allan shook his head seriously. “There is legitimate skill, but it was clear how intuitive you are with your weapon, Genesis. If I wasn’t so terrified in the moment, I’d have been drooling.”
Kiefer smacked Allan in the back of the head before he sat down. next to her. “If Allan is done talking about how sexy my wife is,” he shot the other man a heated glance and Allan just grinned back at him, “the men are here because we also have a bunch of funerals and burials to plan and sort out.”
Genesis knew some of those burials were Russian mercenaries left on this property and the other. “Is there anything I can do to help?” Guilt the men died protecting her was ramping up in her stomach. She loaded her plate full of carbs intending to eat her feelings and then added a giant rasher of bacon.
“There will be but for now, we will get you to focus on Dad. Jerren and I will deal with the notifications and the arrangements while Tadgh is resting this evening.”
A Meal Together
3/9
Monica was sitting next to Jerren. She looked at Genesis with. her eyes watering and sniffed, “thank you for last night, Gen. The first room they came to upstairs was mine and honestly, I know I wouldn’t have survived considering Jerren said the men who came here were all military trained.”
“No, I have to thank you.” Genesis met her gaze directly. “If you weren’t here, holding Egan and staying with him, I don’t know what I would have done. I couldn’t have gotten him safely to the panic room without you, Monica. I mean it. You were vital to our survival. I also can’t help but appreciate how you didn’t freak out, cry, scream and act like the airheads in the movies. You did everything I told you. I really needed you there and I mean it when I say, I don’t know what I would have done.”
“You would have managed things like the boss you are,” Monica was blunt. “Genesis, I’m telling you, my first thought was to hide under the bed or the closet and yours was to dig through Jerren’s drawers and find his weapons. Also, once you locked us in, I cried a lot. Good thing Egan sleeps like he’s comatose because he would have seen me ugly crying.”
“Speaking of Jerren’s drawers,” she looked at Jerren, “while I am infinitely grateful for the gun and ammunition, we need a better storage option considering we have a kid underfoot.”
“I’ll take care of it. I’m going to put weapon depots on every floor. We’ll need codes to get into it so little hands can’t get hold of things they shouldn’t,” Jerren rubbed Egan’s head as the boy shovelled pancakes into his mouth, “but the best thing we need to do is educate Egan. As part of your training and going to our
A Meal Together
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range, we want to start training Egan with weapons. We’ll start him with a BB gun, but we also really want to talk to him about gun safety.”
She looked at Kiefer and knew he was waiting for her to approve Jerren’s plan, and she gave a nod. “I don’t like the idea of him using guns and bullets. He’s only six.”
“He is only six but at his age, I was using BB guns and by eight I was using a revolver. We won’t do anything without your express permission Gen, but the gun safety is paramount. We have too many people around with weapons and we want to make sure he knows what he can and cannot touch.” Kiefer squeezed her hand on the table, “we will keep him safe, but we need to begin his training too.”
“I agree.” She nodded.
Jerren spoke again, “and after last night, we’ve already implemented an entirely new protocol for the house and the men who will be on site when we are not. There will not ever be another night where we leave thirty men who get outnumbered by six or seven militia again. Our men, especially the ones assigned to our home, will be better trained. We’ll also not be as reliant on having a team using the security room to assess. Everyone is going to be trained the way we train the guys who protect Lorcan, Kiefer and Tadgh.” Jerren said bluntly.
“Can I learn?” Monica’s voice interrupted in a breathy plea.
“No.” Jerren shook his head. “It’s not safe, Monica.”
A Meal Together
5/9
She wasn’t asking Jerren though. She was looking straight at Genesis. “Gen, will you teach me? I was scared last night, and I want to be able to protect my future children the way you protected Egan.”
“Sweetheart,” Jerren spoke softly, “you almost burned down my office with a printer you couldn’t plug in.”
“I’m not saying I’m going to be kickass like Genesis is the first try, Jerren but I want to learn. Don’t count me out simply because I’m a klutz. I won’t even argue if you treat me and Egan exactly the same with the instructions but last night, I felt powerless. I didn’t like it. You want me to be part of your world, Jerren. You talked to me this morning about getting married and being with you and having a family of our own. If Gen and I can rely on each other when you guys aren’t here, I would. feel better about it because last night was the worst night of my life and I never want to relive it. You needed to leave to go find Genesis and in doing so, I was left here alone with a bunch of men who were as trained as the first group of men. No offenset to them but I sat with Egan in his room wishing to god you’d left me in the panic room because I didn’t trust the fact, despite there were a hundred of them here, they could keep me safe and I couldn’t keep us safe,” she waved between her and Egan.
“You train her,” Kiefer shut down Jerren’s protests. “She’s right. We failed her last night because we weren’t training our home staff better. If six men outnumbered our thirty, she needs to be able to at least fire a weapon.”
Jerren leaned sideways and kissed Monica’s temple. “I love you. We’ll make sure you feel better equipped.”
A Meal Together
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“Thank you,” she whispered looking at the table as if shocked by her outburst.
“I will give you the same training as I give Egan. You will obey every single instruction, and I mean it Monica, I don’t want to hear a single complaint about me doing this in baby steps.”
“I won’t. I promise.” Monica clapped her hands. “What do you think Egan? Are we going to learn how to defend ourselves and. protect our home together?”
Egan’s eyes lit up as he looked at Monica and nodded excitedly.
Genesis snickered at Kiefer, “you all might want to wear full body armor because I’m thinking you might get shot with BBs if he gets distracted.”
Kiefer gave a shake of his head at her words, “we’ll have a conversation with him man–to–man about respect.”
Monica shrugged. “Far older men treat me with far less respect,
Kiefer.”
“You asked her to marry you?” Genesis asked Jerren with a grin.
“I did. We’re going ring shopping next weekend. It doesn’t feel right to do it today when we’re burying our family.” Jerren gave a bittersweet smile as Monica squeezed his leg.
“Mom,” Egan look bacon off Genesis’s plate and ate it with a grin, “when we see Granddad Lorcan later, I want to bring him at
A Meal Together picture I drew.”
“Sure.”
“Is he going to sleep a long time?” Egan asked.
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“No, only until tomorrow.” Kiefer answered. “Why?” He tapped Egan’s fingers as he reached for more of the bacon Kiefer was putting on Gen’s plate. “Stop eating your mother’s bacon. She needs the protein.”
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“Breakfast is my favorite meal, Dad,” Egan complained, “and having breakfast for dinner is the best. I need more protein too because I’m growing.”
“There’s more,” a housekeeper came in and set a platter of assorted meats onto the table and she ruffled Egan’s hair. “You would think you didn’t have breakfast this morning already.”
“Glutton,” Kiefer laughed at his son who shrugged carelessly. “When you’re done eating, go brush your teeth and hair and we’ll get going to the hospital. Mom and Dad are going to stay with Granddad Lorcan. You’re going to come back with Tadgh. You have a tutor coming in this evening to do math and sciences with you. Jerren and Monica will supervise it. I’ll come back tonight to put you to bed and Mom is going to stay with. Granddad.”
An hour later they were on their way to the hospital and Kiefer and Genesis were shaking their head at Egan’s excitement.
“What are you so bouncy for, boy?”
A Meal Together “To see Granddad.”
“He’s sleeping.”
“I never saw someone with a hole in them before.” Egan said with an eager expression on his face.
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“He’s been sewn up and there are bandages,” Genesis shot him at disgusted glance.
“I heard Jerren telling Monica you could see right through him. You can’t see through him anymore?”
“No!”
Genesis and Kiefer exchanged a look of revulsion as Egan’s excitement deflated like a popped balloon.
“What is wrong with you?” Genesis asked Egan only half–kidding.
Egan shrugged, “When Auntie Astra was in my dream she had a hole,” he pointed to his head, “but she died. Granddad Lorcan has a hole, and he stayed alive. I really wanted to see the hole so I could learn how he stayed alive. Now the hole is closed up.”
“He’s alive because the hole is closed up.” Kiefer’s breathing through his nose betrayed his confusion over the conversation. He made a face at Genesis as if to say their son was weird.
“I’m going to be a doctor when I grow up. I’m going to see
A Meal Together
people with holes in them and help them stay alive but first I need people need to get holes in them. Dad, do you have any people with holes in them I can practice on?”
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Kiefer looked at Gen, “I changed my mind. He’d be a perfect fit to run the Sokolov family.”
Genesis giggle followed them all the way to the hospital room.
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