John Calhoon wearily trudged into his ostentatious McMansion after yet another ten-hour day. So far this week he’d worked 50 hours and his damn boss informed him he expected to see him back at the laboratory once again by nine am Saturday morning.

Unlike many wives, John’s fully supported his employer and the long hours he was required to work. Of course, since his employer was Elizabeth’s father he supposed her support made sense. It didn’t seem to matter to her that one of his patents sold for almost five million dollars and his share was only 40%. His father-in-law and wife were greedy. They wanted more patents so they could have more money.

Elizabeth justified his long hours and small share of the income from his patents by saying “It really doesn’t matter in the long run honey. When Daddy and Mother are gone we’ll inherit everything anyway. This way he can invest the money and make us more.” Consequently, she insisted he continue to work for dear old Daddy instead of going out on his own. Oh sure, he could just ignore her and quit but no one deserved the pain and suffering THAT would drop down on his back. He signed a prenuptial agreement forgoing any share of her family wealth and giving her the lion’s share of their assets should the marriage end in divorce. He could live with that. What he couldn’t live without was his children and she’d get them if he cut her loose.

When John entered the house and passed through the kitchen he stopped to kiss his little girl on the forehead. He turned slightly and said hi to her and his two sons as they happily demolished their evening meal. He didn’t hug the boys because they were already at the age when it wasn’t cool for them to get hugs from their father. Consuela, the housekeeper and nanny smiled at him and said, “Good evening Senor John. The missus say to tell you to quit wasting time with the children and get your lazy butt upstairs so you can change.”

John felt the anger surge once again in his heart when he heard those words. He felt his face stiffen and heat with his anger. He immediately felt badly when he saw the fear cross Connie’s face. Before he could speak. she said, “I am sorry Senor. I was ordered to remind you of your obligations using those exact words. I need this job much too badly to ignore the Senora.”

“That’s ok Connie. I understand. You’re in this mess almost as deeply as I am. aren’t you?” John touched each of his sons with his fingers as he walked past them headed toward the stairway and the master suite of their monstrosity of a house. Try as he might, he couldn’t force himself to think of it as a home.

As he walked toward what he suspected would be just one more verbal reaming that would precede another boring evening and cardboard meal, he reminisced about his life. He still couldn’t believe the changes in what he once thought was a perfect lifelong romance with the love of his life. He first met Elizabeth when he started working for her father’s firm after obtaining his PHD in Electrical Engineering with an emphasis on computer and cybernetic technology. She was then, as now, her father’s Administrative Assistant and heir apparent.

Initially their interactions were cool. She let him know in no uncertain terms he was just hired help. As time passed, his work was good enough and successful enough that she and he spent several hours a week first discussing the work, then later, the patents on it. Somewhere during this time Elizabeth became miss sweetness and he fell in love with her. Not surprisingly, before they could wed her father insisted on a prenuptial agreement to ‘protect her and the family business’. Elizabeth already owned a significant percentage of the company. John understood and had no problem with that. After all, he married the love of his life and had no intention of cheating on her. The marriage was for life.

By the time he and Elizabeth had been married ten years he gave up and decided divorce and losing most of their savings was better than living with the shrew she’d become. Her change in attitude had occurred slowly until after little Seth was born; then all at once the Wicked Witch of the West suddenly manifested in Elizabeth’s body. Nothing he did was right. He couldn’t make enough money or complete projects fast enough to suit her. According to her he was an awful husband and horrible father. She never asked him to do things any longer, rather he was ordered to do them. She made all the decisions in the family even down to what he was allowed to wear daily. Part of that problem was his own fault. John was deeply involved in weapons research even before humanity met the confederacy. Afterward, he immersed himself even deeper, using the freely accessible technology database of ‘obsolete’ confederacy technology to improve human weapons and, hopefully, come up with new or more efficient ones for use against the Swarm.

As John became even more involved in his research, his time and inclination to “rule the roost” decreased and he allowed Elizabeth to take more and more control of his personal life and the family. When they first met and married their lives were in constant upheaval with periods of intense discussion as each attempted to exert control of the other and their family. He, at one point, had well more than 50% say in the family—what they did, where they went, finances, you name it. As he became busier and busier at work, his time and inclination to “rule the roost” declined. Finally, as his work week expanded John delegated, or perhaps, allowed Elizabeth to take, more authority to make the decisions until she became the total bitch she now was. Basically, she reverted to the person she was before they married, and he allowed her to do so.

When he realized what his marriage had become, John tried to take back control with little or no success. Finally a year ago, John had enough and consulted an attorney about a divorce. Unfortunately, what he thought he read in the prenuptial agreement when he signed it was not what was actually there according to the attorney he consulted. The cheap attorney he had hired to review the agreement before he signed it either missed the bomb it contained or chose for some reason not to tell John about it. Instead of an equitable 50/50 split of assets in a divorce not caused by adultery, he found that if he and Elizabeth divorced for any reason each would keep all the assets they brought into the marriage and they would only split the family bank accounts equally. The agreement specifically excluded equal splits on any other assets, giving them to Elizabeth no matter the cause of the divorce.

Even after his new high-priced attorney explained the wording to him, John still thought it said everything would be split equally. John now wondered if his small cut on the patents with the balance going to the company wasn’t part of some great plan to steal his intellectual property for Elizabeth’s family and dump him at some future time. The way the prenuptial agreement was worded he’d be stripped of nearly all his wealth in a divorce. He even lost his rights to all the patents granted him while employed by his father-in-law’s company in the case of employment termination. He was sure if he divorced Elizabeth, his employment would terminate immediately.

John plodded up the final stair steps and moved through the door to the master suite. Elizabeth was sitting at her makeup station putting on makeup when he entered. She barely glanced at him in the mirror before starting on him. She pressed her lips together tightly then said, “You’re late. We don’t have time to discuss that right now. Get in there and clean up. I’ve laid your clothes out on the bed. You have thirteen minutes before we have to leave. We’ll discuss your tardiness when we get home tonight.”

John felt the surge of anger once again and fought it down. He knew he only had three choices. He could continue putting up with Elizabeth’s crap; he could give up and just leave his children with their mother; or he could divorce her. Of course there was always a fourth possibility to escape. He might be picked up by the Confederacy in which case he could take his children with him. If he just left or left and divorced her, Elizabeth would do one of several things. She would ignore his departure and clean him out financially. Or, she might hire a PI to find him so she could continue to make his life miserable. Her father could blackball him so he couldn’t work in his field, or she’d get her tame judges to set his child support and alimony so high he’d starve. She might even hire someone to terminate him. He wasn’t sure whether she’d want him to suffer or die. In any event he was almost ready to see what her choice would be.

You wouldn’t think John would have much of a CAP score considering how he knuckled under to Elizabeth. Oh, sure, he still had periodic angry exchanges with her but they never ended with him the victor. Even if he thought he won a ‘discussion’, Elizabeth just ignored his position and did whatever she wanted. If any other person, man or woman, treated him as Elizabeth did, he would be in his or her face immediately and they would back down. Unfortunately, Elizabeth just WOULD NOT back down from confrontations with him. John was a fine administrator and manager at work. He commanded respect and loyalty from his staff and people he met elsewhere. He just could not seem to do so with Elizabeth or her father. They were from old money and KNEW they were superior. Many times he thought, ‘if it just wasn’t for the children... ‘ He just could not take off and leave his children with her to be raised by a nanny, even one as kind and caring as Consuela. He just had to stick it out and make the best of his bad situation.

It took John sixteen minutes to clean up and dress. Elizabeth stood in the bedroom door glaring at him as he finished dressing. When he walked toward the door with a roiling stomach Elizabeth grabbed his arm and pulled him along. She hissed, “It took you over sixteen minutes to get ready to go. You have to make up the time because I need to arrive at the function at exactly seven pm. We’ll discuss your ineptitude and delaying tactics after we get home. I swear sometimes I think you do these things just to see how far you can push me.”

After making her grand entrance into the convention center ballroom, Elizabeth dropped John’s arm and walked away to find her friends and mingle with the movers and shakers in attendance at this little charity event. Her face lost the grim angry look it held during the drive to the center and gained a sunny smile as she began the process of, as she and her father put it, shaking hands and slapping backs. Just before she walked away from John she said, “You have thirty minutes to mingle with your friends, then I expect you at our table. It’s to the left of the podium as it normally is. Please, try not to embarrass me again. And don’t be late.”

Just after they split, John heard a woman giggle and Elizabeth said, “I swear I don’t know why the hell I put up with him. If he didn’t have such a high CAP score I wouldn’t. I know 8.1 isn’t the best but at least I can take some of the people who matter if we’re picked up. I never allow us to go anywhere we could be picked up without making sure they’ll be there too.”

John once again felt his temper rise after hearing her last comment. He did what he usually did and ‘sucked it up’ because of his children and walked slowly into the crowd, relaxing more and more as he moved farther from Elizabeth. He found the small group of people he usually hung out with at this type of gathering and insinuated himself into the circle.

The evening wore on as John knew it would. He was slowly moving toward Elizabeth’s table when a curtain of darkness descended outside the still open doors of the ballroom. All at once he noticed several tall, very well-built men and women standing at strategic locations around the room. An equally tall man walked to the speaker’s podium and began talking. He said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, please remain calm. I’m Lieutenant Sam Perkins, CSM. This is a Confederacy pickup as most of you probably know by now. I need the following Sponsors to move up here beside me when I call your names. Those of you who wish to be concubines please move to my right and the rest of you move to the left.”

John’s name was the first one called; then in rapid succession four more names were called. John and the other sponsors weren’t even all on the raised platform upon which the podium stood before he saw Elizabeth hurrying toward him almost pulling her good friend Tiffany along. Tiffany’s husband Peter followed with a supercilious sneer pasted on his face.

Elizabeth pushed Tiffany toward John and said, “Stand beside John while I go find Dottie, Harold and Penelope. John, don’t you dare let them wander off. I want to get us all together and get out of here immediately so we can select a good cabin on the ship.”

Elizabeth turned and dove back into the still milling crowd. The LT turned and looked at John quizzically. He said, “I assume, Sir, that these people are your pre pack?”

“Well, my wife seems to believe they are in any event.”

The LT and couple standing behind John all frowned at that comment but no one said anything.

The LT walked to the five sponsors standing in a small group and handed each a small rectangular device. He said, “This is a reader to allow you to see the hidden codes on the CAP Cards. It will, perhaps, help you make your selections for your concubines. Let me show you how to use it, then you need to get busy. We need to finish this pick up as soon as we can. I have another one scheduled this evening also.”

As the demonstration of the card reader concluded, Elizabeth returned with Dottie and Harold. She pushed them toward John and said, “Here John. I just have to find Penelope and we’ll be ready to leave.”

Elizabeth hadn’t even disappeared back into the milling crowd when John looked over his shoulder at two sneering men and one grinning woman. He walked up to an embarrassed Tiffany and asked for her CAP card. She looked surprised and handed it to him then watched him slip it into the reader. He smiled when he saw the scores and looked up at her. He said, “Do you want to go with me and be my Concubine?”

The three others in the group frowned and looked at John. Tiffany looked over her shoulder at her husband Peter before she answered. When he gave a slight nod of his head she said, “Yes, John, we do.”

John noticed the rest of the sponsors were out in the crowd selecting their concubines. Two of them had already begun test-driving some of the women. He turned back to Tiffany and said, “Your card says you scored high in all the sexual areas as well as child rearing and mothering. Take my cock out and show me what you can do.”

Peter snarled and reached for John as he said, “That’s my wife asshole. Keep your hands off her.”

“Listen shithead. You all want to be my concubines. Tiff specifically said she wanted to go with me. Before I take her on, I need to know if she’ll be worth the effort.”

Peter reached for John once again then collapsed to the floor as John slammed his fist into his jaw. The Marine smiled at John and said, “Nice punch sir. You can continue your test drive now but in the future, please let us handle disruptive individuals.”

Tiffany pulled John’s cock from his pants and began what was, at best, a marginal blow job. She was shaking and crying too hard for better. Finally, in disgust, John pulled from her mouth and put his cock back in his pants, turned and walked away. Before Tiffany could stand, he disappeared into the room to begin searching for his concubines.

John headed directly for one of the couples he talked with earlier in the evening. He found his friend Sam watching while a potential sponsor fucked his wife. As the sponsor fucked Brenda he was twisting her nipples sharply. Tears were running down her cheeks. The sponsor rose from between Brenda’s thighs with a snort of disgust. It was obvious from looking at Brenda that she wasn’t lubricated at all. She lay on the floor crying as Sam knelt to comfort her.

John said, “I need to select my concubines before we leave. I want to kill two birds with one stone if I can. I already know I’ll be placed in a research facility to continue my work. I’d like to have you two with me in that endeavor. For you to go, you’ll have to be my concubines.” John knelt beside Brenda and gently pulled her from Sam’s grasp. Sam resisted for a moment then let her go. While he cuddled her John began to gently rub and kiss Brenda while he whispered to her. He slowly moved his hand toward her crotch. As he reached it, she spread her legs and raised her pelvis toward his hand. He felt the wetness as it seeped from her. He rubbed her clit as he continued talking, “I’ll use you sexually Brenda but you’ll still be with your husband if you both agree to come with me as concubines. You’ll each have to follow all the rules and I WILL be your owner. I will not only expect, but will demand you follow all the rules promulgated for concubines. Do you both want to go as my concubines?”

John looked first at Brenda, then at Sam. Sam looked uncomfortable and said, “Uh, I think we do, but I heard one of the other sponsors telling one of the men he intended to have some of his ass also. I’m not really into that.”