Chapter 11

When the alarm went off the next morning, she got up right away and bounded off to the shower. I flossed and used plenty of mouthwash since I was temporarily without a toothbrush. I made a note to buy one when I was out today. “What time is the bed being delivered?” I asked while I was waiting my turn in the shower.

“They couldn’t be specific, but afternoon,” she said from inside the stall. We could have both fit and we had in the past, but that past was distant, so I waited for my shower.

“Okay. I’ll handle it,” I said. “I have the time off from work.”

“Okay,” she said with a smile. “If you don’t have anything else to do. I don’t mind taking the afternoon off.”

“It’s okay,” I said. “All I really have to do this week is start looking for an SUV and that’s a day’s worth of test-drives and research.”

“Okay,” she said. “Well, let me know what you decide and we’ll order it from the dealership.”

She shut off the water and stepped out, taking a towel from me and giving me a quick kiss. I took her place in the shower a moment later, having adjusted the temperature to my liking. I took my time and then got dressed casually before going out to the kitchen for breakfast. Today was a day for microwave oatmeal and we both sat down to a bowl. She kept chatting normally until it was time to go. I kissed her cheek and told her to have a good day before she left. When she was out the door, I looked through the recordings from last night before I got home to see if she’d had a phone call from Brad that might explain her change in attitude. There was nothing though. No phone call this morning while I was in the shower either. It was strange. It was like she was a different person since the fight.

I picked up my own phone and called Cecilia. “Morning, Stud!” she said. “If you’re looking for a booty call, you’ll have to get Marty to sign the permission slip.”

I laughed. “I wouldn’t do that to either of you,” I said affectionately. “I just need to bounce some paranoia off my best friend to see what she thinks.”

“Best friend?” she repeated, surprised.

“Best friend,” I told her. “Previously with benefits.” I told her about how things had been with Barb last night and this morning, her previous interest in getting a suite, the introductions that she’s making on Saturday night and her insistence that her lover was going to another party instead.

“Interesting,” she said. “I don’t know what to make of it either. I’ll keep an ear open and an eye peeled for anything at work.”

“Well that was only half of my strange day. I hired a friend of mine to do some recon work on the power-couple. Yesterday, he wanted to introduce me to a woman who wanted to hire him to follow her husband since she suspected that he was having an affair.”

“He wanted to use you as a reference?” she asked.

“Not quite,” I told her with a smile. “The woman was Doris Davis.”

“Shut up!” she blurted. “Seriously? What did you do?”

“I told her the truth,” I said quietly. “She’s supposed to call me when Brad leaves for work. We’re gonna talk more about what’s going on and see what we can plan out. I’m gonna let her use the gym at my place to get back into shape and see if she’s interested in being part of getting even.”

“What if she’s not?” she asked.

“Then I shake her hand and wish her well. I turn over some of what I’ve collected and what Otto’s collected at their other locations and continue on without her,” I answered. “I hope that she’ll want to be part of it, but even if she just wants someone to talk to, I can be that for her.”

“Okay. Keep me informed. I still want to go to Florentine’s at some point,” she warned me. “You’re not off the hook for that if she bails.”

I laughed and told her to have a good day at work and call me later if there was anything strange going on.

I was wondering whether or not to grab another cup of coffee or not when the phone rang again. “Hello?” I said curiously, not recognizing the number.

“Hi,” Doris said awkwardly. “Mr. Hooker?” she asked.

“It’s just John, Doris,” I told her gently. “I don’t think we should be on a formal basis considering the circumstances.”

“I suppose not,” she agreed. “Did you still want to meet today or...” she trailed off. She expected me to abandon her.

“Doris, I would love to spend the day with you,” I told her. “I don’t know where you live though.” She gave me the address and I told her I knew the area and I’d pick her up in about twenty minutes. I was already on my way to get in my car and I wondered how the day would go.

I got my first look at the Davis household and thought I knew where most of Brad’s salary was going. It was a nicer neighborhood than we lived in. The house would have to cost more than a million in this part of town. I backed the car into their driveway and before I was parked, she had the door open. She brought her son out to meet me as I opened the back door, knowing that we’d have to install the car seat.

“Hi, Brad,” I said and picked him up without hesitation as he was wobbling around on his short legs. He seemed to like me, but that might just be that he was developing an outgoing personality. Fortunately there was very little of his father in his features, so it was easy to like him in return. He babbled to me animatedly with his limited vocabulary as his mother doubled back to get the car seat and his diaper bag. The seat was actually easy to install and we had Brad buckled in behind his mother in no time. She loaded a stroller into the car so that we wouldn’t have to carry Brad when he got tired and then we were off.

“Thank you for this,” Doris said. “Just having someone to talk to and knowing what’s really going on has been a huge weight off my shoulders.”

“You’re very welcome, Doris,” I told her. “It’s been a weight on my shoulders too. When did you start to suspect?”

“About six months ago,” she told me. “Brad started working late and going out for drinks after work with clients, things like that.”

I nodded. “That was just after my wife told me about the affair. They didn’t have to worry about me at that point, so they got more and more bold about it. I told her you’d catch on.”

Our first stop was to get her some clothes to work out in. She was a little embarrassed about it and I assured her that it was fine. My job was to put her on the path to the body she wanted to show off to the world. After that, we got a playpen for little Brad and some baby-gates. My wife’s vagina was big Brad’s playpen, I might as well provide one for his namesake too. Actually, we were shopping from the joint account. Thanks, Barb.

Since we were in Target buying that, I got a new toothbrush and got Doris a prepaid phone and made sure she had plenty of time on the account for it. “I don’t know how to thank you for this,” she whispered in shock as the three of us left the store with the new purchases.

“Well, I’ve committed to helping you start a new life without him in it,” I said. “I sincerely hate him. I can’t tell you how much I despise him for the things he’s done. Barb’s no better, but the love I’ve had for her leaves some lingering trace of mercy for her in my heart. There isn’t much else, but there is a little whimper to go easy on her.”

She nodded. “I understand,” she said gently. “I hate him passionately, but there’s still a little love there. I want to claw that bitch’s eyes out ... no offense,” she added sheepishly, making me laugh.

“None taken. She’s Brad’s bitch now,” I assured her. “I have to ask though, did you notice anything odd in his behavior last night?”

“Yeah,” she said. “Now that you bring it up, it WAS strange. He came home in time for dinner. He almost never does that now.”

“Yeah. I don’t know if it was because it was my first night back in town, but Barb wanted to spend time with me. It was creepy, like she’d been replaced with a pod-person that didn’t know it was supposed to be a cheating whore.”

“He made an effort to be nice to me last night, too.” she shrugged.

I took us to McDonald’s for lunch, Brad delighting in the bright colors, more than the food. Smart kid. We ate and continued to talk about it. We were the only people in the play area, so we had plenty of privacy. I told her in more detail how things had happened to me, meeting Dr. MacDonald, finding out Brad’s name, the months of waning affection, even Cecilia and the brief affair with her before her husband came back. I told her about fighting and how their affair had brought out an aggressive streak that made me more successful in the Octagon. I told her about the house she’d met me at the previous day and how it was supposed to have been for me, but had ended up being used by Brad extensively for months. I even told her that I’d spent a few nights in a hotel leading up to my trip to Vegas because of the whole ordeal.

“Wow!” she said when I was done. “The worst I can say is that I was bored. There’s only so many hours of TV I can watch before I’m going out of my mind. That was my biggest complaint. Well, that and he’s always harping at me that money’s tight.”

“Well, you live in a pretty swanky neighborhood. I imagine that the mortgage eats up a lot of his income,” I said dismissively.

“Technically, my parents own the house,” she admitted sheepishly. “We’re renting it. They live in Thousand Oaks. Basically, we’re paying the property taxes and upkeep.”

I frowned. “That doesn’t seem right,” I told her. “If you don’t have huge bills for anything, where’s his salary going?”

“He doesn’t make great money,” she shrugged.

I shook my head. “My wife is the top seller in the state, so she does stupidly well, but Brad has to be making SOME commission. Let me call my girl on the inside.” I pulled out my phone and called Cecilia.

“Hey,” she said. “How’s my favorite Hooker?” she teased.

“Cheap and easy,” I teased back, making her laugh.

“Not likely,” she called my bluff. “What can I do for you?”

“I have a couple of money questions for you,” I said, lowering my voice. “First, how well does Brad sell? I know you and Barb are the top two, but I can’t imagine he’s a terrible seller.”

“Well,” she said, dropping her voice to a murmur so she wouldn’t be overheard. “The numbers for this year aren’t in, but I’d say he probably came in fourth or fifth in the office. He’s never at the bottom of the pile. He might not have sold as many as me or Barb, but we’re way out in front. I want to say Brad sold maybe 12 houses this past year. I might be off by one or two.”

“Okay, that answers that. Now, the other question is, what sort of commission do you think he’d have gotten off one of those houses?”

“Depends on the price. In the case of your house, I made just under $6500 on the $300,000 sale price. I KNOW Brad unloaded one house for a price-tag that was double that amount. That would have been a check for $12,000 on the day they closed, at least.”

“So he’s probably not hurting for money,” I concluded.

“Are you kidding? We make our salary and then we make commission. He’d be able to live off his salary alone. The commission would make life more comfortable, but really, there are a couple of people that live off the salary and bank all their commission for retirement.”

“He’s a real class act. He’s been singing the poverty song to Doris and probably sitting on the cash,” I said dryly. “Thanks, lover. You’re the best.”

“Best YOU ever had,” she laughed.

“Barb’s not much competition,” I reminded her. “Getting into her pants is about as hard as defeating a Speak-N-Spell.”

She laughed at that. “I gotta go,” she said. “I’ve got a showing in an hour. Bye.”

When I put the phone away, Doris looked like she was going to kill him. I was in agreement, but I had a better plan.

“I know,” I told her. “You want to wait behind the front door and club him to death when he comes home. Hold onto that impulse. I have a better idea. You’re coming to the office Christmas party this weekend, right?” I asked.

She nodded, telling me that Barb’s insistence that he wouldn’t be there was torpedoed. “Yeah. My parents are taking the baby overnight. It’s the one night of the year that I really get to go out.”

“Okay, make a point of talking to the people he works with. Ask them about how well he does. Tell them that he doesn’t really brag at home. Act like a proud wife who wants to know more about her husband’s accomplishments. Then ask a few of them how commission works innocently like you don’t understand how the system works.”

“But, we just heard from your friend how it all works,” she said.

“Yes, but if you talk to people at the party, you can tell him that you learned it at the party. Then you can ask him why money’s so tight if he’s making commission like that.”

“What will that do?” she asked.

“Well, he might be hiding it away and decide to tell you where the money is if you press him without seeming suspicious,” I suggested.

“I’d rather castrate him with a power drill,” she said darkly.

“Well, you’d still get good alimony,” I told her. “It still begs the question of what he does with the money. Gambling, drugs or women would be my normal suspicion, but he already has a woman on the side. So that leaves drugs and betting.”

“I know he used to like a joint once in a while,” she shrugged. “That much money would buy enough weed to fill your car though.”

I nodded. “Well, we’re not gonna figure it out here,” I said lightly and looked at Brad, who was happily playing with his food. “Let’s get out of here and go back to my place. I’ve got a bed coming this afternoon and need to be there to receive it.”

We gathered up little Brad and put him in his car seat for the drive. He was really a good kid. He didn’t scream or cry or bitch when we had to leave. He made minimal mess and ate a reasonable amount. It was impressive and I knew it was because his mother had worked hard to teach him right.

When we got to the house, I backed the car up far enough that the delivery truck could park when they arrived with the bed.

Doris looked at the fence around the backyard curiously as we unloaded the car. “The fence looks new,” she commented. Barb had put up a twelve foot privacy fence. It was high enough to allow her to sunbathe nude if she chose or to let her and Brad frolic naked in the hot tub or the pool.

“That would be Barb’s doing,” I told her. “With a fence that high, they probably had a lot of fun in the yard before she turned the keys over to me.”

Her mouth twisted sourly at that thought and she carried Brad and his diaper bag into the house while I muscled the crib and the baby gates in behind them. I took the baby gates upstairs and the three of us went downstairs to figure out the playpen.

We were lucky it came with the wrench it needed since I had no idea if Barb had thought to put even minimal tools in the house. We mostly had the thing together when the doorbell announced the arrival of the bed.

I let the delivery guys in and they had me sign for the delivery before they carted the bed-frame in, followed by the mattress and box-spring. Barb had spared no expense, getting a top-shelf king-sized bed. I thanked them for their help and then, when they were gone, I went back downstairs, but Doris already had the playpen set up. We’d gotten a pack of padded mats for under the thing. They were just foam tiles that locked together, but they’d pad things so he wasn’t sitting on concrete if we put him in it down here. He had a few toys in his diaper bag and was perfectly content for the moment. Doris kissed him on the head and we left him there for a few minutes while she helped me with the bed. The frame was going to need to be put together and I didn’t have tools for that. I took a look in the other rooms, hoping that there was something, but it was a lost cause.

“I’ll have to put it together tomorrow,” I shrugged dismissively. I went back out to the car and got the bags that had Doris’s new workout clothing.

“Uh, I figured I’d wash that stuff before I wore it,” she said awkwardly.

“There’s a washer and dryer here,” I told her. “Better to change here. That way Brad doesn’t accidentally find it. We should have gotten some other stuff for the house here for you. We’ll do that tomorrow, so you’ll have your own brands for showering after work-outs.”