Decisions...

"Hi Mr. Hansen, I don't really have time for lunch," she replied, "Unless we grab a sandwich and coffee at the café just down the road."

"Let's do that then," said Ben, "And please call me Ben, not Mr. Hansen."

"Ok, Ben," she replied.

When they got settled in the café with coffees and a sandwich for Hazel, Ben opened the conversation.

"As you've probably gathered, Julia has gone to Spain with Brad Thomson. I knew nothing about it until she went missing at the party on Saturday, While I was there, I received a letter that she'd left for me, telling me she was going to Spain with Thomson for two weeks and when they come back, she'll be staying with him at his apartment for a further two weeks. After that she says she'll decide who to live with permanently, him or me and our daughters. I sent her a text giving her 48 hours to come home and talk it out, that 48 hours has passed, and I don't really expect her to come home. That means I'll be divorcing her, and I intend to bring Thomson down too. Now, will you help me? I need as much information as I can get about what's been going on."

"I'm sorry this has happened to you," Hazel replied, "I heard something about her leaving the party on Saturday, but I couldn't believe it was true. Now that I know it is, I'll be happy to help you if I can."

"Thanks," said Ben, "Tell me about this Thomson character."

"Well, he thinks he's God's gift to women,"she said, "He's smooth, but most of the girls here are wary of types like him and he didn't really get anywhere with them until he met Julia. I think Julia was flattered by his attention, he is good looking I suppose, and she liked the attention she was getting. They started taking lunches together and he took her with him when he visited suppliers in town. I think she thought he was grooming her for promotion but most of us figured he was grooming her for something else. It seems we were right."

"Yes, you were right." He replied, "Apparently she's been having sex with him for months, she admitted it in her letter."

"Oh wow, and she expects you to have her back if she decides to come home? She must be demented. Oh, no, I'm sorry I shouldn't have said that, that's between you and her."

"It's OK," said Ben, "I don't honestly know what I'll do if she comes back. We have two teenage daughters, and they really need a mother's guidance, but then they don't need the kind of example she's just shown them. To be honest, they hate her for what she's done, so whether she comes back or not I think it's almost inevitable that I'll divorce her. I'd never be able to trust her again anyway. Tell me does the company you work for have a non-fraternisation clause in its contracts of employment, in order to discourage liaisons like her's and Thomson's developing, and to protect subordinate employees?"

"Yes, it does," replied Hazel, "But I don't know that it has ever been acted on. I've been with the company almost five years and I know that there have been a few affairs within the staff during that time, but I've never heard of anyone being disciplined or losing their job over it."

"Well, thanks for coming and talking to me Hazel," he said, "I appreciate you being honest with me, and I won't let anyone know we had this conversation."

"Thanks," she replied, "I like my job and I'd like to keep it." She blushed and said, "Um, Ben, If you feel that you'd like to talk again or you want some company sometime, give me a call. I'm good at listening as well as talking and I'm currently unattached."

Ben was surprised and flustered by her offer. "Thank you," he said, "I'd like to take you up on that sometime but at the moment I'm sure you'll appreciate that I just want to get this business sorted out."

"Yes, of course," she replied, "Take my phone number, you can call me anytime. Perhaps you can buy me lunch next time."

"Yes, I certainly will," he said.

Outside the café Ben offered his hand to Hazel. She shook it briefly and leaned in to give him a peck on the cheek. "Good luck, Ben," she said, "Julia must be daft going with that slimeball when she had you." With that parting thought she returned to her office while Ben stood watching her confident stride and admiring her shapely backside. He was already looking forward to a future lunch date.

Ben's next task was to find a solicitor to prepare his divorce petition and his claim for damages against the lovers' employer for not policing and enforcing their non-fraternisation policy. That should also ensure that both of them were fired without decent references, it was petty he knew but it would be satisfyingly petty as far as he was concerned.

Three days after the slut's expected date of return to the UK, Ben was back at work. His solicitor was working on the divorce paperwork, and they were awaiting a copy of her employer's standard contract of employment terms, in order to pursue the damages claim for 'allowing' Brad Thomson and the slut to pursue an affair through office fraternisation.

Ben was in his office catching up on some of the work he'd delayed whilst researching Thomson and he'd put his cheating wife to the back of his mind for the moment. He received a phone call from Kelly who was 'spitting nails' and he guessed immediately that Julia had gone home. "The bitch is here dad," shouted his daughter, "She's come for more of her things. We haven't let her in and she's standing on the doorstep shouting her head off. You need to come home and sort her out before she breaks something."

"Ok," said Ben, "I'm on my way, stall her for a while to give me time to get there, but let her in in 30 minutes, I should be there soon after that."

Ben had arrived home 35 minutes later, hoping that his cheating wife would still be in the house and his daughters had not scratched her eyes out yet.

He could hear the raised voices before he'd even got the front door open. The noise was upstairs in the bedroom he'd shared with his wife until a few days ago. Mounting the stairs slowly he could hear Julia screaming at his daughters who'd obviously told her exactly what they thought of her.

"Get off my back you little bitches. You're too bloody young to understand, either of you. Sometimes you just feel that it's time to upgrade, if you don't grab the opportunity when it comes, you might live to regret it forever. I got bored with the 'same old, same old' all the time, so when I got a better offer, I took it, and that's all there is to it. When you're older you'll understand. I'm having fun and my new man makes me feel good and sexy. That's all you need to know. If you want to come with me, you can, but you'll probably be more comfortable with your father. To be honest Brad and I need our privacy. We're not used to having anyone else in our place and we're not quiet when we're together, it might be embarrassing."

"Yeah, it would certainly be a nasty shock for my girls, seeing what a wanton slut their mother has turned into." Said Ben walking into the room. "What are you doing here Julia? Apart from upsetting my girls. Come to gloat at the damage you've done to your ex-family have you?"

"I suppose I should expect puerile insults from you," Julia hissed through clenched teeth. "I've only come to get some more of my things, clothes, jewellery, my laptop, etc. It didn't take you long to turn my daughters against me did it, did that make you feel better getting them on your side."

Ben sneered at her, "You really have turned into a first-class bitch haven't you. I obviously never knew the real Julia. Well, for your information, it was you that turned the girls against you. All I did was show them the letter you left for me, when you didn't have the guts to tell me to my face what you were doing."

"They were as disgusted at what they read in the letter, as was your mother and father, and your brother, and your sister and their partners. They were as disgusted as my parents were, and as my brother and his wife were. As disgusted as most of our friends were as well. In fact, it seems you have pretty much become an all-round pariah."

"My solicitor reckons your letter will make the divorce a slam dunk in my favour. You can tell that arsehole you've shacked up with that he won't be getting away Scott free either. I'll be suing your employer for not maintaining and applying the non-fraternisation policy in your employment contracts. That will probably mean you'll both get fired, and you'll have difficulty getting new jobs without references. That could well be the end of the gravy train for you and the slimeball."

"How dare you let them all see my letter," screeched Julia, "it was only meant for you to read."

"You're stupid as well as delusional if you thought I wouldn't use the letter. As delusional as thinking that you could do what you did, and then think that I would take you back if you decided that your future lay with your family, after you'd already given yourself to your sleazy lover. Dream on, slut."

"That letter saved me from a lot of embarrassing explanations, you did that for me instead. Perhaps I should thank you for that. Now perhaps you'll pick up whatever you came for and go quickly. Get back to your love nest while you can still enjoy it. You'd better be quick; your boyfriend might find someone new while you're away. Did you know you weren't his first choice of the women at your offices? Apparently, the others saw through him and rejected his advances. He was described to me by one girl that he'd approached as 'slimy'. Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention that a copy of your letter is circulating round your offices, so you'd be wasting your breath trying to put a different perspective on your actions."

"You bastard," she shrieked. "You're just a bad loser. Brad's twice the man you are, in and out of bed. We're going to have a great life while you're too busy being spiteful."

"Oh, yes. You're certainly right about one thing," said Ben quietly, "I will be spiteful, I'm going to destroy you both for the pain you've inflicted on all those who used to love you. I'm going to bring the slimeball down and you'll be collateral damage I'm afraid. Now, I suggest you get started on collecting whatever it is you want from here, because anything left after you've gone today will be heading straight for the dump. I'm going to cleanse this place of your poisonous presence; we don't want any reminders of the self-centred bitch you've become."

Julia loaded all the possession she could get into her small car, but that left many of her clothes and other possessions that she wanted to keep. "I'll come back for the rest tomorrow," she told Ben.

"You won't get in tomorrow," he replied, "Your keys don't work anymore as you know, and we won't let you in. What you don't take now will be taken to the dump as I said, perhaps they'll let you pick it over to see what you can find, but I doubt it. Now, get out, you're fouling the atmosphere in here."

"This isn't over," she growled.

"No, you're right there," he laughed. "You've got no idea of the shitstorm that's heading your way."

What Ben didn't tell Julia is that he'd engaged a P.I. to look into Brad Thomson and his activities. He was certain that the arsehole couldn't fund his lifestyle on the income from his job and that there's something murky to be found, and used, to make his life difficult or even to destroy him.

After Julia had gone, Ben sat down to talk with his daughters. "Listen girls," he said, "A lot of nasty things have been said, but she is still your mother and until the last few months she was a good mother to you. Once your anger at the way she's behaved has subsided, you may want to talk to her or see her again and I won't try to stop you. The only thing I ask is that you don't tell her anything about what I am doing or our plans for the future together. I don't want to give her any opportunity to disrupt us, OK?"

The two girls insisted that they never wanted to see or speak to their mother again, but Ben knew that their feelings might change in time. He'd understand it if their attitude softened eventually, after all she'd helped to raise them and make them who they'd become. It was a pity that she hadn't maintained in her own life the values she'd helped instil into them.

It didn't take long for Ben's P.I. to find that Brad Thomson was 'on the fiddle' in his business practices. He'd persuaded a number of smaller suppliers of component to the company he worked for, to load their prices with just a few pence per article when he placed large orders for their products. Each month the suppliers paid the value of the overcharges into a business account that he'd set up, and with a number of suppliers in the game, he was getting a sizeable extra income.

The suppliers were benefitting from guaranteed orders while putting the payments to Thomson through their books in the guise of various seemingly legitimate costs. The extra charges per item were small, but because of the volumes they were dealing in, Thomson was getting considerable sums each month. Thomson's employers were the losers in the scams. As these payments were untaxed and undeclared, he was virtually doubling his salary.

As the P.I. gave Ben details of the scams that had been going on for some years, supported by copies of invoices and cheque stubs, Ben asked him, "How did you get this information?"

"You shouldn't ask questions like that," said the P.I., "What you don't know won't get you or anyone else into trouble, and it's what you pay me for."

"Well, thanks anyway," said Ben, "I guess, this is exactly what I need to make sure that lowlife is fired from his job. I expect his employer will call the police in to deal with the fraud, and the taxman will have an interest in his undeclared income as well."

A week later Julia received divorce documents from Ben's solicitor, declaring that the reason for the petition was due to her admitted adultery. She wasn't really bothered by it, as she was happy that she had traded up with her lover.

At the same time as Julia was receiving the divorce documents, her employers received notification that they were going to be sued for a large sum in damages, for not enforcing the non-fraternisation clauses in their employees' contracts, and thereby allowing one of their senior managers to entice a subordinate into a sexual affair. On the same day they were given the evidence of Brad Thomson's, dodgy dealings that Ben's P.I. had uncovered.

After getting their own lawyers to quickly look into the matters the company's directors were advised to suspend both Julia and Thomson pending further enquiries, which would ultimately result in them both being fired.

The police were called in to follow up on Thomson's scams and H. M. Customs and Excise inspectors froze his bank accounts while they looked into his tax affairs. One way and another he was looking at a likely jail term for fraud, theft and tax evasion.

Brad Thomson's high life was finished and therefore so was Julia's. He wouldn't be able to afford the rent on his expensive apartment, even if he avoided jail, and he would have to move out. With no jobs and no incomes, he and Julia would find it difficult to find somewhere to live once the apartment was repossessed by the landlord.

Thomson blamed all his misfortunes on Julia, for not realizing that her soon to be ex-husband would not just fade quietly into the background, and he turned her out of the apartment immediately.

Julia had no choice but to ask her parents to take her in, which they did grudgingly, but only until she could find another job and then find her own accommodation. Eventually she got a job on a hotel's cleaning staff, with accommodation as part of the package but therefore on reduced wages. She tried to get back with Ben and the girls, but she had no chance, they detested her, and Ben was very happy with his new girlfriend, Hazel. The girls liked her too.

Two weeks before Brad Thomson was due to appear in court to answer police charges for his misdemeanours, he was mugged. His new accommodation was in a rather seedy part of town, and he was attacked in a dark area as he was going home after attending another unsuccessful job interview, the muggers were never caught.

Because Thomson had received a severe beating during the mugging, including a lot of damage from kicks he received to his genitalia, Ben came under suspicion. However, he had a cast iron alibi and couldn't be brought to book, although the authorities were pretty sure that he'd done it.

As things unfolded Ben was sad that his marriage had dissolved in front of his eyes, but not sorry that he'd been able to exact his revenge on the cheaters.

There were compensations anyway. Ben and Hazel were dating regularly and often slept together. They'd become very fond of each other. Kelly and Nicola liked Hazel a lot and the three women were becoming great friends. The future was looking very bright.