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A(fiancee): How nice of you. I don't know how to thank you.
B(other guy): Haha, no problem. I just want to take you home!
C(fiance): Hey! You sure are getting close to a man's fiancee!
Why do they put "a man's" before the fiancee? To my non-native eyes, it's very weird, and I've only found out this after 3 years since I started learning English. Shouldn't it be just "my fiancee" or "other man's fiancee" or "the fiancee"? What's the role of "a man's" here?
When a male speaker says this kind of thing:
C(fiance): Hey! You sure are getting close to a man's fiancee! That man C is addressing his words to B(other guy).
He is referring to himself even though he says "man".
It is common in English to use this sort of thing. Here are some other examples of what looks like a general statement to another person that is actually referring to the speaker. I am not going to recreate an entire dialog, just the quip:
The word man is used in contrast to, say, a man's heart, a man's home, or something else that is identified as belonging to a man. It is used as a substitute for the more direct: my fiancée. The fiancée is seen as belonging to the man. When this structure is used, there is always a possessive like that.
This is not an AmE or BrE thing. It is a way of not saying something directly for any variety of reasons. In writing, the possessive like this is used quite frequently: a man's life, a woman's life, a woman's home, a woman's children.
[Please note: try someone's patience is an idiom that means testing someone's patience.]
"My fiancee" would work. It sounds more possessive, however, and emphasises C's specific personal relationship. As such it potentially implies that C has no problem with B courting other people's fiancees, the problem is only a problem because it's HIS fiancee. Using "a man's fiancee" ensures the problem is defined in the abstract: that A is getting close any man's fiancee. It depersonalises the situation, most likely with the side effect of making it seem more of a joke than a genuine threat.
Of your alternatives, "another man's fiancee" would work the same way as "a man's". "the fiancee" is too objectifying; in standard English it is probably considered rude to A, especially in her presence (although in some dialects, constructions like "the missus" are commonplace and inoffensive).
