Chapter 1: The Beginning: Karen

My name is Stuart Ransom. I am 48 years old. When I was just 30, I married my first wife, Karen Wallace. Karen was my age and she and I had known each other in college, years before we began to date. My impression of Karen was that she was wild and free and a lot of fun but that she was a good and loyal friend. She was someone that I enjoyed being with and she seemed to like being with me. That was my belief, my perception of the Karen I thought I knew.

I met Karen again at a party one night after I came back from the service, ready for a steady girl. Karen was always ready to go party but I liked her style and the sex was phenomenal. We began to go steady and we just assumed that we would finally marry. Our romance was very low key and very uneventful but we felt suited to each other. We were quite happy and I finally asked her to marry me. She accepted and we were married in a big ceremony with lots of friends and family. Things were great and life looked good.

I had graduated from college and put in some time on in-service training for Psychiatry before going into the military. I needed something physical before going to work for the rest of my life so I joined the military and volunteered for Special Services. I reuped once and I was able to finish my internship at one of the military field hospitals and had returned home and proudly opened my own practice of psychiatry. Karen kept her job at one of the legal firms in town as a secretary and together, we did quite well. Well enough that we decided to have a baby. I wanted one very much but Karen was less enthusiastic. She did agree, however, and we began working hard to get pregnant. It only took four months and nine months later Michelle was born.

Right from the start, it was clear that she was my daughter more than her mother's. Karen was competent and a good mother who did all the right things but it was clear that she would rather be out with friends or at a movie or dinner with another couple, almost anything rather than home with the baby. Things didn't get any better as time went on and when Mickey was 18 months old, Karen finally declared that she was going back to work. She had already called to see if her old job was available and she planned to start the following week. My protestations to the contrary she had made up her mind and that was that. She arranged for day care for Michelle and went back to work full time.

It was sometime later, when Mickey turned three that I noticed Karen had changed. She was going out more, coming in later and our love life had all but disappeared. I was working long hours trying to cement my practice and didn't really pay that much attention but I finally caught on when I came home one evening unexpectedly to find Karen in a compromising position on the couch with a man I had never met.

I told Karen that morning that I would probably not be home much before 7:00 or 7:30. I had a meeting with an attorney who had asked for my help and it was across town so I knew, with traffic, it would be at least then before I could make it home. However, the attorney cancelled at the last minute so I left the office just after 5:00 p.m. and was home 30 minutes later. That was how I walked in to see Karen on our couch with her blouse open and this guy with his hand down inside. She had her eyes closed and she was making approving noises as I walked in. Neither one heard me as I entered and I just stood there dumbfounded.

I finally broke free of the stupor that held me and walked directly over to them, grabbing a fistful of collar from the man. I pulled him up bodily and slammed him into the wall next to the couch. Karen had suddenly noticed the lack of her lover's hands and opened her eyes just as the scumbag slid to the floor. She screamed.

"Oh God, don't kill him! Please, don't hurt him. This isn't what it looks like. This is the first time I've ever done anything like this and I'm sorry. Please let him go! It's not his fault."

I ignored her, waiting for the scumbag to get up. I saw that he was at least 50 pounds heavier than I and probably a good two inches taller. I could see tattoos peaking out of the collar of his shirt and some on his well-developed forearms. I looked over at Karen.

"I'll deal with you later. Just get the fuck up and get out of this room. This is my house and this scumbag is leaving it right now." I turned back to the dirtbag. "Do you hear me, scumbag? Get your ass up and get out!"

Scumbag was now sizing up the situation. He saw my size and he knew in his own mind that he could take me. Maybe he thought that would make up for my ruining his fuck session. He smiled an evil little smile as he rose up. He brushed the imaginary dirt off his shirt and tried to stare me down. That failed, so he decided to make it a short fight with a little bravado.

"Don't worry babe. I'll show hubby how to treat a woman like you after I get his attention. You and me are gonna make him watch. I promise not to hurt him too bad. Just keep that pussy nice and wet for me."

Karen yelled at him to just get out before he did anything stupid, but he looked over at her with disgust and shook his head 'no'. Too bad for him. He gave me that stupid shit eating grin again which made me really mad. He threw what he thought was a knockout punch at my head but I simply leaned back out of the way. He spun around with the momentum of his swing and I politely waited till he could relocate me, now standing behind him. He turned with several swear words and stopped. He now tried a new tact. He came at me with both arms out in front like he was going to hug a tree. As he got within reach, I simply swung my leg up and caught him in the crotch. He went down like a sack of wet shit.

By this time, Karen had given up and gone to our bedroom. She knew my background and knew that shithead was going to get his ass kicked. There was nothing she could do about it and she was smart enough to know that. And anyway, she probably figured she had to get her story straight. She had to make it good for me so that she could get out of this without losing her meal ticket.

For background, I used to be the resident shrink for a Special Forces team stationed in Afghanistan before the second Gulf War and I had mastered almost every form of martial arts there was. Our job was to restrict the drug traffic out of Afghanistan into the States and we had to deal with a lot of the local warlords. They were hard men and understood force, but not much else. I knew a lot of ways to kill a man quickly or slowly, but even more ways to make him wish that I would just kill him. More on this later. Too bad for shithead: he didn't know that. Oh well, education is a wonderful thing.