Plunder: a reverse harem omegaverse romance, page 31
Bandit Price: Yes, four weeks. We’re very pleased, obviously.
Tawny: And this song is really personal because this is a song you wrote about your daughter, Jennica, am I getting that right?
Bandit: You want to take this, Gable?
Gable Saad: That’s right. It’s called “Blue-Eyed Sweetheart” and she’s that to us, for sure, our sweetheart.
Tawny: Can you talk a little bit about your daughter and how you were able to have her? I understand you went through a long process to be able to adopt?
Lloyd Cho: We did, yes.
Bandit: (breaking in) It was so frustrating, in fact, that there was a point where I said that I was just going to go off suppressants and get pregnant.
Tawny: Because you are physically capable of pregnancy?
Bandit: I mean, theoretically, yes, I am.
Tawny: And I know, however, this is something you’ve been very vocal about, so do you want to talk about that with us?
Bandit: It’s just important to me that I express to other women out there that the purpose of being a woman is not to make babies.
(Applause)
Bandit: Not that being a mother isn’t worthy of the utmost respect, though. I am in awe of mothers. Of fathers, too. Gable and Lloyd, the two of them… watching them, wow.
Lloyd: We’ve all been in awe of this experience, I think. It’s been probably the most rewarding thing we’ve ever done.
(All the band members nod, looking at Lloyd and smiling.)
Raider Smith: We have a very unconventional arrangement with the five of us. So, we’re all involved in our daughter’s lives, but in terms of her primary caregivers—
Bandit: Right, that’s Lloyd and Gable.
Raider: They’re the daddies. Right now, we’re, uh, we’re Uncle Raider, Uncle Cam, Aunt Bandit. (gestures to the other members of the band)
Tawny: So, you have sort of relationships-within-relationships in your overall relationship with each other?
(All the band members exchanging looks, none saying anything.)
Gable: Yes.
(Laughter)
Bandit: Look, I love little Jennica with all my heart. She’s probably the best thing that ever happened to us, and I can’t help but feel blessed that we have her. But I also feel blessed that we can have her and that I didn’t bear her in my body and that I’m not her primary caregiver? I feel blessed that I’ve been afforded that path in my life. And I just want to let other women know that is a valid path. Just because you have a uterus doesn’t mean you have to be a mother.
(Applause)
Bandit: (laughing) But, um, about our relationship, because that’s what everyone always wants to talk about.
Gable: So, uh, in case you haven’t heard, we’re a polyamorous pack.
(Laughter)
Lloyd: No, really we like to just clear that up.
(More laughter)
Lloyd: And we’re not a typical polyamorous pack either. A lot of people expect polyamorous packs to function like, uh, like monogamous couples, but ours doesn’t, really. I am not in a romantic-connected thing with Raider and Cam, just with Gable and Bandit. However, they are romantically tied to both of them.
Tawny: And so, the baby girl, Jennica, she really belongs to…? Who does she belong to?
Cam: She belongs to our pack, so she’s ours. We are all in love with her, but myself, Raider, and Bandit do not have a direct parental relationship exactly, so it’s, uh, it’s…
Raider: It’s complicated.
(Laughter from the band, from the crowd)
Tawny: Always complicated with you guys, right? You made headlines when you first burst onto the music scene because of being a polyamorous pack, and not just that, but one with two omegas, something that isn’t typical.
Lloyd: Nothing about us is typical. Ever.
Gable: Definitely not.
Raider: I just want to point out that when we “burst onto the scene” we’d actually been playing as a band together for over a decade at that point, and nearly half of that time with Cam and Gable as part of the lineup. So, we didn’t come from nowhere. This is what we’ve been doing for all of our adult lives, basically.
Tawny: Yes, let’s talk about that. You were all essentially forced into a record contract.
Bandit: We were determined to be independent. We were really proud of our identity as an indie band, and it was kind of an ideology for us, that we weren’t going to sell out.
Raider: And we had an intricate infrastructure to keep that working, but it got to the point where we’re paying publicists and roadies and security and we’re trying to manage all of the admin of the band ourselves and we have these record companies just writing us blank checks essentially, and, um…
Cam: It got to the point where it was easier to take the record deal than it was to stay independent, and it’s, uh, it’s worked out.
Tawny: Well, I’d say it has. You are one of the most successful folk rock groups in the world and you are a fixture on radio stations.
Gable: We’ve been really lucky.
Tawny: Do you attribute your success to luck?
Lloyd: We attribute our success to having two very sexy omega frontpeople. Bandit and Gable are magic.
(Bandit and Gable wink at each other.)
(Crowd laughs)
Tawny: And the glare of the spotlight hasn’t been hard on you? On your relationship?
Bandit: We’ve always fought really hard for our pack, for our connections with each other. There’s been a lot of speculation, considering that there are two pair bonds in the pack. Me and Raider and Cam and Gable and then Lloyd is a beta.
Lloyd: But I have four bites. (Showing scars on his neck)
(Crowd applauds)
Bandit: So, there’s speculation that we’re going to settle into two couples and that Lloyd will go his own way. It comes not only from the general populace but from other packs who don’t understand what we have. So, we’ve been really conscious about making sure that everyone is free and is also secure. We pursue our own things and we each have very strong one-on-one connections within the pack.
Cam: I think what we want people to understand is that it doesn’t have to threaten them if we don’t behave the way they do. It doesn’t mean anything about their identity that we are all in love with four people, or that our way of being in love is different.
Tawny: For instance, would you say your one-on-one connections all have the same weight?
Bandit: See, here we go, back here.
Tawny: (laughing) Here we go, back here. Is this question okay?
Gable: You mean, do we love one member of the pack more than someone else?
Tawny: Sure, if you want to field that question.
Bandit: No.
Gable: No.
(Members of band all laugh)
Gable: But I would say that each of our relationships are different and there are various struggles that don’t affect all of our connections. Bandit and me have been very explosively drawn to each other since the beginning, but we also probably fight the most. About…
Bandit: Stupid things.
Gable: Where to eat, who gets to pick the music, stuff like that.
Bandit: (giggling) You’re always borrowing my clothes without asking.
Gable: She has great taste.
(Crowd laughs)
Gable: Um, me and Cam have a bond, so we feel each other through it, and that helps, but it also creates a certain amount of possessiveness.
Lloyd: Oh, here we go, it’s the jealousy question.
Cam: (mimicking announcer voice) Do you get jealous?
Raider: Yes, we get jealous.
Bandit: It’s worth it.
Cam: When there’s five people in a relationship, there’s always someone to go to when you’re feeling jealous.
Raider: Exactly, yeah, it works out.
(Band all laughs, smiling at each other)
Tawny: And with your daughter, how is that working out?
Gable: It’s been an adjustment on tour, because we have had to make things work differently, but I think it’s overall been really doable. Even though Lloyd and I are the daddies, the other members of the pack are very involved with Jennica, and we have amazing help. We have the most wonderful nanny in the entire world.
Lloyd: Yes, shout out to Rochelle. We would be lost without you.
Gable: You are an angel.
(Lloyd and Gable blow kisses at the camera.)
Lloyd: And obviously, we have grandparents, just so many grandparents.
Gable: And that’s been really amazing. I’ve talked a bit about my struggles with trust. There’s a song I wrote called, ‘Broken for You’—
(audience breaks into cheers)
Gable: (smiling) Thank you. Well, I’ve talked about how I built a sort of series of walls around myself to protect myself, and I wouldn’t let anyone in, including my family. I was trying to keep myself safe because I didn’t want to get hurt, but I ended up walling myself off from the very support systems that I needed. None of us can do this alone.
(Applause)
Gable: Yeah, we need each other. And so, that process I had started years ago of finally reconnecting with my parents, I feel like Jennica has really brought that the rest of the way together.
Lloyd: Definitely, for me, too. I mean, no parents are happy when their kid pursues a career in something in a volatile business like music. But it’s been helpful that we’ve been so successful in easing their worries, right?
(Laughter)
Lloyd: And now, with Jennica, I’m probably closer to my family than I’ve been in years.
Tawny: And, so, to return to this, how did you adopt Jennica?
Gable: We ended up with a surrogate, actually.
Lloyd: Yes, we really wanted to go through the channels to adopt a child in need. That was what we wanted the most of all. But we could not get approved.
Gable: Yeah, because—they said—we were a rock band. Not because we were a pack or because the adopting parents were going to be two men. They said.
Tawny: So, you feel as if you’ve experienced some prejudice there.
Lloyd: Definitely, yes. As as society, we’ve come a long way, really we have. But we have a long way to go.
Tawny: Yes, we do. Yes, indeed. (A pause) Well, what’s next for Plunder?
Raider: We are in the middle of a U.S. tour and we’re always writing new songs.
Tawny: So, coming soon to a city near you, go out and see them. (smiles at audience) What about more children? Where are you with that? Possibly?
Lloyd: Uh, let us get to the point where we’re not crawling all over everything and putting it all in our mouths before we even talk about that.
Gable: I think it’s a definite possibility.
Lloyd: Oh, you do? Omegas and babies, right?
Bandit: Hey, Mr. Stereotype.
Lloyd: Sorry. No, I wanted a baby, too. I wanted a baby a lot.
Gable: (grinning at him) You did. And now we should have more babies.
Lloyd: (laughing, rubbing forehead) I’m not saying no, sweetheart.
Tawny: (teasing) What are you saying?
(Lloyd makes face at audience.)
(Laughter)
Tawny: (facing camera) Thank you all for being here. Let’s give a big round of applause for Plunder. And when we’re back from the break, we’re going to get them on stage to play “Blue-Eyed Sweetheart” for you.
(Crowd erupts in cheers)
* * *
Thanks so much for reading!
My other omegaverse books are
Heat Trap
Sweet Omega Liar
How to Tame a Feral Alpha Pack
Poor Little Rich Omega
Designation and Deceit
I also write monster romance under Jove Chambers and epic/historical romantic fantasy under Val Saintcrowe.
Join my V.C. Lluxe email list to find out about my new releases first, here.
V. C. Lluxe, Plunder: a reverse harem omegaverse romance
