"What the hell is this?" I mentally asked myself. I'd been absently scratching a spot on my a arm as I worked at my desk, and glancing at it noticed the area I'd been scratching was inflamed with a red rash about an inch in diameter. There seemed to be small welts with small spots of blood in the center.

I got up and left my office; heading for my co-worker's office next door.

"Hey, Max. What's this?" I asked, showing him my arm.

He looked at for a moment before replying.

"Jim, it looks like an insect bite. Doesn't look like a mosquito bite. Maybe a spider or something like that. It looks like you should put a little cortisone salve on it and an antibiotic so it doesn't get infected."

"I'll have to check when I get home tonight to see if there are any spiders around. Most likely got bit while I was sleeping last night. So, I'll start in the bedroom. Thanks Max." I told him as I headed back to my office.

At lunch time that day I went out and got tubes of cortisone and an antibiotic and applied them. By the time I got home that night a lot of the redness had disappeared and most of the itching had stopped. I wasn't too concerned, but I thought I'd follow up with a search of our bedroom that evening to see if I could find the culprit that had given me the bite.

My wife, Jill, was waiting for me when I got home. She works in a department store in town, but usually gets home before me and would have dinner started before I got home. I smelled roast beef from the crock pot as I walked into the kitchen. She turned from the stove as I came in and gave me a tentative smile.

"Dinner in half an hour." She told me as I leaned toward her for a kiss. She puckered and gave me a light kiss before turning back to the stove.

"That's all I get?" I asked feeling a little disappointed. Lately, she seemed to be very reticent about our relationship and exhibited a coolness, even disrespect, toward me.

"I'm tired and you're lucky I have the strength to kiss and cook dinner. And by-the-way, you didn't take the garbage out before left for work and we have a full bag under the sink."

"I'll get the garbage later." I responded hoping to mollify her

I could see her face turning red and I knew I was in for it.

"Why the hell can't it be now? You're always trying to put things off."

This was typical of our relationship lately and I was getting a little tired of it. She was ready to argue and complain about me at the drop of a hat it seemed...

She didn't ask about my day so I just kept quiet about the bite on my arm. I wondered if her attitude she was due to depression. I'd read somewhere that when a wife started finding fault with her husband and was quick to take offense it could be a wife's symptom of depression. It was just as well to play it safe, as it was obvious she wasn't in a good mood. I quietly got the bag of garbage out from under the sink, while she glared at me, and took it out to the garbage can in the garage. Then I grabbed a beer from the fridge and went into the living room to wait until dinner was ready. I just wanted to stay away from her. If it was depression that was her problem, she should probably see a psychiatrist and get treated for it, but I hesitated to mention it to her. I could visualize her response if I brought it up and I didn't know if I wanted to tackle that yet.

I should tell you about Jill and I before I proceed with my story. We've been married fot ten years or so and we don't have any children because she decided that her career was more important to her. She's 35, quite attractive whereas I'm 36 and average in looks. That is, I don't stand out in a crowd. She's head of the underwriter's department in a regional insurance company. I'm an engineer with a local consulting firm. We both make good money and aren't hurting financially. We were much in love and lust when we first married, but this has tapered off over the years.So that's our history such that it applies to this story.

After dinner I began clean up activities while she went into the living room. While I was working she announced she was going next door to talk with our neighbor. She and the woman next door spent a lot of time together. Her name was Fran and she was divorced. Her husband had caught her playing around, and after filing for divorce just picked up his things and moved to California. He left her the house with an 'under-water' mortgage, and since she made as much as he did there was no alimony. They had no kids so I guess he made out. I wasn't happy that Jill hung out with her so much, but I didn't have much say in the matter. I figured that while she was gone I'd go check our bedroom for spiders after I finished clearing up from dinner.

Later in the bedroom I used a flashlight to look around the room and the furniture, but I didn't spot any spiders. I did find a little brown bug on the head board that I captured and put in an empty pill bottle. Then I found another one under the edge of the pillow, that I killed. I wondered what they were and where they came from, and I also wondered if they caused my bite. A friend of mine, Jake, was into gardening in a big way and I thought he might know the answer.

I gave him a call:

"What's up Jim?"

"Jake, I need your help. I have a bug here that I found in our bedroom and I've never seen one like it before. Do you think you can identify it for me?"

"I'll try. Can you describe it?"

"I'll do better than that. I'll take a close up digital picture of it and email it to you."

"That'll work. "OK, Say, when you take the picture put something common next to it, like a penny, so I can establish the size of it."

"Will do. Thanks Jake."

About ten minutes later I was sending off an email with a picture of the bug as an attachment. Then I sat back and waited.

About twenty minutes later my phone rang.

"Hey Jim, you'd better get hold of an exterminator; you've got bed bugs."

"Bed bugs!?? Where the hell did we get bed bugs!? I thought they were a fictitious insect in fairy tales."

"They're making a come-back Jim, and they're very hard to get rid of. That's why I recommend getting hold of an exterminator as soon as possible. Have you or Jill been traveling lately? People are picking them up in hotels and bringing them home in their luggage or in their clothes. They're even picking them up at work in the big cities."

"No, we haven't been away from home or near a hotel room in the last couple of months. I haven't heard of anybody getting them at work around here. As least Jill hasn't said anything about her work."

"Well, you've picked them up from somewhere. Like I said, get hold of an exterminator, and he might have some ideas for you. If you've got them in your bedroom and you haven't had them too long, they may be isolated there."

"OK, thanks Jake."

"Bed bugs!? Shit!!" I thought. "I'd better go up and search the bedroom and see if I can find anymore of them or the source. It's too late in the day to call an exterminator so I'll have to wait till morning for that."

Before I went to the bedroom I fired up my old PC, and pulled up Wikipedia to check out Bed Bugs. They had quite a bit of info on the little critters and it was a little scary. The only saving grace, I thought, would be that Jill hadn't complained about getting bitten yet so maybe we hadn't reached an infestation stage, but we soon would if they started laying eggs.

I went into our bedroom and began my search. Starting at the bed Jill and I had shared since we married, I began a systematic search of crevices and mattress seams looking for more bugs or evidence they were around. Except for the two I'd already found I didn't find another or evidence there were more of them.

Looking under the bed I noticed the small cloth satchel amongst the dust and rolls of gift wrapping paper Jill kept there. Jill used the bag to take with her to work if she was going to stop at her health club afterward. I pulled it out and inspected it. It was empty and I didn't find any bed bugs, but I did find some evidence they'd been there. I also noticed a hard residue that looked like dried cum on the bottom of the bag. Holding it to my nose I took a smell and got a whiff of what sure smelled like cum and the smell of her juices.

"What the hell?" I thought. "What's going on? There was no way I could think about that this was my cum. Is she cheating on me? Let's not go off half-cocked. Maybe there's a logical reason for what I'm seeing, but I can't think of one real quick-like. Maybe she loaned it to a friend and her friend returned it like this. Not very likely though. If she's screwing around I needed to find out fast and then make up my mind what I want to do about it."

With the search for bed bugs forgotten, I put the bag back where I found it, and went to my den and made myself a big scotch-on-the-rocks. Should I confront her? Before I do that I should confirm if she was having an affair, with who, and for how long. Knowing that would determine how I would proceed. Confronting her would just bring denials and leave me without a definite closure in the matter and lack of trust in her. It wouldn't be a good way to continue our marriage.

Now, how to go about finding out? I could hire a PI, but that would probably be prohibitively expensive, so that left do-it-yourself. Electronic gadgets were the rage, so I got back on my PC to see what was out there. It seems there was a helluva lot sites selling gizmos to catch cheating spouses, and I studied the possibilities of the various snooper items to see what would fit into my situation and wouldn't cost an arm and a leg.

It would appear from the look and smell of her little bag, that Jill wasn't going to her spa after work. She was using the time to get together with her lover and was using the bag to carry her sexy lingerie to and from the tryst. It was obvious that she was going to a motel or a private home, and wasn't doing it in the back seat of a car. I would use that information to pin-point what items to buy to find out who, where and how often she did it.

I finally selected a small recording device that could be hidden in her purse and a GPS unit I could attach to her car. I didn't think a phone tap would work too well as she mostly used her cell phone for personal calls. The GPS unit would help me keep track of her whereabouts while away from home. I dug out my credit card and was just finishing ordering the items with express delivery when I heard Jill come back home.

She didn't come looking for me as I heard her go back to our bedroom. Ignoring me and being miserable to me were pretty much her attitude lately and I now knew why. She was screwing around, and I could be history in a little while if she decided to go with her lover, so I'd better think about protecting myself financially.

Back on the old PC and some banking and investment transfers were made. When I was finished, I felt a little better. If for some reason I was wrong about this, I could change things back later. However, I didn't think I was on the wrong track. I would make changes to my insurance and will later, after I'd gotten definite proof of her adultery.

Two days later I had received the surveillance items I'd ordered and it didn't take me long to read the instructions that came with the GPS tracker and set up my laptop to monitor it. Then a moment to slip out to the garage and attach it to the underside of her car. I quickly followed suit with the mini voice recorder, while she was visiting her friend Fran that evening. The transmitter for the recorder went into trunk of her car. Once that was done I sat back and waited. My wait wouldn't be long because tomorrow was Thursday and she usually stopped at the spa after work on that day.