Chapter 2: The Set up!

"How do you feel about me, Carlie? I need to know so I know what to do. I promise regardless of your feelings for me I will not hurt you. I just couldn't do it now."

"I know that I'm a prick, a bastard, and a vengeful person. I'm hard-nosed as hell but there is another side of me. One that hasn't seen the light of day for a year now. I want to show you that person. Please give me a chance to show you that side of me. I could be the kinder, gentler person for the right woman. For some reason deep inside of me I know you are that woman. There is a nice guy who wants to get out. Revenge is blocking his way. Help me, Carlie, help me get my revenge on your husband. Then if you want we could build a real loving life together."

"My God, Kevin, so much at once. My mind is swimming with questions and right now I don't have any answers. I'm not even sure I know my feelings for you, my husband or even for myself. I need to think about all you've told me before I can give you any kind of answers. Please understand that I'm not playing you or putting you off. I want to help you. You seem to be hurting so much inside, but I don't know, I just don't know."

After a somewhat upsetting dinner, I walked Carlie to her car. I told her I was sorry if I had upset her but I thought she should know the truth. I would do what ever I could to work with her to solve both of our problems. This might have not been the right time to tell her of my growing feelings toward her but I would explode if I didn't vent them to her. I just wanted her to know.

She did let me give her a light hug before she left. So far I hadn't solved any problems, I think I just made everything worse. Maybe telling her about her husband's past wasn't the right thing to do. I have no idea what her thoughts were. I just hope everything turned out good for her.

The next day I couldn't wait to see her at lunch. I had to know her feeling and thoughts. I went to the restaurant where we usually ate. I waited for her but she never showed up. My God, what did I do? Did she have it out with her husband? Did he try to hurt her? If he did, I'd kill the son-of-a-bitch. Maybe she went the other way and just told him about me and who I was. God, her not showing up had me worried. I didn't know if I should try calling her house or just wait one more day. I had a hard time finishing my work day. I did my best to get my mind off Carlie.

When I got home my phone rang, it was Carlie. She sounded distraught. "Kevin, I have to see you. I know I said I shouldn't come to your place but things have changed. I want to, make that I have to see you tonight. Can I stop by please?"

"My God, Carlie, I was so worried about you. I had such a hard time today after not seeing you at lunch. Did that bastard hurt you? If he did, I'll kill the son-of-a-bitch. Yes, come over right now. I'll be here waiting for you." As I hung up the phone, the doorbell rang. Who could that be, I wondered?

I opened the door and there stood Carlie grinning at me. "I followed you home but needed to know if you were just blowing smoke or were really wanting to help me. When you answered the phone the way you did, I knew you were being honest with me. I'm sorry for the little test but I had to be sure."

God, I was so glad to see her. I gave her a big hug and she felt so good.

I asked, "Why didn't you go to work today?"

She told me, "Last night I spent the whole evening trying to get my mind straight. Jim, my husband, came home late. He used his usual excuse of working late. I tried to be a little lovey dovey with him but he wanted no part of it. He said he was tired and was going to bed."

I thought to myself, "If a man refused to have sex with a woman like Carlie, either he had just gotten his rocks off or was brain dead."

Carlie said, "I waited for Jim to leave for work this morning and then I thought I would do some detective work. I started going through the computer files looking for hidden files or letters that didn't belong. I work on the computer at my job so I know my way around them them pretty good. Because of the information you gave me I was able to trace a few files. Here's what I found."

She handed me all kinds of information. She said she would explain it to me so I wouldn't have to read all the detailed information. She looked at me and said, "First, I have tell you, I don't love Jim anymore. After all the information I found out about him, I think I despise him. I don't like being used and that's one of my possible problems with you."

I grabbed her hands and held them. Then she said, "I'm not sure how I feel about you. One side of me really cares for you. But the other side of me says, 'Watch it. He just wants to use you for his revenge and then drop you like a hot potato.' So for now I want to keep our relationship on a wait and see mode. If you care for me like you say, you will wait till our lives become clearer, then we can proceed from there. What do you say?"

I smiled at her and said, "That's all I ask for is a chance to prove myself. I really do care for you and if I start moving too fast, please just tell me to slow down. Can we seal our deal with a kiss before we get started on your detective work?"

She smiled at me with a big silly grin and said, "No, now let's get started."

"My husband applied for this job here, he wasn't just transferred like he told me. He asked to be transferred. That was his first lie. This was his old home town where he grew up. I didn't think much about it at the time. I just thought that he was like a lot of people and just wanted to move back to their old stomping grounds. I loved him so I agreed to the move. He went to his class reunion about sixteen months ago. Did your ex wife go to it and if she did, did you go also? I had a family engagement at the time. It was my mom's birthday so I went there instead. He told me the old class reunions are usually boring anyway."

"Come to think of it, my wife did have a class reunion. I had an out of town business trip that weekend. I asked her if she wanted to go with me but she said she would like to go see all her old friends. I never thought anything about it till now. Damn, you are a pretty good private investigator."

"Here's a copy of some of the e-mails between them just before the reunion. Not love letters but they definitely were expecting to see each other. Now here are a couple of e-mails after the reunion. As you can see or at least read that when you caught them having sex around four months later that it wasn't their first time meeting up and having sex. They had been doing it for four months already."

I got pissed, that fucking slut. Telling me "Oh, honey, It's not what you think. It just happened." I thought my revenge against her was over since we weren't married any more, that I was only going to get revenge on Jim but now things had changed. Carlie could see the hurt and meanness in my eyes.

I told Carlie that I wasn't mad at her at all but being made a cuckold by my ex-wife really pissed me off. Then I looked over at Carlie and said, "I really need to be kissed right now to calm me down or I'm going to have to run my fist through the wall." I stood up and walked toward the wall.

"Stop, you idiot, I'll kiss you, I'll kiss you," she screamed.

She got up and came up to me. She put her arms around me and kissed me really gently for a few seconds. When our lips separated, I looked into her eyes and slowly pressed my lips to hers again with a little more feeling.

As we separated the second time, she said, "That's enough, tiger. I'm only human too."

As we sat back down, I thanked her. She looked at me and said, "My pleasure and I really mean pleasure. Now let's get back to work. I can't be here all night." We both laughed as we thought the same thing.

"Here are copies of my husband's cell phone records for the past year or so. As you can see this number is called almost daily. I called the phone company and it belongs to a Rachel Miller."

"That's my wife's maiden name. I didn't even know she took it back. Also I never knew she had a cell phone. When was it purchased?"

"According to my husband's phone records to that number, it must have been about a month before he was beaten up by a couple of thugs named 'Kevin.' She was smiling. That means she had the phone before you caught them. That could explain why they got away with it for so long and also why she didn't fight for more money during the divorce. Some of this might have come out and wouldn't have helped her case."

"What about you, Carlie? Where do you stand in all this? For me right now, it's mostly pride but you're still married to the bastard. What do you want us to do?"

She looked at me knowing I said the word "us" instead of "you."

"I want to take him for everything we have. I want to make him sorry he ever did this to me. I want to embarrass him in public. How do I do all this without becoming a slut or a whore. I want to keep my pride and hopefully you."

"Carlie, do you think you can live in the same house for a couple of weeks without giving anything away?"

"No problem, I just don't want to have sex with him. Other than that I don't have any problem making a dinner or two. If he continues to see his girlfriend regularly I should be alright."

"Well, Carlie, to begin with, you need to go shopping. We can go during lunch if you like. Make sure you use joint credit cards in both your names. We don't want you to get in trouble using cards in his name only. Buy yourself everything you always wanted. Run up as much debt as you can. Take some cash advances and put the money in a savings account or buy bonds or stock"

"Kevin, aren't you a stock broker? Why aren't you doing the investing for me?"

"I didn't want you to have any doubts about me. I really care for you and want you to trust me. I can invest the money for you if you like. I just want you to know that I don't want any of it. I'm here to help you. If you decide to make love to me at some point, that will be the revenge for me."

We figured that the credit cards were going to be our starting point. As she got up to leave I asked her if I get any more kisses tonight. She put her arms around me and opened her mouth slightly and kissed me. I was feeling like a teenager and pulled her body into my growing erection. She pressed her pelvic area against me. Then she pulled away saying, "Damn, you're good. See you at lunch tomorrow." She smiled and got into her car.

The next day instead of eating lunch we went to a couple of banks. Using her joint credit cards, she took thousands of dollars as cash advances. That would give her a month to make all her transfers before the credit card bills came due. She was smart. She didn't max out any cards, just in case he was to use any of them. She did find out he was charging a motel room twice a week on one of the cards.

We did the bank thing for three days using seven different charge cards. I took the checks and invested all the money for her. I used tax-free government bonds and other accounts that would be hard to get the money out of. Carlie had me put the accounts in my name so her husband wouldn't be able to get any of the money. I did make her a co-signer of the accounts so I couldn't take any money without her signature. The co-signer was my idea... I wanted her to feel safe about the investments and about me.