She flushes after she says this. Aileen grins, and Sheena nods her head.
“Aye,” she says. “Like oral sex or a damn good spanking. Very few men are going to know that right off the bat, as it were.”
I snort. “Aw, lord, I don’t want to go there.”
“Why not?” Sheena asks. “You live in the damn McCarthy mansion, woman, there’s likely a kinky streak as well.”
I snort, Caitlin and Aileen laugh out loud, and I finally stop laughing enough to ask her, “Why on earth do you say that?”
“Well,” she says. “First, because it’s hot.”
“What is?” I cringe, waiting for her response.
She grins. “All of it.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say all of it,” Caitlin says. “And honestly, I’d imagine you have to be with the right sort.”
“Now that’s the most sensible thing I’ve heard anyone say all night,” I say. “And for goodness sakes, girls, remember who you’re talking to. I’d have you note I’m the one that gave the lot of you advice, no?”
Mother of God, I’m hardly a virgin.
“Aye,” Aileen says. “But if it’s a man of the Clan, he’d be the right sort.”
“How do you get that?” I ask. “The only men that I know well who are even available are…” I pause, ticking them off my fingers. “Lachlan, and he’s too young for me. Boner, too…” I shake my head. “He’s all lines and angles and high energy, the man exhausts me just looking at him. And Tully, who’s way too old for me and I don’t go for the Hagrid type anyway…” There are many others, but the inner circle is the one I know best.
Sheena shakes her head. “You didn’t say Carson.”
I look away, feigning surprise. Of course she’d say Carson. He was the first person that came to my mind when they mentioned the men of the Clan, and the very one I have to avoid. I hope they buy my nonchalance. I swallow. “Carson?”
“Aye,” Sheena says with purpose, clearly not buying my bluff. “Carson.”
“Sheena,” I say, sobering while I shake my head. “Are you mental? You can’t mean that, can you? Carson’s still mourning the loss of Eve.” Hell, we all are. “And he’s got a child. And anyway, more to the point, I’m smart enough to know I can’t possibly date a man of the Clan.”
Aileen chews her lip thoughtfully. Caitlin doesn’t speak for a moment. Even Sheena seems lost in her thoughts.
“It’s true, though, isn’t it,” Sheena mutters. “As the sister they never had, they’d damn near smother you to death.”
“Exactly. I’d never get a moment’s peace or privacy, and if he so much as touched me, the men would beat him senseless. If he broke my heart, he’d be fucking drawn and quartered, and they’d damn near put me under lock and key.” Not that I’d let them, but they’d try. Annoying.
Aileen nods. “This is true. Cormac would lead the way,” she says. Her husband Cormac is the largest of the group, the resident Bonebreaker for good reason.
“And Nolan would join him,” Sheena says, the slightest edge in her voice. Let it not be said her man isn’t as fearless as the rest. I hide a smile so she doesn’t see it, but I think it’s adorable how protective of him she is.
“And not only that, girls,” I say, unable to hide the note of sadness from my voice. “I mean… we don’t talk about this often, but… well, it troubles me to know what some of their jobs are.”
The girls nod quietly. It goes without saying that we accept what they do, because they’re family. Because we love them. Because they work hard for a common good, even if they defy the law, and sometimes the decisions they make are brutally painful and barely moral.
“So I don’t know if… I don’t know if I can handle one of them.”
“Okay, but hear this,” Caitlin says. “Being claimed by one of the Clan… well, there’s nothing like it, Megan. Aye, they have very old-fashioned principles, I’ll give them that. You know it as well as I do.”
I snort. “Old fashioned? You don’t say, Caitlin? The men of the Clan are the heads of their households like it’s the fucking turn of the century.”
“But they were all raised to be gentleman,” Caitlin says. “To protect and care for the woman they love. To meet her every need.”
“Aye,” Aileen says. “’Tisn’t easy being married to Cro-Magnon, but they make it worth your while.”
“Marriage,” I scoff. “Whoa, now. Girls, I don’t want to get hitched. I want to get fucked is all.”
“You say that,” Aileen says, wagging her finger and attempting to look wise, but failing miserably with her slurred words. “But there’s no shortage of sex if you’re married to a man in the McCarthy Clan.”
I roll my eyes heavenward. “Lord, help me,” I mutter. I need to change the subject. Not only do I not want to talk about sex in the same context of the men I grew up with, but the conversation’s dragging up an ache inside I thought I’d numbed long ago. Turns out I haven’t.