Chapter 1

He couldn’t help but notice the little things about his wife after being married to her for twelve years. That was the thought Scott Adams was having about his wife Diane. What he was noticing was that his wife who was very meticulous in her appearance usually looked the same when she returned from work as she did when she left to go to work. Now on certain days however, Wednesday in particular, when she came home from work she looked like she had been out in a strong wind. That was also the same day she came home late from work saying there were things there that required that she stay longer.

In thinking about his marriage he knew the passion that they had for each other had been substantially reduced from when they first were married. Where it was every night they were making love when they first were married now it was reduced to once a week or maybe every two weeks and that happened only because Scott’s instigated it. It seemed to Scott that Diane now didn’t care if they did or didn’t make love. She gave him the impression that she was only having sex with him because her wifely duties required that she do it.

Scott had some thoughts about why this was happening and he didn’t like what he was thinking. The scary thought he had was that it could be that she was cheating on him. To dispel that thought he placed a tracker in Diane’s car that would tell him where her car was located which he would check when she said she would be coming home late.

The following Wednesday when Diane said that she would be late in coming home from work, Scott would look at the tracker to see where her car was located. During normal work hours the tracker showed her car was at the parking lot of the large bank she worked at. She was the recently promoted to the head of the mortgage department at the bank which was located in a northern suburb of Chicago.

After normal working hours however the tracker showed that her car was located in the parking lot of a Hampton Inn Hotel. To Scott that indicated that Diane was not being truthful with him and was probably having an affair. If she was cheating on him as far as he was concerned the marriage was over because that was something he couldn’t accept and forgive. Before he pulled the plug on the marriage however he had to be sure that was the case.

Lynn Reynolds was the older sister of a friend of Scott’s who was an attorney and specialized in handling divorce cases. Scott phoned her office and made an appointment to see her the following day.

At Lynn’s office the secretary told Scott he could go right in and he entered. Lynn was sitting at her desk but in seeing Scott she rose and extended her hand to him.

“How are you doing Scott? It has been some time since I have seen you. What brings you here today?”

Scott told her about his suspicion he had of his wife having an affair and what the tracker had shown. He said he needed to confirm that Diane was having an affair and if she was the marriage was over and he wanted Lynn to handle the divorce.

Lynn questioned him if this was really what he wanted to do and Scott was adamant in responding that he was. She asked him for a picture of his wife and the tracker information. He took out his cellphone and sent her a picture of his wife and gave Lynn the tracker information. Lynn said she would put her investigator Sadie Tagger on this and would be in touch with Scott on what Sadie was able to discover.

It was two weeks later that Lynn phoned Scott. She said her investigator had followed Diane into the Hampton Hotel and road up with Diane in the elevator. They both exited the elevator on the same floor and Sadie saw the room Diane had entered. Sadie placed on the wall across from that room a video spy camera that looked like a smoke detector and was motion activated. The camera recorded Diane and a man leaving the room some time later. Lynn said she was now e-mailing a copy of the video to Scott.

While he was still on the phone with Lynn he opened up the e-mail attachment on his computer and viewed the video.

“That man leaving the room with Diane is Donald Prescott. He is the President of the bank where Diane works. I have met him at the bank’s Christmas parties,” Scott said.

“What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to file for divorce but hold off doing that because I need to do some planning for that just in case the divorce gets ugly.”

Ending the call there were a number of thoughts running through Scott’s mind on what he needed to do. He also was having the thought that it was going to be twelve years of marriage going down the drain. Scott started to make up a checklist of things he needed to do. Making a list of their assets, notifications he would need to make, accounts he would need to cancel, things he would need to take and were he would live all where on his mind and listed on the checklist he was preparing.

Where to live was the first thing that he gave serious thought to doing. Scott was completely flexible on where he could live since he worked out of his home. Scott was blessed in that he had a very distinctive voice and he had become a narrator of audiobooks. He narrated books for four authors who produced by themselves or in conjunction with other authors about three books each on average in a given year. In addition to doing those audiobooks he also did the voice on a number of commercials that were shown on television or heard on the radio. The compensation he received for doing this work was comparable to what Diane received working at the bank.

While he had seen on the news or heard stories about people relocating to the warm weather States or less expensive Countries to live, Scott was not a warm weather person nor did he want to leave the States. He remembered that a number of years ago vacationing with Diane in the Wisconsin Dells, Portage, Wisconsin area and he liked the area. Scott was not a big city fan and preferred the small town living. While they were in that area they had visited some relatives of Diane who had retired there and Scott was impressed by the area. He made a decision that was where he was going to initially relocate too and if it didn’t work out he could always move to another location.

Scott had compiled a rather long list of things he needed to do because of the looming divorce. On Tuesday afternoon after looking on the web for realtors in the Portage area he placed the call to Bowman Realty. Besides being located there he was impressed by the picture he saw of Dana Bowman.

It turned out that after his call was answered he was transferred to Dana Bowman who had a pleasant voice. Scott introduced himself and said he was planning to move to the area and was looking for a home to purchase.

“What are you looking for in the way of a home?”

“A home that is well constructed, on a large lot and most importantly in a quiet area since I work from home. A plus would be if it was as you realtors call it truly a “Turnkey” since it would include its furnishings. I won’t be moving any furniture, only some personal items and my clothes.”

“There is one house that has been listed and on the market for two months that could meet your requirements. I just received a listing yesterday that had me this morning taking some photos of this new property. I am getting ready to put it on the multiple listing and I think it also meets your requirements.”