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Biggest and Best

By: Flavian



Copyright © 2012 Flavian

Chapter 1

It was something as simple as font size in a web browser that gave me my first clue that my loving wife of the past ten years might be unfaithful to me.

As a financial advisor, I am paid to notice the details of my clients' financial situations. I recommend appropriate strategies for them to follow in order to meet their long term financial goals in life -- strategies involving debt, credit, savings, investments, retirement planning, allocating funds for the kids' college expenses, and life insurance.

I have been very successful in this endeavor to the point where I am highly respected in the business community of our town. Referrals keep my business going and growing; not only here in town, but with clients in the surrounding towns and general community as well. Paying attention to details was a huge part of my success.

After marrying Claire and moving to her hometown -- from listening at various gatherings of her friends and from general talk in town -- I had found out over the years that she'd had a wild youth in her high school days before we met. She had been a cheerleader in high school and had hung with the A-crowd. Those folks only included the so-called cool set. They shunned anyone in the B-crowd as also-rans. Those folks did not figure in any of the invitations to their social events, which sometimes, evidently, had included wild parties involving drinking and at least heavy make-out sessions, if not outright sex.

Most everyone in town now seemed to agree -- and I had believed -- that she had finally settled down when we had married and put down roots as a couple here and had begun our family. She stayed away from the old wild crowd and actually had begun to cultivate friendly relations with the old B-crowd members, many of whom had visited our home and were part of the group that we, as a couple, called friends.

Domestic problems were not limited to any particular income strata or class of folks anywhere, and our town was no different. It seemed, though, that the old B-crowd folks were much more stable in their marriages than those of the old A-crowd. At least the family court docket reports in the local newspaper seemed to bear that out.

Unlike a lot of the folks in our town who had grown up here together and met their life partners while in school, I was a move-in. I grew up two states over. Claire and I were the same age and had met at Iowa State University. Neither set of our parents was happy with paying out-of-state tuition for us, but we had made them proud by graduating on time and with reasonably good job prospects after college.

I had been a Business major and Claire had majored in Interior Design. We had met and had maintained an on-again-off-again relationship starting our junior year. We had finally settled down to be a couple in our final semester of senior year. During graduation week, I had asked her to marry me, and she had eagerly consented. We had come back here to her hometown, and been married in a ceremony attended by her family and a lot of her long-term childhood friends.

At the reception following the wedding, I had enjoyed meeting her friends and relatives. I particularly noted that she was on extremely good terms with a lot of the guys she had grown up with. I also noted that, with few exceptions, a lot of the girls she knew were not as warm toward her.

Hearing one girl named Joy say that she was glad that Claire McNamee was finally married and out of circulation so that she wouldn't have to worry about 'Harvey' anymore -- whoever he may be; her husband, I presumed at the time -- gave me pause. But the activities surrounding the expected events at a typical wedding reception -- dances, bouquet toss, garters, etc. -- had me distracted. I had discounted those whispers whenever they had infrequently come to mind over the years -- until now, ten years later, as I looked back over our time together and reflected.

One incident at the wedding reception had stuck with me, leaving me with a bad feeling afterward. One of Claire's men friends, a guy named Dwight Newman, seemed to be holding her a little too intimately during a couple of the dances they shared. Dwight's wife, Carol, was standing next to me when Dwight and Claire were sharing a third dance of the day, and he seemed to have his hands a little too low on my new bride's back -- almost down to her ass, and she was not only not objecting, she was laughing with him the whole time.

Carol, who had been very nice to me during the reception, looked at her inebriated husband and his idiotic actions with my new bride in public. She had looked up at my frowning and annoyed expression and had put a restraining hand on my arm.

Carol had told me, "They used to be an item when they were in high school, Wade. And Dwight was a regular hellion here before he went off to college and came back as a schoolteacher. But you don't need to worry about him now. Sometimes, he gets a little carried away when he's had too much to drink, but I am pretty good at keeping an eye on him and keeping him from getting too far out of line. And this is still a relatively small town; his being a teacher in a public elementary school keeps him under the community microscope as well."

With that being said, she had gone out and cut in on the two dancers, peeling Dwight away from my new bride with a big smile. Dwight had acted momentarily surprised and irritated, but then he had smiled at Carol and given Claire a shrug before turning to dance with his own wife. Claire had immediately been whisked into the arms of another of her male friends to dance, just as her parents had approached me to tell me they were extending the open bar hours.

After the reception, Claire and I left for a honeymoon in Key West, and returned, tanned and sexually spent after screwing like rabbits for a week. We had enjoyed each other's company immensely, cementing our relationship with pleasant times spent together in pursuits outside the bedroom as well as inside.

Unlike some honeymoons I've heard about and read about, we did not have any episodes of the new bride being hit on and isolated from the husband for hanky-panky, nor did we experience any unpleasantness concerning her overexposure at the beach or pool. There were no 'true confession' moments following the wedding, since we had already discussed our past sexual histories together and had opened ourselves to each other -- warts and all. Well, almost all. I'll get to that.

While Claire had evidently had a more colorful sexual history than I, we reassured each other that we were both over our seasons of sowing wild oats and were now single-focused on loving each other. Our honeymoon was simply a very nice and loving time for both of us.

We came home to Claire's hometown and I went to work for a national brokerage that had established an office there. Dillard's, a retailer at the only mall in town, hired Claire to be one of their consultants and buyers for the home store side of the business dealing with home furnishings and accessories. Her dad was the assistant manager in charge of the retail clothing side of things for the store -- family members working at the same business in a relatively small town? No problem.

Once in a while, we would encounter some of Claire's old A-crowd friends -- it is sort of inevitable in a town of this size. Claire would be polite and make sure to introduce them to me and me to them. But, she seemed to be trying to separate herself from the old wilder side of life that she had lived in her teens and seemed to be trying to avoid the old crowd. She also seemed to me to be opting instead toward cultivating new friendships among her acquaintances within the old B-crowd.

Her high school graduating class organizes reunions every five years. We had missed the Five-Year reunion because of the requirement of my job that my wife and I attend a national sales and award meeting in Kansas City -- Claire had been somewhat pissed at having to miss the reunion because of my job. But I had only been with the company for about one year, and I did not want to screw anything up because of a social misstep.

For the Ten-Year reunion, we had to miss because of a minor infection Claire had contracted following the C-Section delivery of our second child -- an infection that had her recovering in the hospital on the day of the event.

The Fifteen-Year event was fast approaching and it appeared as if nothing would keep us from this one -- Claire was very excited at the prospect.

The missed Five-Year reunion was only one reason for our annoyance with my employer. Other reasons, mainly internal regulatory requirements, seemed to be holding me back from helping my clients in the best ways to meet their financial life goals.

After about three years of working at the local branch office of the national brokerage, I took a risk by resigning and established my own financial planning business. And I guess the extra hours that I spent during the next two years after leaving that brokerage, getting my client base into place, and getting my reputation established, paid off. I was able to settle back to a reasonable pace in a relatively short period of time.

The good thing about doing what I was doing was that I could do it locally and rarely had to travel. Most of the banking and investment stuff I could handle via correspondence, teleconferences, email, and online transactions. Only a few times a year did I have to travel to meet with the life insurance companies for which I recommended products to my clients. I also had to travel a couple of times a year for, uh, other reasons; but I will tell you about those later.

Now, after a little over ten years in the work force, with the last seven of those years being my own man in the world of financial planning, I can say that my wife and I are on our way to being very comfortable financially in the short and long terms, barring any disasters, like a death -- or maybe a divorce.

About those 'other reasons' for travel to which I alluded earlier. Sometimes I was required to travel in order to meet with 'special clients' to discuss confidential financial arrangements. Allow me to explain.

In my sophomore year at Iowa State, I had helped a guy who became a good friend -- Sonny Giancomo -- avoid a major confrontation with the law. We did not know each other very well before showing up at the same party one weekend. But we became fast friends after I helped get him out of a window, despite his heavy state of intoxication, and through and out of the back yard of the house during the mêlée involving a police raid because of an anonymous tip about drugs at the party.

Like most college parties at the time, there was an abundance of drugs at this one. Several people were arrested and a couple of them pointed vaguely to the name of Salvatore 'Sonny' Giancomo as the source of the majority of the stash that was confiscated.

Sonny and I were having pie and coffee at a Denny's a couple of hours later when he finally sobered up enough to thank me for getting him out of the house before the police had arrived. He promised me his eternal friendship and loyalty if I would continue to be a loyal friend in return.

He had speed-dialed a number on his cell and had spoken to someone who I later learned was an attorney for Sonny's family -- by that, I mean his extended 'familia.' The lawyer had stepped in with local authorities and Sonny had not even been required to show up at the police station to answer the inquiries related to the vague claims of those who had tried to finger Sonny as the source of the drugs. The whole matter was simply ... dropped.

Sonny was the son and heir apparent of the man who ran the local and regional businesses and activities that helped to transform the provenance of the extended family's finances from 'dirty' to 'reasonably clean.' In other words, Sonny's dad basically oversaw the money laundering efforts of a branch of what, at one time, had been part of the Gambino crime family. It was called something else now, but I have not yet been informed what, and it does not really matter as long as I keep them happy.

From that night on, I maintained a relationship with Sonny that continued into the present. Through that connection, as well as through my own business dealings in the world of finance, I had become quite adept at the establishment and management of domestic as well as off shore accounts and other financial avenues for the movement and holding of assets that 'special clients' wanted to keep secret.

Today, I maintain quite a lucrative off shore deposit of my own assets -- unknown to the Feds as well as my own wife -- accumulated from helping Sonny's family to clean up the look and feel of their incomes, and they compensate me very well for that service. I have used my skills to help several other prominent legitimate clients to establish off shore accounts as well, helping a couple of them keep from suffering tremendous losses during particularly ugly divorce cases.

So, my business dealings leave me in a position of not having to worry too much about my family's financial outlook for the future. As for day-to-day expenses, we have the appearance -- one that I work hard to maintain -- of being a typical family dealing with balancing a family budget and being frugal in our purchases.

Claire, in addition to her job at Dillard's, has a franchise for Majestic Jewelry and arranges for different ladies in the community to host Majestic Parties in their homes -- similar to Tupperware Parties. She and the other Majestic representatives gather to make presentations at the homes of various ladies in the community periodically and to take and place orders which are fulfilled mainly online. Yeah, with my income and with her income from Dillard's, along with her part-time income, financially, we are doing okay; actually a little better than okay, but we don't flaunt it.

And now, back to my current situation ...

Within my home, I handle the management of the household finances for our family using a commercial accounting software product. When I say 'our family' that includes our daughter, Mindy, 7; our son, Paul, who just turned 5; Claire; and, of course, me -- my name is Wade Sloan. The computer in the library of our house is top-of-the-line and I keep it up-to-date with regular online updates of the operating system, anti-virus software, and our other software applications.

The ability to notice the details that I mentioned earlier has helped me deal with my own life situation very well for as long as I can remember. But when the font size in the web browser showed me something I had not been aware of up to that point, I came to the conclusion that I had not paid enough attention in one area of my life. That area was the one dealing with my wife's activities and daily routine; the activities and routine that she had may have been skillfully manipulating in order to cheat on me, it would appear at first glance.

A 'blink-out' of power had caused the computer to be interrupted at an inopportune moment. It was just as I had been in the process of re-starting the computer to allow for online updates that I had downloaded to be applied to the operating system. Thus, when it finally re-started again after the 'blink-out' the display settings were out of whack -- with icons out of order and screen resolution set way too big. I reset those items to the settings I preferred and attempted to open an internet connection.

When the browser opened, a box asked if I wanted to go to the page on which I was last working. I clicked 'OK' and was taken back to the login page for the bank site where I monitor our checking account online, and had been working while the computer updated in the background. When the spreadsheet-style listing came up showing the recent checks we had written and the recent debit card purchases, I noticed that the font size was smaller than we normally keep it. Before I readjusted it to the size I was used to seeing, I noticed two details that I otherwise would have missed due to their normally being cut off by the column width.

My wife keeps her calendar on the computer with scheduled events, having a notification feature that pops up during the day with sufficient and timely notification for her to prepare and, if necessary, travel. On one particular day that I was remembering from the previous week, I was aware of her plan to attend a Majestic Party hosted at a lady's house on the east side of town. Remember, I am pretty good at noticing and remembering details. Claire had evidently stopped to purchase some food items on the way back from the party from the grocery store chain that we typically use.

The grocery chain that we frequent has two stores in our community -- one on the east side of town and one on the west side. Because she had used the debit card for the purchase that day, the bank screen showed the transaction. Because of the smaller font size, I was able to note something about that transaction for which I would otherwise have been clueless.

The store number for the store at which she had made her grocery purchases was for the one on the west side of town instead of the one nearest to the party location on the east side -- from which Claire had come afterwards -- supposedly; I recognized it because I sometimes stop there for items on the way home. Additionally, that evening, she had purchased gas at a convenience store on the west side, the location now visible because of the smaller font -- a fact that would have been screened from me by the column width limitation otherwise.

In my formative years before college, I had come to cling to a couple of quotes from famous people that had served to establish part of my outlook on life. In high school, a girl who was supposed to be going steady with me had burned me. She had sneaked around with one of the football team captains before I caught her and dropped her like a bad habit. From that incident of broken trust, I had adopted the late President Ronald Reagan's approach to dealing with the Soviet Union when it came to nuclear weapons disarmament: "Trust, but verify."

In my junior high years I had been bullied a bit. Following my considerable growth spurt in my high school years, I had been able to inflict considerable pain and physical discomfort on those who had sought to continue said bullying. From that period in my life, I had adopted a line from John Wayne in his role as John Bernard Books in the movie, 'The Shootist.'

"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, and I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people and I expect the same from them."

If Claire, my supposedly loving and faithful wife, was misleading me in any way about her activities, I would be very disappointed and angry. Because of what I was seeing on the computer screen, I was going to have to institute a positive regimen of verifying her activities. If she was, in fact, cheating, then I would need to inflict harsh retribution on her and the one -- or ones -- with whom she was cheating. After all, I won't be wronged or insulted; and I could be very vindictive if it turned out that this was the case.

"So, you want her followed and checked out?" asked Sonny when I called him the next day from my office.

"I guess that is what it is going to take, Sonny. I have already missed out on just where she went on Thursday, the day that she was on the wrong side of town.

"Maybe you can track her electronically with a GPS-type thing or something like that. That way, she wouldn't spot a tail, nor would any of her friends. As small as this town is, and with almost everyone knowing who everyone else is, an out-of-towner would stand out like a cat at the dog pound."


Biggest and Best



"Okay," said Sonny, "I can arrange that by sundown today. Do you have any idea who she might be seeing? That could give us a start on the rest."

"I know the general area of town that she was in when she should have been elsewhere. And I've got some names that come to mind based on what I've heard in passing conversations over the years and from what I have seen and heard at parties and other gatherings. The men who match those names all live in that part of town.

"I've also done a thumb-through of her high school senior yearbook -- boy; that was enlightening, I'll tell you; at least based on what they wrote by the pictures and in the pages in the back," I said.

Several entries handwritten in her yearbook referred to 'The Quarry' and vague references to 'the Friday before Memorial Day.' I only knew of one rock quarry in the area -- now abandoned -- and I could surmise, from the entries written in her yearbook, that some major incident had occurred there about fifteen years ago -- sometime around the end of May, Memorial Day Weekend -- and it had been significant not only for Claire, but for several other people in her high school class, most of them boys -- now men, quite a few of whom still lived here in town.

I gave Sonny the men's and women's names that I suspected as possibly being part of her old high school rowdy crowd, along with addresses for them that I had gathered from the local phone directory.

"You know, Wade, you are going to need to keep tabs of her phone conversations as well. I got a guy that I use who can put a wireless bug in each extension of your land line phone tied to a recorder right there in your home. He can even plant a tiny device in your wife's cell phone. Does she have a plastic protector for her cell phone?" Sonny asked.

"Yeah," I replied. I gave him the brand of cell phone she used with our wireless service.

"Good, good," he replied. "My guy can put a wafer-thin pickup between the body of the phone and the plastic case. She won't even be able to feel the difference. You just have to get the phone to him; he can even drop by your house tonight or tomorrow and you can slip out back with the cell phone and he can hook it up in about three or four minutes.

"And the neat thing is that it is powered by her cell phone battery. As long as she keeps the phone charged, the bug is active and ready. And what it picks up will transmit over your cell phone carrier's network specifically to another digital recorder at your house."

I could hear the pride in his voice and I had to admit that I was surprised at just how sophisticated his electronic surveillance methods were proving to be. I guess it made sense in the world in which he had grown up to keep close tabs on certain people. Trust, but verify, indeed.

"Please try to keep this as inexpensive as possible, Sonny," I said. "I don't want to have to come up with a lot of money beyond what we have in our checking and savings. Claire does not know about my other assets, and I sort of want to keep it that way until I can be absolutely sure about her. In fact, I still want to keep that knowledge of our true financial picture from her even later on, just on general principles, especially if she proves to be unfaithful to me."

"Don't you worry about anything, my friend," assured Sonny, "This won't cost you a dime. After all, look at all the money you are saving us every day with the way you have set things up for us," I knew who the 'us' to whom he referred was. "And, hey, you are a friend in need of help, and I am there for you, Buddy. We'll get you the answers you need in no time at all."

That evening, after supper, I helped my daughter, Mindy, with her arithmetic -- basically adding and subtracting was all she was doing in the second grade at this time -- and her word list, explaining what the words meant and helping her learn how to spell them. Claire straightened up the kitchen and played with little Paul, who was still getting used to kindergarten.

"I'm trying to do what you tell me, Daddy," said my seven-year-old daughter, "I'm trying to be the biggest and the best in school. I'm going to be the biggest winner when they give out the awards at the end of the year and I'm the best speller in second grade."

I had been encouraging Mindy -- ever since she had been able to understand -- to be competitive; to be the biggest and best at whatever she tried to do, but not pushy or arrogant. That included her approach to school work as well as any sports or other activities she tried to undertake. That positive attitude of setting goals and seeking to achieve them, coupled with learning humility and sportsmanship, would serve her well as she grew into adulthood.

At nine o'clock, Claire and I put both the kids to bed. Then we sat together on the sofa in the den, sharing some wine and a tender moment of soft conversation and gentle touching.

"Claire," I said softly, "I probably don't tell you often enough these days, but," I lifted her chin and looked straight into her eyes, "I love you more now than I did when we were first married, and that love keeps on growing the longer we're together."

Her eyes widened in delight at my statement. She put her wineglass down and reached behind my neck to pull my head down to her as she pasted a very firm and active kiss on my lips. Finally pulling back, she said, "Oh, Wade, I love you, too; so much." We finished the wine and put the glasses back in the kitchen before retiring to the bedroom. 

For the next hour-and-a-half, Claire tried to kill me with sex. What a way to go!

As usual since we had married, she denied me nothing and offered me everything. She sucked my cock to completion and swallowed, causing my vision to dim and sparkle with purple flashes. All the while, she was maintaining loving eye contact with me. Then she continued to suck, all the while licking it with her velvety tongue, it until I was hard again.

She pushed me back and mounted me from above, riding me for a good while, rocking her majestic body over me and bringing me off again after experiencing her own orgasms, at least twice in a major way, and once with a tense shiver and moan. After a period of resting in each other's arms, caressing and kissing, she sucked me to hardness yet again -- a feat I had thought impossible -- and I mounted her in classic missionary position, but with her legs propped in my biceps, opening her body to me as fully and completely as she possibly could. I rocked gently in and out, ensuring that I brushed against her clit with my pubic bone on the down strokes.

She approached orgasm after about ten minutes of this movement, but she just could not go over. I felt like I was not going to cum again, but I was just luxuriating in the intimate contact of our sex organs and the loving motion and eye contact we were making; not to mention the joy we both derived from my kissing and licking of her nipples and her lips while we rocked in love's ideal wave motion. Finally, we realized that we had made it as far as we were going to go for the evening sexually and just relaxed in a tender mutual embrace.

Afterward, we used the bathroom and cleaned up a bit before getting into bed and into each other's arms. We remained naked, planning to sleep that way. Ever since Paul had turned four, we had no longer feared his coming in to ask to sleep with us. He had outgrown most of his nighttime fears and thus had allowed us to go back to sleeping naked, as we had done for the years before he had become a toddler.

"Wade; what you told me downstairs earlier ... about our love growing ..." Claire had tears in her eyes now. "I want you to know that I feel the same way, Baby. And I just hope ..." She suddenly looked away and the tears that had formed began to trickle down her cheeks.

"Hope what, Sweetie?" I asked as I kissed the tears away from her cheeks.

She took a breath. "I just hope that you never stop loving me, even if ... well ... no matter what happens."

Something was bothering her, I could tell. "Even if what, Sweetie? What do you mean, 'no matter what happens,' ... what could happen?" I was watching her face and saw a touch of sadness there.

Finally, she sighed and said, "Oh, we can't predict what might happen sometimes. I just don't want anything to come between us; be it money, jobs ..." here she paused and looked away as she continued, "people ... or strange circumstances."

"What strange circumstances are you anticipating, Honey?" I asked. I was focused on her every nuance at that point, watching for the details, her 'tells'.

She sighed again and smiled at me before kissing me on the lips and saying, "Oh, I don't know. Anyway, it's getting late and we both need to be alert for work tomorrow. Just hold me now and let's get to sleep."

I did not press her, but turned her so that her gorgeous naked ass was spooned against my spent and now flaccid cock. I held her right breast gently cupped in my right hand as she turned out the light and we went to sleep.

I am usually up about an hour before Claire, so that I can go for a run in the neighborhood before having breakfast and getting ready for work. As I prepared coffee before my run the next morning, I was startled by a soft knock against my glass patio door.

I looked around suddenly to see a man standing there in the dimness of the early morning smiling and waving with a friendly demeanor so as not to cause me discomfort. It did not work as he thought; because his at-least-six-foot-three-two-hundred-fifty-pound body and countenance were scary, no matter how friendly he tried to make his smile, especially in the dim light of early morning. I glanced at the stairs and listened for any sign that Claire might be awake. There was only silence and stillness.

Cautiously, I approached the patio door and braced as I opened it, in case this was not Sonny's guy after all. I relaxed when the man said in a surprisingly soft and higher-than-I-expected voice, "Can you get me the cell phone? I just need a couple of minutes." I beckoned him to come on in, but he declined, choosing to remain outside, where he could make a quick withdrawal from the scene if necessary.

I retrieved Claire's cell phone from her purse in the kitchen and brought it out to him. He examined it for a couple of seconds under a small Maglite and went to work on it. True to his word, he had the purple plastic back cover off the case, the battery compartment open, the attachment in place, the wafer-thin receiver stuck on, and the phone with cover back to what looked like its original condition in under five minutes. I was impressed.

"That ought to do it. For what it's worth, I hope that this is all wasted time and effort. I always hate it when Sonny's friends and associates get involved in the ugliness of cheating and divorce," he said, offering me his hand to shake.

"Oh, do you have a key so that I can get in the house later to put the bugs on the phones after you folks leave the house?" I got a spare from our key rack in the kitchen and returned and handed it to him. I told him to leave it under the steps of the back deck when he finished in the house and locked up afterward, and I would find it.

After I closed the patio door, I looked again and he had simply vanished as if he had never been there. I returned Claire's cell phone to her purse and went about my routine as I usually did every morning, starting with my run. Starting today, my daily routine would be anything but usual until I could figure out what Claire was up to.

Chapter 2

A package arrived by UPS in mid-morning on Wednesday. When I opened it, I found what looked like a typical GPS device like the one I kept in my Toyota 4Runner. The note in the package, from Sonny, indicated that this particular GPS was not used to show my location or direction of travel. It was to show me the location of Claire's car -- the tracker had been planted under the body of her car and I could see where she was -- if she was in her car -- any time I turned on the device.

My receiver could be powered by the car power adapter when I was on the road or by the USB connector to my computers at work or home so that I could monitor her location while at my desk or in my den. This was way cool; I felt kinda like Daniel Craig in one of the new James Bond movies -- or, as the British entertainment media called him, 'James Blonde.'

Sonny's note also included a recommendation that I should check my email a couple of times a day for electronic records of her travels. Twice daily, the logs from the GPS device would be downloaded to a server somewhere out there in the world and the listings would be sent to me as an attachment to an email at work disguised as a legitimate marketing message supposedly offering me special discounts to fly with Delta Airlines. I just needed to make sure that my email client was set so that it did not screen these out as spam.

Now, I simply had to watch and wait. God, I hate that! I am just not the patient type. I need action rather than idle waiting.

With that, I called in my Administrative Assistant, Grace, and we went over the list of clients who were most in need of being scheduled for a meeting with me for an annual financial review.

That evening, the routine was just that -- routine. We had supper and helped the kids with homework and enjoyed some family time. When the kids went down, I told Claire that I needed to check email and that I wanted to read a bit from an eBook that I downloaded from one of my favorite online eBook sites -- David Baldacci had a new suspense thriller out that looked promising.

Retiring to the den, I woke the computer and went quickly through the home emails. Only a couple of them were of interest. They were from mutual friends of Claire and me, and they informed us of plans for upcoming end-of-school-year parties and kids' activities being planned. We were now in the middle of May and school was scheduled to end on the fifth of June -- shortly after Memorial Day. There were also early notices for Claire's upcoming Fifteen-Year reunion of her graduating class, scheduled for the last week in June.

I had closed the den door -- Claire was watching television in the family room -- but the computer desk was situated so that I could face the door. I activated a file transfer software application on the computer and plugged the USB cables from the two remote phone recorders in my desk drawer to the USB hub sitting beside the computer. I wanted to transfer copies of all the recordings from her cell phone and the land line phone here at the house to the computer so that I could burn copies of anything significant to DVD-R or CD-R if needed.

Once the transfer was complete, I checked to see that the memory cards for the two digital recorders still had sufficient available space for recording a couple of more days of telephone traffic. Then, I disconnected them and put them back into stand-by mode and began to listen to the collection of audio gleaned from the land line phones at the house and from Claire's cell phone. I used my ear buds, so that the sound would be limited to my ears only as I listened and watched the door.

It dawned on me that I might need to get with Sonny later about some way to capture any message traffic that might occur when Claire used the texting feature on her phone. I sent myself an email to my work address to remind me to call in the morning, and then I cleared out the 'Sent' copy to keep Claire from seeing it if she checked the email.

The home phone traffic was limited only to a couple of solicitor calls that went directly to voice mail. Sometimes I wondered why we even kept land line phones anymore, since most of our communication in today's world was done on mobile devices. The traffic on Claire's cell phone today did not pick up until she turned the phone on as she was leaving work, and the only call recorded was her calling her stylist for a hair appointment for the upcoming Saturday morning.

Ah, well. So far, so good, I guess. It was only the first day, after all. I would just need to persevere for a while and see where this was all going to lead -- if anywhere.

The week continued with nothing uneventful on the personal or electronic front. We both went to work and sent the kids off to, and picked them up from, the schools they attended. Nothing even remotely questionable came up from the recordings or the travel logs for the tracker on Claire's car for the next few days. Claire had her hair appointment on Saturday for a cut and wash and I did some work around the house and we made love passionately and vigorously on Saturday night for about two hours.

Finally, Sunday afternoon, there was one call of interest to the house land line. I listened to it with interest on Sunday night just before bed. I was using my ear buds, as usual, to keep the listening to myself without fear of anyone else hearing.

[Claire] "Hello?"

[Female voice] "Hey, Claire Bear, how are you?"

[Clair, with an audible sigh] "Hello, Gay. What's on your little mind?" Claire did not sound enthusiastic at all. In fact, she sounded a bit irritable. I remembered that Gay was one of the old A-crowd that Claire had been keeping at a social distance.

[Gay, evidently] "Now, Claire, you know that we are all excited about your upcoming return engagement. The last one was so exciting and the sex was just so hot!" She actually giggled when she finished saying this.

[Claire] "Look, Gay, I can't talk about that now ... here on the home phone. Wade might hear. He can never find out about that other time. I just don't think he could stand to keep me around if he found out."

[Gay] "Well, he doesn't have to find out if you stay calm. Look, Dwight, Harvey, and Tim each want to have a solo hook-up with you before the big Memorial Day bash -- you know, to knock off the edge, so to speak. They all still think that sex with you is the best thing since Graham Crackers. I know that Tim has been drooling over the video that he keeps on our computer. He has watched it almost every night this week. Then, after he watches it, he gives me a hell of a ride after seeing you in action; it gets him all worked up."

[Gay continues] "They worked out a schedule for this coming week with Harvey on Tuesday, Tim and me on Wednesday, and Dwight on Thursday; Harvey and Dwight will arrange for their families to be out of the house on the nights of your expected visits. Then they will all three be there, of course, for the main event at the quarry on Friday."

[Claire, following a moment of silence] "I wish there were some other way. It would kill Wade if he were to find out about this ... or about the other time. I can't lose him, Gay; I just can't." 

I could hear emotion in her voice and detected that she was probably on the verge of crying as she said it. Maybe she was experiencing some remorse for having already cheated on me and for the plans -- which they were discussing -- to continue doing so.

[Gay] "Now, Honey, if you are careful, he won't find out. After all, it will all be over after Friday, and we can simply keep those sexy memories for the rest of our lives and then be able to start up a program of making a lot of new memories, if you are game." Gay giggled again.

[Claire, after a moment's hesitation] "We'll see if it actually works out like you think it will. I just need to be as discreet as possible for now. Nothing about this must surface, or else my marriage and my life as I know it will be very much in danger."

[Gay, with irritation now in her voice] "You worry too much. Just make plans for your visits to see the guys individually and be sure that you are careful. We don't want poor Wade to get all upset at this point, now do we? Anyway, I gotta go. I'll call you later in the week to see how things went; and, of course, I'll be there Friday for the big event; just like last time. Bye."




Biggest and Best



Something in Gay's voice when she spoke about me held an edge of disdain. This bitch evidently did not think too much of me. I had no idea why, unless it involved my being a move-in rather than having grown up here with all of them. I had only met Gay a couple of times in passing at various events. Claire had not said too much to me about her, other than giving me the fact that they had grown up here in town and gone to school together and they had both been cheerleaders in high school.

[Claire] "Yeah ... bye." But by then, the other woman had already broken the connection.

I went to the family room and walked directly over to the book shelves that held Claire's high school yearbook from her senior year. Taking it back to the den, I sat down and thumbed through, looking for references to the names I had heard discussed.

I found Gay first, on the sixth page of individual shots, recognizing her from the few times I had encountered her. The legend identified her as Gay Marshall back then. Turning to the back, I looked up her name in the picture index and found several references. These turned out to be pictures of her with the varsity cheerleader squad. My breath caught when I saw just how gorgeous Claire looked in her cheerleader uniform standing next to Gay in the group shot. I also recognized Mindy's teacher, Carol Newman (Carol Hinson back then) as one of the other varsity cheerleaders.

Like Claire, Gay had been a real babe back then, but the expression on Gay's face in almost every picture showed that she was really full of herself, reflecting vanity and a sort of smugness. One shot showed her receiving a bouquet and a crown at the homecoming football game. The player presenting the bouquet was identified as Tim Harmon.

Now I had the Tim more than likely identified as Gay's husband, who I had seen around town as well. I did not know him personally, but I knew who he was, since his face, though a little older and fuller, looked down from a billboard out on Highway 6, advertising his auto dealership in town. I got the White Pages and looked up his name in the Residential section; I found it listed as 'Harmon, Tim and Gay', followed by the address on the west side of town and the telephone number. Well, that answered my question about how to locate Tim and Gay.

Back in the yearbook, I looked for other pictures of Tim and found football team pictures. In a shot of the offensive backfield players together, I found pictures labeled with the names Harvey Bland and Dwight Newman. I had remembered hearing about Harvey at my wedding reception -- I deal in details, remember. I had also met him and seen him at Chamber of Commerce meetings a couple of times, but had never had the chance to talk to him much. The White Pages got me his address -- also on the west side of town.

Dwight was someone I knew pretty well, along with his wife, Carol. I saw him and Carol regularly as a client couple and I remembered him from our wedding reception. Our families did not socialize, but we ran into each other quite often, since Mindy was a student in Carol's second grade class and Dwight was now the principal of John Bankhead Magruder Elementary School, where Carol taught. 

I had always thought that Carol was nice, and she seemed to want to work hard at educating her students. Her parent-teacher conferences with Claire and me were always thorough and with the best interests of Mindy in mind. I would say that it was a good thing that she taught elementary school. As hot as Carol was, it would have been difficult for the boys in junior high or high school to pay attention to the subject matter with her in front of the class.

Dwight seemed to want little to do with me except to have me manage his investments and insurance. I did that as professionally as possible, even though he fought me on most of my recommendations.

When Claire and I attended school functions, there were not many instances where we got to interact with Dwight much, given the large size of the school. But, during the few times when we did, I always got the uneasy feeling that Dwight was looking at Claire with a little more than just the professional interest of an educator. Sometimes, I saw Carol eyeing me with more than just passing interest as well.

When I went up to bed, Claire was already asleep. That was good, as I did not want to have to carry on any kind of conversation with her right then. I was pissed after hearing the phone recordings that revealed what sounded like confirmation to me of her deception. I knew that she would pick up on my anger in a heartbeat if she were awake.

It took me about an hour to get to sleep. Before I drifted off, I vowed that I would get Sonny to help me thwart the plans of my wife, who, by early indications, really was turning out to be a cheating whore.

I skipped my morning run Monday so that I could get out of the house early and avoid talking to Claire; I was still pissed and I did not want her to pick up on it. I left her a note saying that this was a busy week and that I was spending some unusually long hours working on client accounts for the next few days.

I monitored the movements of Claire's car with the device that Sonny had given me. It showed her going to work and her car remaining at the mall where she worked all day. Of course, she could have gone off in the middle of the day for a rendezvous with one of her men friends and I would not have been able to tell without actually staking her out and following her. I figured that, with the assets I already had in place -- thanks to Sonny -- and the information they were helping me to gather, I would soon probably have enough evidence assembled to establish a good case for divorce -- if I chose to go that route.

Why would I not go that route? If she was cheating on me, giving away to some other asshole the pussy which rightly belongs exclusively to me, then I had every right to divorce her whoring ass! And the majority of guys in my situation would do just that! With as much malice and vengeance as they could conjure up and execute!

But, damn! I loved her. Cheater or not, I loved her.

She was the mother of my wonderful children. For the good of the children, if not our own financial well-being, divorce was just not the way I preferred to go. Yeah, yeah, call me a wimp if you must, but I have to be practical as well as emotional here.

Children from broken homes developed too many emotional problems that affected their lives later on.

And one of the single most devastating financial events in a family's life is divorce.

If I could get her to stop all of this nonsense, I was probably going to keep her around; for the sake of the children; for the sake of our finances (those in the public accounts); and for the sake of the years of love and emotional investment we already had in each other. I wasn't going to let her know all of this, though. Maybe I'd let her sweat it a bit once she finally realized that I knew.

If this panned out as it was starting to look like, I would use the evidence to hang over her head like the Sword of Damocles to keep her in line for the rest of our years together. She would be on as short a leash as I could manage for the rest of her miserable life and she would feel the tug on it every day as it tightened figuratively on her lovely neck. I would make her feel my retribution for any hurt and disappointment that she might cause me for many years to come.

I know that might cause her to seek divorce from me on her own if I were to be too harsh. I would have to temper my attitude and actions to offer her just enough hope to try to tough it out.

I putzed around the office so that I could get home later that night in order to validate the story I had given her in the note that morning. I had noticed today that she had not made any attempts to call me just to say, "Hi." This was unusual. We routinely tried to communicate with each other daily. That had not happened today.

Getting in around nine, I gave Claire a perfunctory kiss and begged off supper, having already grabbed a bite in town. She was quieter than usual and did not argue when I said that I had some things to do on the den computer.

Listening to the recordings of the phone conversations, I heard nothing but routine stuff on the recording from the land line at the house. The one from her cell phone was a different story. When she had turned it on after work, and just before heading home, she had gotten a call from Harvey Bland.

[Harvey] "Hey, Good Looking."

[Claire, with what sounded like a bored or irritated tone] "What is it, Harv?"

[Harvey] "I just wanted to say that everything is set for us tomorrow at my house. Joy is taking the kids to her mother's for the afternoon and evening, and she won't be back until late. So, plan to come on over at seven and just walk in the front door. It will be open."

[Claire] "Harv, can't I get you to reconsider all of this? I mean ... what if Wade finds out? And, with the longer periods of daylight now, it will still be light at seven." I notice that Claire did not mention Harv's wife, Joy, or any concern about her finding out.

[Harvey] "Oh, Claire Bear, I would not miss this opportunity to enjoy your sweet pussy again. You are just too good to pass up. Now, no more arguing; it's going to happen again. I just wish that I had a copy of all the video and pictures, like old Tim."

[Claire, after a pause] "All right; I'll be there. But I can't stay long; just long enough for ... well ... And I need your promise of no more pictures or video! I can't have any more of those floating around."

[Harvey, laughing] "Believe me, Claire Bear; you are going to be here long enough for the both of us to enjoy a good romp in the bedroom. Just look at it as good practice for your upcoming nights with Tim and Dwight. And don't forget the fun we are all planning for Friday. Man, oh, man, that's going to be wild! And, if everything works out afterward, I won't need any new video or pictures; our continued adventures will more than make up for that!"

[Claire] "Look, I can't talk anymore. I have to get home. Goodbye, Harv."

So, she had been fucking Harvey. Here was what amounted to an audio confession of her adultery! I was so pissed I could not see straight for a few seconds! Even though it was after nine-thirty, I decided to call Sonny.

"Sonny," I started in as soon as he answered, "It's Wade. Man, I need your help big time!"

"Hey, you got it, My Man. What's the deal? You getting what you need with your spousal unit's attempts to disrespect you and cheat around?"

"Yeah; thanks for the assets. I've already got her dead to rights in all of this business captured on audio. But I want to put an end to her meets with the assholes that she's cheating on me with." I told him about the planned get-togethers she had on tap for the next night with Harvey, then Wednesday with Tim and Gay, and then again Thursday with Dwight. "I need some help in shutting down those meetings; preferably before they can happen."

I was greeted by a moment of silence on the other end. Then, "You still love her; don't you?"

His quick assessment only surprised me a little bit. I sighed and said, "Yeah. God damn it, Sonny; she's the mother of my children and the only woman I ever imagined spending my life with. Once this episode is dealt with, she and I are going to have a major sit-down and she's going to find out just how close she came to my throwing her under the bus."

"I can arrange for that to happen; literally, I mean," said Sonny.

"NO!" I shouted.

"Hey, I'm just pulling your chain," said Sonny with a short laugh. "We'll get this all sorted out without messing up one hair on her pretty little head. I can't say the same for these guys she's been dealing with. Look, you tell me what you need, and I'll pull out all the stops to get it done."

We talked about the planned upcoming activities and I asked Sonny to try to keep Claire's involvement out of the public eye with whatever he had planned for the Three Amigos ... the Three Assholes ... and Gay, too, I guess.

"Hey, I got an idea on just how to do that. But I need you to stay out of this, Wade. If you try to put your hand in, you could get burned. And you are too valuable to me as a friend and as an asset to our business for anything to happen to you. You hear?" Sonny was very serious in his tone and the emphasis he was putting into his words.

"Okay, Sonny. I won't get in the way. I promise." I was telling him the truth; just not all of it. I was planning to follow Claire so that I could be close by in case anything were to go wrong tomorrow.

I hung up with Sonny and put the computer to sleep. I couldn't help but be tense with all of this going on. I knew that I would have to come up with a cover story for Claire when I got upstairs to bed. When it came to wanting to have sex with her tonight, I did want to ... but, then again, I didn't. If she was giving it away to those other assholes, and maybe playing a game of Lickety-Split with Gay, I really did not want to touch her skanky ass right now. I figured that I had better pull out the old 'too tired from everything today' excuse.

She seemed only slightly disappointed at my lack of interest in sex, but she was quiet after my putting her off. I figured that her conscience was probably bothering her. Either that, or it wasn't bothering her at all and she was trying to get her own story straight as to how she was planning to lie to me so that she could get out of the house for the next three nights; and then again on Friday. Yep, that's just what she did.

"Wade; I have Majestic Parties that will probably go late every night all this week starting tomorrow night. I'm sorry I did not tell you earlier. But, now that I know that you are tied up with work in the evenings as well, I don't feel so bad about not being here for you.

"Mom has agreed to keep Mindy and Paul at her house overnight for Tuesday through Friday and get them to school on Wednesday through Friday mornings. Then she said she would let them stay with her for the weekend."

Claire then looked at me with a sly smile. "That way we can make up for not being able to enjoy each other's ...uh ... company all week. We can stay in bed together all weekend long, if you want to." She had one of her sexiest smiles on.

So, there it was; her cover story; pretend Majestic Jewelry get-togethers going late every night. And, with my supposed late work schedule and with her mom, Nan, watching the kids, she was going to be free to act. It might be a hoot for me to demand to see her Majestic Jewelry sales invoices later to back up all these sales parties. I'll just bet she'd shit gold bricks if I did that.

I said, as reasonably as I could, "Okay, Sweetie. Just remember that I'll hold you to your promise of all weekend in bed." With that, I kissed her and rolled over, facing away from her. She sighed and rolled to face away as well.

Chapter 3

Tuesday, I could hardly think about work at all. I had risen and left the house early, like I had on Monday, skipping my run this time. Grace, my Administrative Assistant, must have thought I was on heavy medication or something, as dopey as I was acting -- and probably looking.

I know that I had told Sonny that I would not do anything personally. But my mind was in turmoil with all sorts of ideas about what my wife was doing -- hell, had been doing -- with these guys she had known for twice as long as she had known me. I had to try to see the proof of my wife's evident infidelity for myself.

I drove to the Sheffield subdivision just outside of the downtown area, where Harvey and Joy Bland had their house -- the location for tonight's scheduled cheating rendezvous. It was not a new subdivision, but there was a new section being developed. There were several houses still under construction -- some just being framed and some almost completed, but being finished inside and landscaped -- just a half block from the Bland house.

I parked just inside the new section -- behind a construction dumpster -- at about quarter to seven, leaving a clear view up the street to the house scheduled for tonight's rendezvous. I hoped that Claire would go straight to the Bland house and not drive this deep into the subdivision to the point at which she might spot my presence.

I noticed several contractor vehicles in the area, despite its being late in the day. There must have been a big push for completion of the work by the developers.

Looking down the street, at the front of the Bland house, five houses down from me on the left, I could see the garage with its door open. The two-car garage only had one car in it. I assumed that this was Harvey's car and that Joy had already left with the kids for the evening.

I drew a deep breath as I saw Claire's Toyota Camry pull into the street and park in the Bland's driveway. She sat there for maybe a whole minute with her head down before exiting the car and walking up toward the front porch. 

Halfway up the walk, I hit the speed dial on my cell phone. I saw her pause as I heard the sound of the call going through in my ear. She reached in her purse and pulled her cell phone out. Her face registered surprise as she saw the caller ID, showing that I was the one calling her. Pressing a finger to the face of the phone and holding it to her ear I saw her answer my call.

"Hello? Wade?" she answered tentatively.

"Hi, Honey. How's it going with the Majestic party? Are the ladies drooling over the catalogue listings and the sample items?" I asked.

"Oh ... unh ... we are just now getting to the refreshments, Honey. We haven't started the presentation yet," she lied. "Are you going to be very late tonight?"

I bit off my bitter response and took a quick cleansing breath. "Yeah; it looks like it might be around ten or eleven. What about you?"

"It will probably be around eleven for me, like most of the times when we throw these parties. You know the ladies like to talk for a bit after the sales presentations are complete and while the orders are all being logged," she said.

"I just hope that the regional sales lady does not schedule this many parties this close together again. I will probably need that time I promised you this weekend just to catch up on my rest as well as catching up on our 'us' time." She had told me all of her lies just as smoothly and as naturally as if nothing sordid could ever be going on.

I was quiet for long enough for her to get concerned enough to say something else. "Honey, is everything all right? You are coming across as if something were bothering you."

I answered, "Sweetie, I'm just distracted by all the things that are keeping us apart right now. Just in case I haven't said it to you enough times lately, I want you to know that, whatever happens, I love you very much."

She paused for a second and then said, "I ... I love you, too, Honey; very much." She paused again and said, "Wade, I ...," then she paused again.

I waited. Then I said, "Yes?"

"Just ... I love you and I always will. I gotta go. Jill wants me to help out back." With that, she broke the connection. I watched from down the street as she looked at her phone for a second or two before dropping it back in her purse.

She visibly sighed and turned back toward the house of Asshole Harvey Bland and climbed the two steps leading to the front porch. She paused again before reaching for the door handle. I remember Good Ole Harvey telling her to walk right on in. It looked now like he had not left the door open as he had said he would. Claire tried the handle for a few seconds and then pressed the doorbell when the door would not open for her.

By this time, I was ready to hop out of my 4Runner and dash over there and grab her by her hair to drag her away and demand of her just what the hell she was thinking in all of this. I wanted her to explain it all to me and tell me why she was lying, cheating, and tearing my heart out.




Biggest and Best



I wanted to pull her hair, slap her face, and tell her that she was acting like a slut. Then I caught myself as my imagination began to run away from me. I knew that I could never really lift a hand to her. I don't hit women, particularly women I happen to love.

As I continued to watch, Claire remained at the door, but no one came to answer the bell. She pushed the button at least three more times and still received no answer. She looked around and tried the door handle again. It did not open for her. She reached in her purse for her cell phone 

I watched her scroll through her screen listing until she found a number and touched it. Putting the phone to her ear, I watched her wait as the call went through. She waited for almost a minute, and then she clicked to disconnect and pressed the phone screen lightly again, listening as her redial went through. Once again it was almost a full minute before she closed out her call attempt.

She dropped her phone back into her purse and stepped off the porch. She looked up at the second-floor windows, and then scanned the curtained windows of the first floor for any sign of activity in the house in which she was supposed to be meeting Harvey Bland for some illicit sex.

Finally, seeing no activity from the house and getting no response to her knocks, rings, and calls, she sighed and walked quickly back to her car and climbed in. She started the car, looked at the house for a few seconds more, and then drove away, probably much faster than the residential area would consider safe.

I just sat there, trembling with a combination of feelings of rage, relief, nervousness, and disbelief. My wife had actually tried to keep a rendezvous with a married man -- NOT her husband -- for the purpose of having sex outside of the bonds of her own marriage vows. And at HIS house no less, while his own wife and kids were conveniently away from the house. And it was still light enough for the neighbors to have seen the strange car and to be able to identify the adulteress who was attempting to gain entrance. I just shook my head.

I was still sitting there fuming and thinking about all of this about twenty minutes later when I noticed a couple of very big guys, one with what looked like an oversized laundry bag, walking my way from the direction of the Bland's back yard and then along the sidewalk. I watched as they moved with a sense of urgency toward one of the vans painted in the livery of a local landscaper. One moved to the driver's door and the other to the passenger side. The passenger came around and opened the sliding door on his side and threw the bag inside before reclosing the door and climbing into the passenger seat.

Within a few seconds, the driver started the van and gunned it once, sending out a bit of visible exhaust from the rear. He spun on the gravel as he accelerated away and the van moved quickly out of the subdivision by the same route taken by my wife earlier.

I finally started my 4Runner and drove back to my office so that I could establish my story of working late. I went inside, but I simply sat at my desk and read some of my ongoing Baldacci story on my computer, via its eBook reader application. I kept this up for about three hours, but found it frustrating, as I had to keep rereading paragraphs two and three times in order to keep up with the story. My mind was on other things and I found it hard to concentrate on my reading; no matter how good the story was.

Finally, I closed up and went out to my 4Runner. I stopped for gas on the way home and pulled into the driveway at about ten-thirty. Claire was not home yet. I wondered where she was, but figured that she was doing something similar to what I had done -- wasting some time -- so that she could arrive home late to match her earlier story. The only satisfaction that I got from that was the knowledge that she evidently did not get a chance to fuck Harvey Bland tonight.

I had a second of panic, thinking that she might actually have gone back to see if Harvey had been there later, but I wasn't going to go tearing out into the night to go back there myself. I really did not want to see any more evidence of her betrayal.

I was asleep when Claire finally got home. I woke for a few minutes, listening to her in the bathroom as she brushed her teeth. I took it as a good sign that she did not feel the need to take a shower following her evening out. But I was exhausted from the emotional strain I had put myself through over the past few days, especially today. I was out cold before she even came to bed.

I threw the newspaper on the kitchen table as I came in from my run Wednesday morning. I had run for about twenty minutes more than usual so that I could burn off some of the hurt and anger that I was still feeling over Claire's escapades of the previous evening. I did not even look at any of the headlines like I usually do. I just went for the coffee pot.

Claire was up and drinking coffee when I came in from the run, but she did not offer her usual good morning greetings or try for a hug. She looked like she was miles away in her thoughts. When I tossed the paper in front of her, she just glanced at it. I turned to finish pouring the coffee when I heard her gasp.

I turned back around and saw her looking with fear and surprise at the below-the-fold story and headline on the front page of the local paper. Her hand was to her mouth. She made some kind of strangled sound and pushed the newspaper away. Standing quickly, she poured the rest of her coffee in the sink and left her cup on the counter as she scurried quickly out of the kitchen and headed for the stairs without a word to me.

Curious, I looked at the newspaper and saw a headline indicating 'Home Invaders Terrorize Local Family.' The picture accompanying the story showed the front of a familiar house with a Police Officer talking in the foreground to reporters and a gurney in the background coming off the porch with two Fire Department EMTs moving it.

The article indicated that a house in the Sheffield subdivision belonging to the family of a Mr. Harvey Bland had been broken into while the homeowner was there. Fortunately, his wife and children were out of the house for the afternoon and evening.

Police would not give many details about the case, but they did say that it looked like the homeowner, Harvey Bland, had been surprised by two masked men entering the house in the broad daylight of the late afternoon through the patio door -- which sources say was forced. Bland had allegedly been assaulted and duct-taped to a kitchen chair with his eyes taped over as well, while the men allegedly went about moving through the house looking for valuables. No indications were given from authorities as to just what had been taken beyond a laptop computer. A source, who spoke on grounds of anonymity, revealed that the wife had returned late in the evening to find her husband secured to the chair in the kitchen and had called 911.

Bland had also been assaulted further in a strange manner. First responders evidently had difficulty in treating Mr. Bland, as his injuries were initially difficult to treat directly. The alleged attackers had driven an eight-inch landscape timber spike through Bland's left foot and into the wooden floor of his kitchen.

To keep him from bleeding out, they had sprayed all over and around the foot and the spike with an aerosol-delivered home insulation foam material used in construction for sealing odd-shaped openings -- the brand name on the spray can left behind in the trash, and identified to reporters by the unnamed source, was 'Great Stuff.' Reports from Sentara Hospital, where Bland was taken were sketchy, but it appeared that there are no other injuries, except for minor scrapes and a bruise to the left side of Bland's face, where he had allegedly been struck by the intruders upon their first arrival in the home. Early prognosis was for Bland's full recovery with no really harmful after effects.

There was more, including national and statewide statistics about home break-ins and home invasions. The Chief of Police made the usual plea for any witnesses to call the toll-free crime line. Blah, blah, blah ...

I put the paper down and smiled. It would seem that Mr. Harvey Bland had really -- I know, I know; it's lame and really corny -- put his foot in it when he decided to mess with the wife of a friend of Sonny Giancomo.

By the time I had finished my shower, Claire was dressed and ready to go. Since her Mom had the kids at her place this week, there was no typical scurry to get them ready for school. Still wearing just my towel, I got a perfunctory kiss, and an 'I love you; see you sometime late tonight' from her as she hurried out. She did not say anything about the report of the crime at the Blands, but I could see that she was upset. I just wished I could read her mind to see if she was upset at a friend being assaulted, or upset that the event had ruined her plans for some hot, monkey sex with another man.

I did not care at the moment. I was just basking in the relief that Sonny was taking care of things for me. I was also feeling a bit smug that Asshole Harvey Bland had gotten a small taste of exactly what he really deserved. I sorta wished that it could have been something more; something that Harv would carry around with him for the rest of his life; like maybe -- no dick. Nah! I'm not that vindictive, but the thought DID cross my mind once as I got ready for work.

Grace, my AA, was probably about to call a shrink for me as she watched me operate in my fog for a second day in a row. When she asked me at lunch time about my strange apparent fugue state, I tried to snap to attention mentally and smile at her, assuring her that I just had a lot on my mind. She wasn't buying the simple answer, but she did not press it.

I left the office for the rest of the day at around two. I went home, but felt a need to park around the block from the house. I cut across back yards and entered my own house surreptitiously from the rear. There was no sign of Claire -- not that I had expected any -- but I still listened for any sign of a presence in my house.

I checked the phone recorders in the drawer of the computer desk and saw that one of the digital counters had moved since I had last checked. Plugging it in, I got one recorded call from the cell phone recorder. When I had transferred the conversation to the computer, and plugged in the ear buds to listen, I noted that the call had been made during Claire's lunch break.

[Male voice] "Hello; Harmon Motors, where your job is your credit for one of our new or quality pre-owned cars."

[Claire] "Tim Harmon, please."

[Male voice] "May I ask who is calling?"

[Claire, with cold precision] "No. Just get him." Wow, I thought. She was really intense with that poor guy.

[Different male voice] "This is Tim."

[Claire] "This is Claire Sloan. Did you see the paper today? Have you heard anything about how Harvey is doing? Have ..."

[Tim Harmon] "Whoa, Claire Bear." God, I hated that cutesy name that all her old friends called her. "Yeah, I guess the whole town has heard; seeing as how it was on the radio all morning and in the paper. Gay went down to the hospital and linked up with Joy this morning. Joy was a wreck, understandably -- scared to go back to her own house. I guess, with Harvey not there, and with the break-in and all, she feels vulnerable."

[Claire] "Tim, I can assure you that any woman would feel that way after such a traumatic thing as that in her own house. I know I would. What I called about is to beg off tonight in light of what happened with Harv and Joy."

[Tim] "Oh, no; just because of one random act of violence that happened to hit in our circle of friends, I am not passing up my night with you. So, don't even think of trying to get out of it."

[Claire] "Tim; be reasonable. This kind of thing puts what we are doing under greater threat of being discovered. I have told Gay and now I'm telling you; I will NOT endanger my marriage to Wade in all of this."

[Tim] "Look. I have to go. I have a business to run and appointments to keep. You just be there at seven tonight according to plan, like Gay told you on the phone Sunday, and we will all work together to keep Wade out of it ... heh, heh ... for now. Now, get hold of yourself and calm down. I gotta go." Click!

[Claire] "Son of a bitch ..." This last was said to no one, as the call was already cut off by Tim's having hung up on his end.

I put all the stuff away in the desk and put the computer to sleep. I would have liked to sit and contemplate a bit, but I knew that I had to get out of the house in case Claire came by here for some reason. I also did not want my neighbors who got off work earlier than either of us to spot me here and say something to Claire -- after all; I was supposed to be busy at work until late tonight.

Deer Hollow subdivision, where Tim and Gay Harmon resided, was an established residential area and there was no good place for me to watch the Harmon house from within my 4Runner. Parking it on their street would be too obvious. So, I parked at the club house for the subdivision's community center and walked the three blocks to their street. I had arrived at six o'clock so that I could see what might be transpiring before and during Claire's expected arrival. I also had to find a place from which to watch without being detected.

There was a small retention pond behind the Harmon house. On the far side of the pond from their house, there was a very small building that looked like it might be a pump house for the city and county sewer system. Landscaping around the small building provided me enough shrubbery and bushes to be screened from view from the street and neighboring houses; while I was able to look obliquely at the back of the Harmon house from the driveway side.

I had been watching the back and side of the house for about ten minutes when I saw the patio door open. Two large men came out and closed the patio door behind them. They looked all around before moving off the back deck. Then, they strolled casually toward the retention pond and skirted the shore around the far side and through the yard of a house off to my left.

One of the men carried a cardboard box about two feet by two feet by two feet and one carried a bag that looked similar to the one carried by the landscapers I had seen the day before at the Bland house. In fact, these men looked exactly like the two landscapers I had seen the day before. They were not dressed in landscaping coveralls this time. Today, they wore khaki work clothes, maybe Carhartts.

I listened for about another ten minutes to the silence in the air, except for normal neighborhood noises and the sounds of passing minivans. There were no sirens in the distance. So much for Neighborhood Watch; these guys just waltzed out of a house in the subdivision in the middle of the day while the neighborhood simply ... watched!

Detecting movement at the side of the Harmon house, I looked to see Claire's Camry pull up in the driveway. After a minute or so, she got out and I lost sight of her as she walked around the front of the house.

The tension I had experienced earlier, followed by the smug satisfaction that Sonny's guys had already finished whatever they had been up to in the Harmon house, was now replaced by anger. I was seething at my wife's deception and outright lies. I had planned to call her with another preemptive call, like the one at the Bland house. But, this time, I just watched to see what would happen next.

There were no signs of activity and still no untoward sounds from the neighborhood. After about five minutes, I saw Claire reappear from the front of the house and walk around to the side and back. She looked all around, giving the indication that she was trying to determine if she were being watched by neighbors and then moved up onto the Harmon's patio deck. Here she paused and just looked at the patio door ten feet away.

That's when I hit the speed dial on my phone. Claire had been just about to step toward the back patio door when I saw her jump. Quickly reaching for her cell phone, she turned and began to walk back toward her car.

"Hello? Wade? What's the matter, Honey?" she asked. I could detect the fear in her voice.

"Hey, Sweetie, I was just calling to say just that very word ...'Hey' ... there's nothing the matter on my end. Is there something the matter there? By the way, where is the Majestic Party tonight?" I asked, after my dig at her conscience.

She paused and I could hear her breathing heavily, obviously still startled by my call. "Oh, it's at the ... umm ...Claiborne's. I'm almost there. I'm running behind and had to stop for gas."

"Okay, Sweetie. Well, I hope that it goes well tonight. You still plan on being late? If you don't pig out too much on the finger food, I could order pizza for a late snack and we could share that and some wine. Then, maybe we could ... uh ... snuggle, you know?"

Claire paused before answering. "I think we need to take a rain check on that, Baby. It sounds nice and romantic, but I am already tired and it's only going to be worse when I get in later after this party. But hold those types of thoughts for Saturday. THEN, I plan to rock your world for about a day-and-a-half. How does that sound?" She had gone from sounding frightened to sounding assured and sexy in the period of a few seconds.

I answered, "Oooh ... I like the sound of that. Well, I'll let you go. I wouldn't want to distract you and have you ending up in the wrong neighborhood ..." I saw her jump at that from all the way across the pond. "I mean with you being late already and all. Love you, Sweetie; see ya later." I cut the call before she could even answer.

I saw Claire look at the phone in her hand. Then she looked like she might be contemplating trying the Harmon's back door again. She then just sighed and turned back toward her car, all the while scanning the windows of the house trying to detect any sign of anyone's being at home; evidently with no success.

Unlocking the car with the remote key fob, she walked to the driver's door and got into her car and backed out. Turning away, she drove off, turning onto the street where my hideout was, and she passed my location without even looking at the structure behind which I was hidden.

The rest of Wednesday evening went much like Tuesday evening. I wasted some time before heading home and, evidently, so did Claire.

I heard her arrive in the house at about eleven and I could only wonder where she had gone to hang out in order to keep her own cover story alive. I smiled to myself and turned away from the bedroom door and feigned sleep when she came in to undress for the night. I was asleep before she finished in the bathroom and came to bed.

After my early run on Thursday morning, I brought in the newspaper and saw the headline -- this time, above the fold on the front page -- 'Second Home Invasion in Two Days.' I scanned the article briefly to assure myself that it did, in fact, reference an attack on the Harmon home, and then I went inside the house without looking for any more details. I placed the newspaper on the kitchen table in Claire's place. I had an idea of what the rest of the story would say about details; I was just content to see the Harmons get theirs in some way. 

I had some coffee and held the cordless house phone in my hand as I sipped my coffee and watched for indications of Claire's descent from upstairs. When I heard her moving toward the head of the stairs, I hit a speed dial button on the phone, connecting me to the ADT Security number. As Claire turned into the kitchen, she heard me voicing my concern to our home security company's help line.




Biggest and Best



"Yeah! Are you guys sure that we are okay and that all the ADT monitors are in place and functional?" I was asking the help desk technician on the other end. As far as he was concerned, this was a call from a worried homeowner.

"Mr. Sloan, we have been assuring customers from your area all morning long that our systems are all up and running and our sensors are all testing out perfectly. I can assure you as well that ADT is always paying close attention to your home security needs," the young man told me. He actually sounded American, with no sign of the sing-song inflections that someone in a call center in Mumbai might generate when speaking.

"Well, folks are really worried around here. I mean what with two home invasions in two days ..." I heard Claire gasp when I said that and she moved quickly to the table. She saw the headline and I saw her eyes get as big as saucers. I went on with my conversation; but I kept my eyes on my wife. "I'm just calling to make sure that you guys are aware. Okay?" The guy assured me that the company was aware and alert. We finished up the call and, all the while, I was watching Claire as she scanned the article in the paper before her about the attack on the Harmon house.

Before I could say anything after replacing the phone in its wall cradle, Claire looked quickly over at me and stared hard into my eyes. She did not say anything, but it looked like she was trying to discern anything unusual in my expression. Finally, she said, "Wade. Did you ..." here she paused, "Did you ..."

Now, I said, "Did I ... what, Sweetie?" But, try as I might, I could not hide my hard expression and perhaps the slight touch of satisfaction that I was feeling. I mean I was inwardly pleased, knowing that Tim and Gay Harmon had been dealt with appropriately concerning their involvement in my wife's attempts at cheating on me. I guess some of satisfaction was bound to show up in my eyes if not in the rest of my face, or in my voice.

Claire paused again and it looked as if she might be afraid of me for a second. "Did you ... get some assurance from the security folks?" she finally asked.

I smiled my best loving and assuring smile as I stepped toward her and reached for a hug. I noted that she flinched at first, but stepped toward me after that and returned my hug as she pressed her face into my chest. I could feel the tension in her body, though. I kissed the top of her head and pulled back. Then I remembered.

"Oh, don't forget today's the day for Mindy's Show-And-Tell with 'Yours Truly' as her guest." Today, I was to join some other parents in giving a short presentation to Mindy's class about what my job was. I guess her teacher, Carol Newman, wanted the kids to start thinking early in life about what they wanted to be 'when they grow up.' I swear; that theme never goes out of style in public schools. I remembered it from when I had attended long years ago.

Anyway, Claire and I were supposed to be in place at ten-thirty at the school so that Mindy could 'show me off' while I made my pitch about what I do to contribute to the work force. About four other working moms and dads were also supposed to make a pitch as well. Claire indicated that she remembered, and moved to the coffee pot.

I went upstairs to prepare for the day, and Claire and I passed each other a couple of times between the bathroom, the bedroom, and the kitchen before we kissed goodbye and promised to meet up at the school. Claire called her mother to make sure that the kids were okay and that Nan would get them to kindergarten and school on time. I was out the door while she was on the phone.

Grace saw that I was much happier than on the previous two days when I walked into the office. "Hey, did you get laid last night or something? You look like you are in a much better mood today."

I just grinned in response and walked from the coffee pot back toward my office. I actually got no meaningful work done this morning, as I turned my attention to the online edition of the local newspaper and today's main story.

This time, the picture in the article was of the DA and the Police Chief holding a press conference. The accompanying story told of a home invasion and robbery at the Harmon residence with a similar MO to that of the Bland residence on the previous day.

The only difference was that, this time, the wife was home. The article went on to say that the Harmons had no children. It seems that Tim Harmon had had his foot penetrated by a landscape timber spike similar to the one used on Harvey Bland. The foam used in the first instance was used in this one as well.

Gay Harmon had been found in her bed with her arms stretched above her and tied with ropes to the headboard. Both of her feet had been penetrated by long, but very thin, hardwood flooring staples, attaching her feet to the wooded footboard of her cherry wood bed by penetrating just behind the middle toe knuckles. The 'Great Stuff' foam had sealed her wounds like those of her husband, stopping the bleeding from getting out of hand.

Both of them had been blindfolded and gagged. It appeared that only a desktop computer had been stolen from the house. The Police spokesman at the scene said this was strange because there were many valuable items that the thieves had passed on, perhaps in haste to depart. An anonymous 911 call had been placed from what appeared to officials as a number from a throw-away cell phone and there were no other clues as to the call's origin. Evidently, the call came in at around eight o'clock, and the attack was estimated to have happened at around five-thirty on Wednesday afternoon.

Both of the victims had been taken to Sentara Hospital and were under treatment. Doctors indicated no long-term problems associated with their injuries. There were no disclosures of clues or suspects at the time of the article and the Chief had made the plea again for anyone with any information on these horrible crimes to call the toll-free crime line.

I closed out the browser and read some of my emails. I answered a couple of them and soon it was time to leave for the school and my 'rendezvous with destiny' with my daughter and her second-grade class. I checked my tie and my hair in the mirror in the office bathroom before telling Grace where I was going. She grinned and wished me well.

Chapter 4

I had timed my arrival so that I could stroll by the school office before having to go to Carol Newman's classroom to meet my wife and daughter. I wanted to see if I could get a quick look at the Principal's -- Dwight Newman's -- face this morning after the news of the incidents involving his fucking asshole buddies -- and Tim's wife, Gay.

I was outwardly smug and upbeat, but I was still pissed that the audacity of those three fuckwads. The very idea of trying to make me a fucking cuckold; of trying to humiliate me in my adopted hometown, the place where I was raising my children; of disrespecting me; and using my own wife to disrespect me.

As I passed by the office, I stopped to listen to the unusually high level of noise and activity from inside. The school secretaries were trying to deal with several parents at the service counter. I heard one of the ladies on the phone talking about Dwight. 

"No, I'm sorry, but Mr. Newman was called away suddenly early this morning and is not in his office today." Pause. "I believe it was an out-of-town family emergency, but he did not tell me any details." Pause. "Yes, I expect him to be back in the office on Monday." Pause and the sound of pages turning. "It looks like he has a half hour on Tuesday afternoon at two." Pause. "Okay, Mrs. Lang, I'll pencil you in. Thank you."

Well; it looked like Dwight Newman had suddenly developed a reason to leave town for a couple of days. It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. I grinned to myself and moved on down the hallway -- past the hand-drawn pictures by the first and second graders of graveyards and flags and Soldiers and Marines (actually stick figures with what might be helmets and rifles) in anticipation of Memorial Day.

Even though I was a bit early, I was still the last parent to arrive. I saw Claire sitting in the back on the far side of the classroom just as she saw me. Her face flickered with a short smile at me and then she looked down at her hands in her lap. She did not look up again, so I looked for Mindy.

My daughter smiled at me with the intensity of the sun, she was so glad to see her daddy arrive. She lifted a hand from her desk to give me a shallow wave so that her friends could not see her excitement. After all, even in second grade, 'cool' was still required. There was a low murmur in the class of about twenty-five students.

Mindy was seated in the column of desks nearest to the window all the way across the room from where I was forced to stand. I looked at the front of the class and my gaze was met directly by an unsmiling look from Carol Newman. Carol did not glare, nor smile. It was a look more of hesitant accusation, coupled with a touch of fear. Standing behind Carol was a cute twenty-something girl, who must have been a teaching assistant or something like that. I did not recognize her from my previous visits to the school.

Carol turned to the class and got everyone to quiet down and began to introduce the Show-And-Tell event. This was a continuation of the events that occurred once a month. She had been taking it alphabetically. When they got to the Esses the first time, I was not able to attend. So, I had been rescheduled for today with the Double-Yous and added to the end of the list.

Carol said, "All right, class. Today, we will hear from several of the working parents about just what type of work they do and how they contribute to our community. While the parent is presenting, I want his or her son or daughter to stand up front as well. I just know that you are all proud of your moms and dads and want to show that pride by standing with them."

The students and their teacher, along with about a dozen adults either sitting or standing along the walls, heard the presentations from the other four parents before it was my turn. I really had my work cut out for me trying to show just how important selling investments and insurance was compared to what the store manager, the welder, the florist, and the cop did. This ought to be fun.

"Suppose you paid ten dollars for a large pizza. On the way home, a dog knocked you down and ate your pizza. How much money did you lose?" Several of the kids looked at me. No one wanted to answer out loud in front of the others; that was just too embarrassing. I pointed at one boy who did not look as scared as the rest. "How about you? How much would you lose if that happened?"

The boy blushed and looked around before answering tentatively, "Ten dollars." When I smiled at him and told he was correct, he got a little more assured and added, "And I would still be hungry because my pizza was gone." This got him some snickers from the other kids and some of the adults.

"That's correct. Now; what if you knew that you had to pass that dog's house every time you planned to bring home a pizza; and, what if, every month, you paid me ten cents -- one dime -- to make sure that you did not lose the ten dollars or the pizza whenever you got one. In other words, for the ten cents that you pay me each month, you could call me up to tell me that your pizza had been eaten by a dog who attacked you; I would show up about a half hour later with a replacement pizza at no cost to you." 

I paused to let that sink in, and then asked, "Was it worth it to you to pay me a dime each month so that you would not have to pay another ten dollars for the pizza that you had already bought, anytime you got one, and had to walk past the house where that dog lives?"

When they began to see the wisdom of that, I said, "The ten cents a month that you paid me for being comfortable that you would not lose your pizza money is like the insurance that your parents buy from me. They pay me a small amount to take all the risk and keep them from losing huge amounts, like the cost of a house or a car or the loss of a parent's salary when he or she is ill or dies. Okay?" I guess maybe twenty out of the twenty-five had a light go on for them. The other five were not really paying attention anyway.

The class had already had a lesson earlier in the year, according to Carol, on banking and interest. I just said that investments were sort of like a bank, but that the amount of 'interest' varied. I wasn't about to get into dividends and short-and-long-term capital gains with a bunch of second graders.

Mindy had stood beside me the whole time I had made my presentation. She beamed at me, looking around the room with a smile that said silently but visually, "This is my daddy and I am so proud of him." I glanced at Claire and saw her force a smile at me briefly when our eyes met, before she looked away at Mindy.

"Well," said Carol Newman, as I nodded to her that I was finished. "That was very informative." Turning her gaze to Mindy, Carol asked, "So, Mindy, do you think that you might want to follow in your daddy's footsteps and be a financial advisor?" She was smiling as she asked this.

Mindy glanced at Carol and then at me before surprising me a bit. "No, I don't think so," she said. Then she surprised us all somewhat by saying, "I think I would like to be more like Mommy." I raised my eyebrows and glanced from Mindy's adoring face to Claire's surprised but pleased face in the back of the room. Claire's lips turned up into a pleased smile.

As I looked back to Mindy's teacher, I saw that Carol was now smiling thinly at me with a 'she-got-you' look on her face. "And why do you want to be more like your mommy, Honey?" asked Mindy's teacher.

Mindy sort of looked apologetically at me, apparently hoping that I was not disappointed that she did not want to be more like me than Claire. Then she said, "Daddy is always telling me that I should try to be the biggest and best at everything I do. And I try real hard to do what Daddy says."

I smiled as any proud father would at realizing that his child has been listening to his philosophy of life and his encouragement of his children. Mindy took a breath and continued.

"That's why I want to be like Mommy, because she is the biggest and best at what she does." Listening to Mindy and glancing around, I could tell that I was not the only one losing track of what she meant. Then, like they say -- out of the mouths of babes -- came her reason.

"When Mommy and I were in the Principal's office one day last week after school when she picked me up, I had to wait for her while she went into Mr. Newman's private office for a couple of minutes. When they came out, I heard Mr. Newman say that Mommy was probably still the biggest and best, but he used words that are not on my second grade word list. I guess they will be on the list for me in third or fourth grade."

Mindy furrowed her brow as she tried to recall exactly what she had heard. Then she grabbed my right hand in her left hand and smiled at her mother, who was now definitely NOT smiling, in the back of the class. In fact, Claire had what I could only interpret as a look of mild panic on her face. Mindy then -- without realizing what she was doing; with all the innocence of a child -- lowered the boom.

"I heard Mr. Newman laughing as they came out of the office and he said Mommy was probably still the biggest SLUT and the best FUCK in town."

Following a couple of gasps from the adults, there was a moment of silence. Mindy said into the silence, "If my School Principal thinks Mommy is the biggest and best, then I want to be like her."

One or two of the boys in the class were giggling -- they knew what the words meant. One of the second-grade girls was blushing furiously and looking at her desk. The rest of the kids were confused. The other adults in the class were shocked and looking now at Claire.

I stood there with a stone face and no expression, as far as I realized. Later, one of the parents would tell me that I had just looked disgusted, but not surprised.

Claire was looking shocked and afraid as she gazed briefly with her mouth open at her daughter; then, for some strange reason, at Carol; and, finally, at me. Mindy was rapidly losing her smile and comfort as she began to realize that she may have said something that was not pleasing either to her mother, me, the other adults, or her class.

Claire looked directly at me and her face took on a look of absolute anguish. She locked eyes with me and I knew that I could not hide the disappointment, the hurt, and the anger. She could also see that I was not as surprised or shocked as a normal husband would be at this revelation. I could see the dawning of recognition on her face that showed that she realized that I probably knew something related to Mindy's revelation. She sobbed once as tears began to leak out of her eyes.

All of this had transpired in a period of about ten-to-fifteen seconds. I saw Claire's lips move in what might have been, "I'm sorry." She was evidently truly mortified and stood. Then, with tears running down her cheeks, she made a dash for the door, pushing a couple of the parents out of her way in her flight.

I just stood there, watching her leave, without saying anything. After Claire had cleared the doorway, I stooped down and tried to reassure Mindy, who now looked both upset and frightened. "Honey, don't worry. You may have misunderstood Mr. Newman that day. Mommy is not really upset with you; so don't you worry about that. We are both glad that you are proud of your mommy and want to be like her. You and I will talk later, along with Mommy, and she and I will try to help you understand what is happening. Now, you go on back to your desk. I have to go and talk to Mommy for a minute or two and then I have to go back to work. Mommy and I will try to get over to Grandma Nan's to talk to you later."

Mindy was not entirely reassured that everything would be all right. The adults were acting too strangely after what she had said. She was pretty bright for a seven-year-old, so she knew that there was more to all of this. But she hugged me and smiled weakly as she walked back to her desk and sat down.

When I stood up, I felt Carol's presence right next to me. In a whisper, she said, "Wade; we need to talk. I will call you after school. Okay?" Carol now had what looked like an expression on her face that reflected something between simple resignation and emotional fatigue.

I nodded and said she could call me on my cell that afternoon or evening and I handed her one of my business cards with my office and cell numbers on it. I avoided looking at the other adults in the room as I walked out of the class on my way to the front exit of John Bankhead Magruder Elementary School and then out to my 4Runner in the front lot.

I saw Claire's Camry pulling out quickly and driving off. I sighed to myself and decided not to rush into traffic and try to follow her. After all, I could track her movements; and we both had cell phones. I'd let her worry for a while before I called her, and I would keep alert in case she called me.

I skipped lunch and just stayed in my office over the lunch hour. I had a one-o'clock appointment for a guy who wanted to establish a Uniform Gift to Minor's Act investment account for his six-month-old daughter. If he and his wife kept feeding money into that account steadily over the years, they would have enough to get the little girl through college without any debt from college loans on the back end. That would be a wonderful way to start their daughter out in her adult life, well ahead of her peers, financially. The UGMA account would save him and his wife a little bit of money in Federal taxes as well over the years.