Chapter 27

For some reason I woke up very early the next morning. Joyce was sleeping curled up against my front, but Shirley had left our room, sometime during the night.

I vaguely remembered several dreams that involved the Pipkin sisters. In one of them, the one that stayed the sharpest for me, they had been chasing me through a dense wooded area, them the hunters, and me the hunted. I had finally fallen, unable to run further, looking up at the two of them as they slowed, and then cautiously approached me where I lay. I watched, helpless, as they smiled above me, and then eagerly started removing their clothing.

That must have been what awakened me. The fact that I'd had several dreams about the sisters reinforced the earlier feeling I'd had that it was extremely important that all of us do our utmost to make Dale and Eddie feel welcome, and to make them want to be a part of whatever it was that we were forming together.

One thing I'd realized, and it was very different from my previous beliefs, was that there couldn't be a successful separation of the brain trust from the personal group we had already formed.

It was Brenda that first made me realize this, because of the role she played in the life of our group. We all worked in the business, except for her. We all went to college, except for her. Still, in spite of that, the contributions she made by cooking for all of us, and by caring for the children, in our absence, made whatever we were doing that much more productive. Without actually being a part of the work or the studying, Brenda managed to be included, by her support of our activities, and by the confidence we had with her being in charge of caring for our precious children. We trusted Brenda, and she trusted us to take care of her, just like she took care of all of us.

There needed to be a strong bond in order to make my brain trust idea work. In the final reckoning, what I sought was a synergistic relationship, one where each of us added more to the group than any of us had to offer by him or herself.

So far, I really believed we had managed that with the group that had already formed. Each of us had become an extension of all the others. Because Emily and Shirley were deeply involved in the group home operations, Joyce and I were freed to concentrate on other aspects of the entire group's interests. I could feel free to trade, Joyce to command the shipping, storage and distribution schedules, Brenda to cook, and to supervise the households and children's nurserys. We were each gravitating to the tasks we did best, and found most interesting, rewarding, and fulfilling.

This didn't exclude all the other help that we had either. Things were being done, getting accomplished, that had been set in motion by one or more of us.

I knew I was being made healthier, mentally, by the support and the steadfastness of all my loved ones. Part of it was due to the increased responsibility I now felt, to my wives, and to my children, but another part was from knowing I wasn't alone, that I always had back up if I needed it.

That was what the brain trust idea was all about, ensuring that none of us would ever be overcome by any single problem we might encounter. We would stand together to blunt the negative power than might overwhelm any one of us standing alone. We were all support for each other.

My father had managed to run the company, almost alone, for nearly twenty years. Not only run it, but grow and expand it to what it had become. He and I had spoken about the need to prepare for his replacement, but seeing him in California had brought home to me the understanding that he worked like he did, not from choice, but from necessity. He had no one else to turn to, none that he trusted anyway. I wondered if he would welcome a gradual phasing in of my brain trust management concept. Would he appreciate the luxury of passing off a meaningful part of the burden he'd shouldered alone for all those years?

First, I knew I needed to attract the people necessary to form what I wanted. After that, the theory had to be tested, under real working conditions. A problem solving team was useless, unless there were real problems that needed to be solved and overcome.

I knew then how we would all be spending the coming summer. It needed to be something that seemed natural and non threatening to my father. Perhaps something as simple as getting him to expand on his daily list of things he wanted me to take care of for him. The goal could be to get to the point where all Dad needed to do was sit in his office, and prepare the lists for us to work on. Once the tasks were accomplished, he could then review things and give us further comments about what it was we found out, or what we did.

I had this different plan forming in my head, as things changed from the idea of it being my brain trust, to it being our brain trust. Consistent with that change was the realization that I needed to relinquish my "ownership" of all these girls. I was being selfish and parochial in my outlook. Love was love. Sex didn't convey ownership, it was a way to express a feeling of closeness. All the girls had shared me with each other. If the brain trust was to also be my family, then I too would have to learn to share, to be willing to share.

I needed to give it a lot more thought, and to discuss it with Joyce and the X's. I needed to wrap my head around the idea, to find a way to eliminate from my thoughts the idea that I was losing anything by not being the sole male sex partner to these women. I'd flirted with it in the past, always pulling back from being able to embrace the reality of sharing.

My mind started telling me that it had enough of thinking about the idea of creating the type of situation I was then contemplating. I got out of bed and went for a shower, hoping to make myself ready for school in time to go down and spend an hour tinkering with my trading program.

I had been following gold, silver, and the U. S. Dollar for the past month, on a separate screen feed in my office. There was a way to play the grains against inflation, and I could see a definite pattern showing that the movements were somewhat aligned, each controlled, in part, by the other. I wanted to trade on the difference between the four grains and the three monetary equivalents. Thus far, I'd merely observed the two different groupings on a side by side basis. Very soon, as soon as my computer guy had the program ready, I was going to merge the two on a new screen, and trade the price differentials. If I was right, they were like an accordion, separating, but then returning, to merge, and then separate again.

My theory was that I was already exchanging grain for money, and money for grain, but using the value of money as a fixed constant. This other way, I could profit from the constantly changing value of money, relative to that of the other commodities. It was just a theory, but one that none of my study had thus far contradicted. I wanted to harness all that volatility for my own gains.

At seven o'clock, I was sitting in my office when Joyce led Dale and Eddie in to see me. I paused from what I was doing long enough to make polite conversation, inquiring as to how they slept, and asking if there was anything they needed.

"Who was that doing all that yelling and screaming last night? It was hard to get to sleep with all that noise." Eddie was smiling when she asked that.

"That was Shirley. Sometimes she gets herself caught in situations where she loses her composure. When that happens, she just starts yelling about whatever's on her mind." I smiled back, and Joyce nodded her agreement with my statement.

"That girl has a trashy mouth on her. How many people did you have in your room attacking her?" Dale asked the question, but she was looking right at Joyce when she asked it.

"Don't look at me, Dale. All I was doing was watching them. It was only Kenny that was making her say those things." Joyce used her finger to make the 'cross my heart' sign, smiling as she did so.

"It wasn't only Shirley that we heard yelling last night, Sister Joyce. Wasn't that you was making all those moaning and groaning noises before Shirley started yelling out her things?" Eddie turned her attention on Joyce too. I could see that Joyce was in for it now, with both sisters ganging up on her.

"That was Kenny too. You two made him all excited last night, and he took it out on Shirley and me. You have to be careful what you say in front of him, else he'll make you yell and scream, and moan and groan too." Joyce was trying her best to turn it all back onto me.

"You told us it was just you and Sister Joyce that were going to be together last night. How come you lied to us?" Eddie had taken Joyce's bait, and had turned back to shine the light of her attention on me.

"You can see for yourselves how tiny Joyce is. She needed help last night, and Shirley was the only other one of the girls that was available to help her."

"We were awake too. Dale would have been happy to help Sister Joyce. You left her in a very helpful mood. I wish you'd let her help too, because maybe then I'd have gotten a little more sleep than I did." Eddie pushed Dale on the shoulder playfully, knocking her back closer to where I sat. "Look at her now. She's still ready to help Sister Joyce. You tell Kenny how much you wanted to help them girls last night, Dale." Again she reached in, and, using both hands this time, pushed Dale back until she popped down into my lap. I looked over at Joyce, noticing her eyes starting to glaze over with sexual excitement.

I put my hand around Dale's waist, trapping her there on my lap. She wasn't resisting, but I sensed she was waiting to see what move I'd make. I wondered if this was another test the two girls were giving us.

"You know what, Dale? I think Eddie is projecting her hopes onto you. I think it was her that wanted to be in our bedroom last night. Tell me the truth, was it her that kept you up, or was it you that kept her up?"

"We kept each other up. You kept us up too, with all that noise coming from your bedroom. I hope it isn't going to be like that every night, because I need my rest." I had my hand wrapped around her waist, but it was up high enough that I could feel the weight of her left breast against my forearm. Joyce and Eddie had both gone quiet, watching what was unfolding between Dale and me.

"We have ear plugs if you need them. All the girls who live here seem to enjoy hearing the other girls scream. Only Shirley is really loud though, and only when she's having a really strong cum. The rest of the time, you can hardly hear her at all. You and Eddie have really big titties for such tiny girls. It makes you both look like Dolly Parton."

"Dolly Parton? We don't look like no Dolly Parton." Eddie sounded indignant. Not so indignant that it kept her from thrusting those bodacious ta ta's further out from her chest though.

"I think you do. In your chest at least. I always wondered what those big titties of hers felt like too."

"Like silicone probably." Dale said that as she sat placidly on my lap. She had to feel the boner her sitting on my lap had given me. She didn't wiggle around suggestively, but she wasn't making any attempt to move away from it either.

"Like silicone? You don't think those are the titties God gave her? Yours aren't silicone are they?" When I said that, I moved my forearm up just enough to put more pressure on the bottom of her breast. She didn't move away from that either.

"No, all the women in our family have ones like these. Our Mama says it's a curse." She and Eddie laughed at that, obviously not sharing their mother's opinion on that particular subject.

"Well, that's good to know. Joyce's titties are real too, and so are Shirley's." Joyce shot me a very annoyed look when I said that. She and Shirley were both sensitive about their breasts. Joyce liked nursing because it kept her breasts fuller. Shirley's had gone back down to two egg yolks even while she was nursing. I thought all titties were attractive, and I liked that they came in all different sizes and shapes.

"She's dying for you to feel hers, Kenny. Go ahead. We both have very sensitive titties." Eddie put both hands on her own and gave each a little squeeze on her nipple area.

"I don't think Dale wants me to play with her titties. If she did though, I bet it would feel great to see how much I could get in these big hands of mine." I took my arm off of her waist long enough to raise my hand and spread my fingers out. I have big hands and feet for my height, and I'm over six foot three anyway. The sisters were both so tiny, even the big titties on their chest would probably each fit into one of my hands. I dropped my outstretched hand until it was centered directly over her right breast.

"If she don't let you touch hers, you can throw her off your lap, and I'll take her place. You can touch mine all you want to."

"Eddie, you can be so trashy sometimes. What are these people going to be thinking about us if you say things like that to them?" Dale had started grinding her ass on my erection, and was using her words to try to cover up that fact. I moved my hand even closer to her breast, until no more than half an inch separated my palm from her very erect nipple. I felt her tensing up when I stopped moving. "You might as well go ahead now and feel it if that's what you want to do. I don't know why it is that you men have such a fascination with a girl's breasts."

As soon as she got the words 'feel it' out of her mouth I had my hand caressing her breast. I let my thumb slide back and forth slowly and lightly across the nipple, and the wider areola area. Eddie was right when she'd said that Dale's breasts were very sensitive. I felt her responding to my touch immediately. I leaned in to whisper to her, low enough that only she could hear me.

"Last night, I was thinking about how it would feel to be holding onto your breast like this if I was behind you, fucking you really good." She moaned, and then ground her hips down on my dick as hard as she could. I increased the pressure of my whole hand on her breast, squeezing it just hard enough to let her know that I felt her excitement too.

I stopped playing with her titty, and reminded everyone that we still hadn't eaten yet. All three girls seemed disappointed that I'd gone ahead and spoiled the fun they were having. I had already told Joyce that we needed to have a group meeting to find out how everyone felt about doing things with the Pipkin sisters, before we did anything with them. Even what I'd done already in my office was more than what I'd planned on doing before that meeting.

I had an eight thirty class in Accounting, and then an eleven o'clock class in Corporate Finance. I was going to spend my whole afternoon working on ideas about how to integrate the metals and the U.S. Dollar with my grain trading. I needed to find a reference base in order to align the one with the other. It had to be something that I could slide, as needed, to account for actual currency inflation. This basis line would keep me from chasing too big of a move in the Dollar, or in the metals. I wanted to make money on the volatility, but not get caught in the event of a major move by the dollar.

I could profit from the 'noise' of the metal and monetary markets, but I had no interest at all in purely speculating in the metals, or with the Dollar. I'd leave that kind of trading to the people who were experts in that field.

To me, these other markets were like an ocean. If I found a wave that helped me get to where I was going, I'd ride it. I didn't want to get caught out in the open sea though. Right then, I was safely on shore, watching the waves, and trying to figure out a safe way to harness their free energy to my uses.

When I got home at around twelve thirty, Brenda and Emily were both in the kitchen, talking about Dale and Eddie. I went in and had a Coke, while Brenda finished making me two sandwiches. I noticed that Brenda and Emily had shared a Cobb salad. When I asked if there was more, they told me they had made only enough for themselves. Brenda promised to make me my own for the next day's lunch.

"So, what do you girls think about Dale and Eddie?" I figured I may as well sound them out before we had a meeting of the whole group. Brenda was the first to answer me.

"For this brain trust, or for our group too?"

"That's what I'm asking the two of you. Joyce thinks we need to do things with them too, if we want them to be a part of what we're trying to build."

"What do you think, Kenny?" Emily sounded suspicious. Not yet hostile, but definitely suspicious.

"I've been thinking about the whole brain trust idea. What all of us in the group are now, that isn't like what I thought a brain trust should be. One big similarity though, is that we all help each other. Each of us contributes enough to make the group, as a whole, better and stronger. In a lot of ways, our group is like a company, and right now, the company is doing very well. Well enough that the thought of tampering with it has me worried."

"Don't tamper with it then." This was so like Emily, jumping right on the first statement out of my mouth that happened to suit her own beliefs and conclusions.

"Tell me why you think that."

"You're the one who said it, Kenny. Things are almost perfect for all of us now. We have everything we could ever want. Why take a chance on ruining it?" When Emily finished speaking, I looked over at Brenda, and she seemed to be agreeing with Emily.

"You feel like she does, Brenda?"

"I agree that things are perfect, Kenny. I like both those girls, but that doesn't mean I'd be happy if you started sleeping with them too." Brenda put my sandwiches in front of me, going off to get me another Coke from the fridge. "We already share you with Shirley and Joyce. We already don't get to spend as much time together as we used to. You have so many other things you have to do now."

"Sometimes I feel the same way, that I'm too busy to enjoy what I have. Then I remember the reasons why I'm so busy. I need this education, and I need to trade too, so that we can afford to do all the other things we're already doing. Trading is also something I'm real good at, something I enjoy doing."

"Do you enjoy it more than spending time with Emily and me?" Brenda was starting to go into one of her classic pouts.

"No. But that isn't what we're talking about. Do you enjoy cooking more than fucking?"

"No, but I'm not fucking all the time. If I was, we'd all starve. I like to cook, but I like being with you too. I like it when we're all together, even if it means we aren't really doing anything with each other."

"Joyce thinks the brain trust idea is a good one, that, in the long run, it will give all of us that much more time to enjoy doing fun things together. Joyce thinks that Dale and Eddie won't stay with us, not unless they become part of our group too. A real part of it, not just two more girls for me to sleep with."

"Joyce sleeps with you more than half the time anyway. Plus, you know part of her wanting to do this is because she wants to do things with both those girls herself." Emily was getting wound up into a high gear. I could tell she had already given this matter a lot of thought. She and Brenda were both going to oppose the inclusion of the Pipkin sisters. At least, oppose them, in so far as it meant them being full group members. This is something that I'd been anticipating, in spite of Joyce's assurances that Emily and Brenda would go along if I said I wanted to do it.

"If you both feel strongly about this, we won't make any changes." I had already told Joyce I felt this way. I wasn't going to risk what we already had in order to try to gather a brain trust. It was only an idea. What we had already was a living reality. It was something we needed to protect and keep going. I could survive and thrive without the brain trust, but I needed my family with me.

Emily looked surprised that I'd given in to her so easily. She must have believed I was really going to push for the new girls to be included.

"Joyce is going to put all the blame for this on us now." Emily looked over at Brenda, hoping for some comfort and reassurance from her. She didn't get it.

"You're the one that was so against it. All I said was I didn't want Kenny to take any of my time away to give to those girls. Everything Kenny and Joyce have done with the group so far has been okay with me. If he does stuff with Dale and Eddie, it will have to be with one of his free days. I'm not giving up my turn, just so he can sleep with them." Brenda could change sides in a heartbeat, or even quicker. I think she wanted mostly to put some distance between herself and Emily, just in case Joyce did end up being really upset.

"You're doing it again, Brenda. I don't know why it is you can stand up to me and boss me around, but you can't ever seem to do that with Joyce or Kenny. You know I'm right, you said so, ten times today, at least. As soon as you start worrying about Joyce or Kenny being mad at you, you change your tune."

"There isn't any right, Emily, and you don't need Brenda to back you up. I'll back you up. Just you, all alone, would have been enough. This is our group, and we aren't changing it, not unless every one of us agrees to those changes."

Sometimes, you had to be supportive of one of the other people, even if it meant going against what you wanted, or what you believed would be the best thing in the long run. To me, this seemed like one of those times.

"You don't think I'm right though, do you?" Emily had dropped her aggressive stance. This was an honest question. When she got like this, she tended to be very open and reasonable. She didn't get like that too often, at least she didn't get that way around me a lot.

"I can't say, because I can't really put myself in your same position. There's no question in my mind that Dale and Eddie could be tremendous assets to us, in the business, and in our lives. They are both super smart, and they know how to attack problems. I'm looking at this for purely selfish reasons though. The only way I'm going to have the time to enjoy my life and do the things I want to do is if I find a way to have other people running the company besides Joyce and me. You've seen how much time and energy my father spends on keeping up with running the company. He has to do that, and, with it growing like it has been, even that isn't enough. He has to turn all the bakeries over to someone else now, because he can't take care of them and still handle all the vending business expansion, and deal with all the finance things."

"But, he likes doing that all the time." Brenda interrupted me to tell me this.

"That's what I've always told myself too. What if it isn't true though? You saw him in California. Sure, he did some work when he was there, but he also took out a lot of time to do things with all of us. Maybe he only worked so hard because he didn't think there were any other choices available for him."

"I'm sure he likes working. It's something he's really good at. Everyone admires him for being so good at running the company. Even my father admires him." Brenda was being stubborn. I think she knew where I was going, and she didn't want me to tell her what she thought I was going to say.

"Even if he does, I wouldn't like it, and I've promised both my parents that I'd step in and take over the company, when the time comes. I'm going to keep my promise, and when I do, I'm going to have to work just as hard, just as long as my Dad does now. That's why I want to set something else up now, while there's time, so I won't necessarily have to."

"Suppose you go ahead and do this, set up your brain trust, and all of us have even less of you than we do now? How do you even know it will work? You might do it for years, then, when your dad dies or retires, find out that it doesn't work. If we stay like we are right now, you might be forty five years old, or even older, before you needed to take over. You'd be too old to be much good in bed anymore, and we wouldn't even miss you if you were at work night and day."

Emily tried to smile, to take some of the sting out of her argument, but I could see she meant she wanted what we had now, and let the future take care of itself. I just wasn't someone who could operate that way. I was always trying to think ahead.

"I've got to try to keep it from happening like I'm afraid it will, Emily. This is how I'm being selfish. Maybe I should go out and find a few guys who would be good brain trust material first. I've been considering it, just so you'd know I wasn't just doing this so I could have more girls to fuck. That's what you think. You know already that I don't want to share you with other guys, and you know I know I'm being selfish to be that way. I think this is important enough for our futures though, that I'd be willing to do it, if the right guy came along, someone I knew could really help the brain trust idea."

Both Emily and Brenda looked shocked that I would say something about that to them. Even before, when I'd threatened Emily and Joyce with having Don Grestwick fuck them, Emily had been excited and repelled all at the same time. Her need to be treated rough, to be punished, might have welcomed it, but, in her heart, she would have been wounded that I had allowed it to happen.

I didn't want to do it, but it was becoming a practical necessity, if we went ahead and incorporated the whole brain trust into our family grouping. I was only one man, and I couldn't handle much, if any, more than I now had. Add eight or ten new people, and there simply wasn't any way I could keep up. Not if they were all females. We would need at least two new guys in the brain trust. Three would probably be better. Emily had said something I didn't want to think about too. What happened as I got older? Older guys slowed down sexually. What would happen when I could only do it once a day? Hopefully, that wouldn't happen until I was up in my fifties though. I wondered if it was the kind of question I should ask my father?

I had to quit thinking like that, adding to the problem by worrying about things that hadn't happened yet. Even if I did start to slow down, the girls would still have each other.

"You'd really bring some other guy in here, and tell him he could make love to us?" Emily was starting to build up another head of steam. I wanted to head her off before we got sidetracked again. That was the problem with speaking to Emily without pre planning what you were going to say to her. With Joyce, this wouldn't have been a problem. Probably not with Shirley, or Brenda either.

"Emily, I was just saying how important it could be for all of us, to have this brain trust, so that none of us would have to work too long or hard on things they didn't want to. If I was able to share all of you, even though I really hate the thought of doing that, it should help you understand how important I think the idea is. That's all I meant."

"You threatened me with that before, with Don, and I told you how bad that made me feel. Now, you're bringing it up again. It sounds to me like you really do want to do that. If you ever do it, I'm leaving, and I'll take the children when I go. You can have those other girls, if it's so damn important to you, but you aren't going to pass me around to your male employees, especially as some kind of bonus. You told me you loved me, and I believed you. If I knew what you were planning, I'd have never let you get me pregnant."

I watched her turn and walk out of the kitchen, followed closely by a suddenly solicitous Brenda. This was exactly what I'd been afraid of. I was going to have to wait now for Joyce to get home so that she could help me get this mess straightened out. Worst of all, now I was so upset I wouldn't be able to sit still and think about how best to integrate the grains and the metals and Dollar. This whole thing about the brain trust was throwing off my schedule. At the rate I was progressing, I'd never get a team in place before my Dad needed me to take over for him.

When Joyce came home, with Dale and Eddie, Brenda and Emily were still upstairs, and I was sitting in my office, staring at my two computer screens. I told her what was happening while Dale and Eddie were getting something to tide them over until dinner.

Speaking of dinner, I wondered what we'd be having for dinner, with Brenda upstairs taking care of Emily. I told Joyce, and she said we'd just order up some pizzas. I guess I was sounding pretty discouraged to Joyce, but she just laughed and told me to stop worrying.

"Kenny, Emily isn't nearly as upset as she's pretending. She just knows this is a way to get you to back down from doing what we're going to do anyway. All she's thinking about is what she thinks is best for her, right this minute. She has to understand that it can't always be about what she wants. You stay here and entertain Dale and Eddie while I go up to talk to those two. When Shirley gets here, have her order us up seven large pizzas. Make one of them cheese, one pepperoni, and at least three of them with all the toppings except pineapple and anchovies. Get one with only pineapple and anchovies, for you and Phil, but make sure you don't bring it too close to Brenda. She hates the smell of anchovies."