Chapter 1: New Arrangements

Nancy stood beside Dave’s desk holding her iPad so Dave could see the display. She pointed at a dark green crescent of heavy rain in the southern Gulf of Mexico flecked with red and orange showing strong cells, “It’s called Tropical Storm Bebe. It formed last night from a strong tropical depression just off the Yucatán peninsula. The track has it headed right for New Orleans, but the way she’s wandering around, she could make a straight-line right for us.”

“Still strengthening?”

“The fine print says that NOAA doesn’t think it’ll make it to hurricane status. I agree; for mid June it’s still early for things to intensify in the Gulf. We know it can still do a lot of damage, plus there’s always flooding and storm surge wherever it comes ashore.”

Dave said, “All right, let’s follow the procedures you and I set up in January.”

“Where do you want to marshal the crews?”

Dave looked at the map and the cone of uncertainty. “I think I’d put them up around Lake City in the state. What do you think?”

Nancy grinned, “I already booked all the hotel rooms there.” She chuckled at her own audacity. She looked around to be sure no one was at Dave’s office door and then gave him a quick kiss. “I love you and we think so much alike.”

Dave laughed and waved her away from his desk. “Give me a report at noon about the storm or after NOAA updates the forecast again.”

Dave reached behind his desk and pulled out the thick and tattered notebook filled with emergency preparedness checklists, notes, agreements, and mandates. He called the state emergency coordinator, Steve Gibson, and told him about the deployments they were already making. From his office window, he could see about ten of the line trucks preparing to caravan up to Lake City as soon as the last of them had the recommended storm repair equipment onboard and half of them with augers were pulling trailers with utility poles on them. Dave sent an FYI email to the executive team of the utility.

By five o’clock all the crews from Sarasota and Tampa had been dispersed to Lake City. The storm had moved significantly, and started to turn towards the west, aiming more for Houston, Texas, than New Orleans, Louisiana or points east. The mutual support pacts the various utilities had executed with one another, covered a wide area, and so some of his crews would indeed see action at the rate things were happening. Landfall was expected the next morning. Given the speed of the storm, major flooding might be avoided although landfall did strange things to storms like this.

Dave said, “We’ll watch it tonight and see if there’s any changes that need our attention.”

“Let’s go home,” Nancy said. She reached for Dave’s hand and pulled him from his comfortable desk chair. He threw a few things in his backpack and they left for the Circle. He noted it was Thursday and that tomorrow morning he’d have to make a potentially costly decision about putting the crews on overtime as they waited for the storm to do its damage.

As usual, upon arriving at the Circle, Dave dropped Nancy off at her townhouse so she could change and walk over to the core, and he went home to change into shorts and a tee, and then tend bar for those interested in any liquid refreshment.

As Dave reached the patio, he found the bar staffed by Jake Randall and Murph, who he’d learned donned the real name of Angus Murphy, a peculiar mix of ethnicities. They waved to him as he arrived. “We just thought we’d open early for you.” They looked worried that they’d overstepped some rule.

“No, you guys keep doing that if you like. I do it because it’s kind of fun, plus I get to see most of the Circle. You should be doing that if you plan on hanging out around here for any length of time.”

Murph nodded. “That’s what we were thinking. We want to get known as the nice and helpful guys that we are; Phil and Ron, too.” Big smiles. “We also want to meet all the others we never got to see at the graduation party. The girls seem to have a better time of it just by showing up; they’ve met everybody. We have to work at socializing.”

Karen Simon strolled out onto the patio barefoot and wearing short shorts and a see-through top. Murph’s eyes about fell out of his head. Dave said, “Ah, my sister-in-law.” He stood and went and greeted her with a large kiss and hug.

Dave asked, “Everything all right?”

Karen said, “I think so. Wait until Alice and Julie join us and then I’ll tell you about the past couple of weeks. I’ve been a busy beaver in so many ways since I left you. I did talk to Julie on the phone so I know a little about the aftermath of the graduation party.” She uncharacteristically giggled at the thought.

Dave introduced Karen to Murph and Ron. There was some snickering and laughter on both sides. Karen explained, “I think we kind of met the night of the graduation party. Actually, we did more than meet – a lot more.”

Both of the young men came out from behind the bar and gave Karen a solid hug and some kisses. There was some real affection there much to Dave’s surprise. He surmised that the two men had been two of the four men Karen had sex with before she connected with him.

Alice showed up in a monokini. She waved and said, “Before I talk to anybody, I need to have a dip in the pool. I’m hot and I need to be refreshed.”

Dave chuckled when he heard Murph say to Jake, “I’d like to help refresh her.”

He turned and said, “And she probably wants you to do just that. Hang around for dinner and then see what happens afterwards.”

The two men looked at each other and bumped fists.

Lisa arrived on the patio with Grace following. She joined the men and gave out kisses and hugs. He saw that the men also knew her. She was wearing scrubs, but Grace had changed into some shorts and a thin scoop neck top.

She kissed everybody, even the young men, or as Dave continued to watch he changed his observation to ‘especially’ the young men. They obviously liked Lisa and the kisses she freely distributed.

Alice came up to the group dripping but drying off with one of the pool towels. “Hi everybody. Hi sis. When you’d get in?”

Karen said, “Only a half hour ago. Where’s Julie?”

Alice laughed, “She’s up in the bedroom with Phil and Ron helping them take the edge off the day. I think they’re taking showers, so she’ll be down shortly.”

Murph and Jake looked at each other in dismay. Jake said loudly, “Well, we opted to tend bar. I didn’t know that there were other options.” Those standing around laughed at their shortfall.

The guys took orders and prepared drinks for everybody. In Dave’s opinion they were doing a pretty credible job. He noted that when they were unsure of someone’s name, they asked in a friendly way. Often, they were asked for their names as well, so they were getting some integration in the Circle. He heard their twenty-five word ‘elevator speech’ introductions several times.

About ten minutes later, Julie, Ron, and Phil strolled out on the patio. Everyone had wet hair, and Julie was in a sexy microkini that she’d just bought online. Dave noted there wasn’t much in the way of skin that didn’t show, even in her nether region.

Lisa looked at Julie and declared, “Oh, if only I was younger again.”

Grace encouraged her friend, “Around here you know you could try it. We all love nudity, so you could just skip the suit completely.” As an afterthought she said, “Why are you still wearing your scrubs? Take those off.”

Lisa blushed, “I don’t have much on underneath.”

“More than Julie?” Grace teased.

“Well, yes, barely; but...”

Grace leaned over and helped Lisa peel the top half of the light blue scrubs from her body. The functional bra went next revealing a nice set of mature tits, and then Lisa slid out of the pants to the scrubs, leaving her in a small light green bikini-style set of panties. She ditched her shoes, too.

Lisa’s blush disappeared after about five minutes. Nobody gawked or made a big fuss. A second glass of wine helped, too. Lisa did notice that the two young men at the bar carried erections in their pants, apparently over the increasing amount of skin available for viewing.

Alice said, “All right, Karen, tell us what happened.” She pulled her sister off to the side. Dave and Julie followed.

Karen said, “I want Cricket here, too. Is she coming? She had such good ideas.”

Dave nodded. She should be here any sec ... oh, there she is.”

Cricket bounded across the patio from Dave’s house. “Hi everybody. Karen! You’re back.”

“Come join us. I was just about to tell about the past two weeks.”

“Oh, goody,” Cricket said as she boosted her small body up on a picnic table to listen to Karen and crossed her sexy legs. She was wearing one of Dave’s shirts unbuttoned and a thong of some kind. She was sexy and when she turned, she often-revealed significant breast. Murph and Jake noted that feature immediately.

Karen started, “First off, I had to confirm what I was pretty sure was happening. Before I left, I called a local company somewhat like Dale’s – a private investigator. A woman runs it, and she has about six people working for her. They got pictures, a recording, a video, and everything about what was going on. Yes, Daryl is cheating with Candy Hotchkiss – solid fact.

“Based on what they found out, I went and paid Candy a visit one evening. She was shocked to say the least, and thought I’d come to shoot her. I assured her I hadn’t and that I was trying to figure out what to do. She asked whether I was considering divorce, but I told her no. I dropped the bomb on her that if she and I liked each other that I was thinking of adding her to the family – making us a threesome. She could be with Daryl all the time, sleep with us, but she had to share and be open about the relationship. The cheating would be forgiven. I thought Candy might faint after I laid it all out for her. She was speechless at first, but then kept coming up with questions.

“Cricket, I’m so glad you and I talked. You raised all the points she asked about, and I gradually won her over. I don’t think she thought I was serious at first. We hadn’t thought of that possibility.

“I was trying to be as friendly as I could, and I kept reassuring her that I wasn’t there to hurt her, had no plans to do so, didn’t want to hurt Daryl, but that we had the kids to worry about. I told her I’d found a place full of unconventional relationships and that I’d had a chance to evaluate and participate in a few. I didn’t go into details but I made her wonder – at least on that visit. I told her that’s where the threesome idea came from.”

Alice prodded her sister, “So, did she express interest?”

“Ultimately, yes. We talked and I went into detail about why I didn’t like any of the negative and disruptive options. I told her this was a harmonious solution, and Cricket I used so many of your words and phrases. Thank you. After we’d talked for almost two hours, I asked that she think about it before I talked to Daryl about it. I told her, if she wanted, she could be there at the same time and we’d talk as a threesome. I think that made her feel better about it all; I didn’t want any more secrets between any of us. I explained that this was how we’d ultimately make family decisions and that she’d get an equal vote. We got together again two days later, and Candy said she’d try the arrangement, but might want to opt out if things got weird. I thought that was great.

“She wasn’t expecting it, but I hugged and kissed Candy. She kisses nice. I asked whether she’d be interested in a sexual relationship with me. She said she kind of assumed that sometimes we’d interact, but not all that much or often. I told her a little more about the Circle, including how the women interacted with each other. I offered a free trial – that was a laugh, but Candy took it seriously and said she wanted to do that, but not that night because she was tired.

“We got together the next night again. I laughed a lot inside, because Daryl was at home taking care of the kids and his wife and girlfriend were eating each other’s pussies and doing everything they could to deliver multiple orgasms to the other. We were very successful, I might add. Candy said she’d really looked forward to spending a lot of intimate time with me. I told her it’d be even hotter when Daryl was watching the two of us and stroking his cock. She loved that thought.”

“Did you then talk to Daryl?”

“No. I asked Candy for a couple of more days so I could talk to my older kids. I thought this was a little too advanced for the nine-year-old, and marginal for the twelve-year-old. Bridget is our seventeen-year-old. I took her out to dinner for a ‘Bonding with Mom’ night, and I gave her the whole ball of wax to consider. She, too, was blown away even though she’s quite mature.

“First, she was royally pissed that her father had cheated on me – on the family. I calmed her down and told her that I wasn’t, and that I should be the most aggrieved party if at all. I had to explain about the real world to her, and how rife it was with cheating and lying. It was rude awakening. I then told her about talking to Candy and how nice she is. I explained about how I was thinking that she would fit nicely into the family, and that we’d form a polyamorous relationship with her. That was a long discussion, but it went well and she considered it.

“I had to tell Bridget that she didn’t have to like Candy, but she had to tolerate her presence if the threesome came to pass. I asked whether she thought she could do that, and she basically said that if I could, then she could.”

Alice said, “What about Sean?”

Karen said, “I enlisted Bridget, and so the next day we talked to my son together. I just said we were thinking of adding another adult as a family member, a very nice woman. He asked whether he’d then have two mothers to bug him. I said that I didn’t think she’d bug him, but that if she did, he could come to me and we’d fix it. In the end he agreed to try it. Bridget explained to him that the three of us would be sleeping and making love together, and that we were all fine with that. Christiana we just told we might add another friend to our family, and that was fine with her. She’s often on a different planet anyway.”