Goes Like an Otter - Afterwards

I'd like to thank Randi for her editorial support and her great help and inspiration.

*****

Mike Cooper was angry. No, fuck that shit! Mike Cooper was, what was that expression? Yeah, he was 'incandescent with rage'.

There was absolutely no fucking need for what had happened. Yeah, okay, so his wife was, shit, had been, a cheating, duplicitous, conniving bitch, but there had been absolutely no need for what had happened to her.

Her lover? Douglas Williams had arguably deserved all he had received, but... Nicki? She hadn't deserved that. Not that. He felt tears. He grabbed a tissue from the box.

Sally reached out to him and hugged him to her. "Yeah, it's horrible, isn't it? Although I know he cheated on me, I still expect Dougie to walk in, pick up the boys, give me a kiss and... and... I can't believe he's gone! What a stupid, stupid, wasteful way for his life to end.

"I know I was divorcing him and you were divorcing Sally, but... fuck! After what happened to them, I don't know what to feel, how to react."

Mike nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I know. It's a pity we didn't have some foreknowledge of how it would play out. All the detective knew was that he was having an affair with Nicki and that other woman up in Doncaster, in Yorkshire, but he hadn't got any details on the husband of the woman he was having a fling with up there, so there was nothing he or we could have done to stop what happened. It's not our fault..."

Sally finished his sentence: "I know that's it's not our fault. So why do we feel guilty?" She then burst into tears, taking a tissue and holding it to her eyes.

Mike shrugged and chose his words carefully. "It's possibly because as we were the innocent dupes; we were the good guys in our marriages and they were the bad guys. Even so, I don't feel they deserved what happened to them."

Mike's mind drifted back to the evening of the confrontation. After Nicki had left their, or rather what had been their apartment, he had phoned Sally and she had come over to be with him.

He had poured them a cup of tea each, and they sat on the sofa, drinking their tea.

It was funny, but after months of having a torrid and hot revenge affair in retribution for the actions of their cheating spouses, all they both felt like doing was sitting and relaxing, just enjoying each other's company, even though he had changed the sheets on the bed in preparation for her arrival.

"I can't believe that it's over" Sally had said.

"I know what you mean," Mike had replied. "It's happened, they have both left us to live in their love nest. I don't know about you, but I'll still miss my cheating slut of a wife."

"And I'll still miss my lying cheating conniving ex-husband to be," replied Sally. "God knows how the boys will take it. They are having a sleep-over for a couple of days with a very good friend of mine. Simon and Vincent love her and her two kids to pieces, so they'll be quite happy there for a while."

It had been at that point when the intercom for the flat had buzzed. Mike had glanced at Sally, saying, "Who the hell could that be?"

On the screen he saw two uniformed police officers. "Hello, Mr Cooper?"

"Yes, I'm he."

"Can we come up, please? We have some news for you regarding your wife, Nicola Cooper."

Mike felt his guts go liquid. "It's the police! About Nicki!" he said to Sally. "God! She must have had a car crash!"

He buzzed the officers in and they walked into the apartment, looking as sombre as possible when wearing a modern British police uniform with the garish and brilliant reflective jackets.

"What happened? Where did she have the accident? Is she okay?"

"Sir," said the older of the two officers "Your wife did not have a car accident. At a little after 8pm this evening your wife was in a property in Lower King Street, in the city centre. An intruder to the property shot Mrs. Cooper multiple times. I'm afraid she died before the paramedics could arrive. I'm sorry."

Sally let out a moan of pain. "Was there anyone else with her?"

"Why do you ask, madam?"

"Because I believe Mrs. Cooper was meeting up with my husband at that flat. They'd been having an affair and both of them had left us, earlier this evening."

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Mrs. Williams." He spoke into his radio. "51 to base. The team who are visiting Mrs. Williams with the news of her husband can stand down, we have Mrs. Williams with us and we will inform her accordingly. 51 Out."

He turned to Sally: "I'm sorry Mrs. Williams, but your husband was also slain by the gunman."

Apparently the husband of the woman from Doncaster who Douglas Williams had been having the affair with was not as thoughtful and as stable as Mike and Sally.

When he had found out that his wife was having an affair he had shot his wife, killing her, and had used a GPS tracker device that he had secreted on Williams' car to track him back down to the Midlands.

He had knocked on the door, barged his way into the flat and had shot both of the occupants multiple times, killing them both.

He'd then driven his car across the Midlands and into Mid Wales on the A5 and had then made his way to the coast where he had deliberately driven his car into the sea at Cardigan Bay, off a cliff.

The idiot had been pulled out by the volunteer RNLI Inshore Rescue Lifeboat team and he had ended up in a hospital prison, on remand, while his fractured spine was mending.

The funerals for Nicki and Douglas had been sombre affairs, friends and family only. Both had been awkward for those attending, as it was common knowledge that they had been cheating on their spouses, and tongues wagged at both funerals when it was obvious that the wronged spouses, widow and widower, had been giving each other more than merely moral support.

In fact, Mike had harsh words for several people, especially Nicki's parents and her siblings. "I never asked Nicki to cheat on me! I never ticked the box for: "Do you want your spouse to cheat on you" did I? So as far as I am concerned, you can all fuck off! I am paying for her funeral, which is more than many would do, under the circumstances."

They didn't apologise to him or Sally. Well, of course they didn't.

The Nicki they'd raised or grown up with would not have cheated, so they preferred to not understand that the Nicki they knew wasn't the pure delightful creature whom they had known. In all probability, she'd never been that sainted creature of memory. Like all people, Nicki and Douglas were ordinary flawed people, neither totally wicked nor totally good.

After grief counselling, and a suitable period of mourning, for the sake of appearances, Mike and Sally got married and, eventually, Mike adopted the boys.

Despite the dire predictions of the naysayers, they are still doing pretty well, several years later.

Eventually the killer, a rat-like little nobody, got two life terms, but would probably serve no longer than 20 years, if that. An example of the wonderful British justice system.

However, due to his broken back he was serving his time in one of the UK's only prisons dedicated to housing disabled criminals.