Lost Lives Ch. 01

"Oh yeah, I know all about that."

So I told Ginia what I'd found out about Steph's mother and the talk with Marcus, of course she had met Marcus at a Senior faculty function, she also remembered him from when she first worked there. What surprised me was the depth mother dearest was involved, I knew she had a less than disingenuous relationship with me I had tried for Steph's benefit to not stir her up but what we were talking about now was a hatred, she was encouraging Steph's behaviour, "Fuck this Gin, I'm done with the pair of them, Steph didn't need to listen, she didn't even need to ask her for advice, she did listen and here we are."

I could see that that wasn't where Ginia was trying to move the conversation, but when she went to object, I put my hand up, "No Virginia, stop, ok just stop, Me and Steph, we're done, she's killed it."

I got my phone out and started to decide words that would suit to tell Steph to pack up and get the hell out of Dodge, when I realised my phone was on silent but I'd not felt it ring, there were two messages, the first from Janine, Dad txted yo' wife and set up a meeting at 7pm 2nite. B strong j. I replied.

The second was a text with attachment. The number I didn't know - It read, Sorry about your marriage, thought you would like the evidence, a friend.

It was a video of Steph on the couch last night with somebody else's fingers in her pussy, what stood out were the tattoos on the males lower fore arm, I knew Dwight wasn't into tatts, also an unknown blond (they would hope, but we knew who it was) with her face in my wife's pussy while she received same from my wife. I now had enough to go after all of them starting with the Barman.

It would be a fact gathering mission, no confrontation with the guilty parties, and as far as Benny was concerned he may have had his arse fired already for all we knew. As it turned out he hadn't I recognised the tatts, but there seemed to be another person, a reasonably big looking character, hovering around in the background, we suspected either the owner or the bar manager.

Because she could Ginia went into full chat up mood and found out he was the owner of the place. In a round about way Gin managed to get him to sit with us, although he wouldn't accept a drink, he was on the clock and didn't want to be impaired at this point in time, Ginia remarked, "Wow, Joe that's a bit serious, I thought you guys were laid back with your businesses, is it a bit stressful running something like this?"

I think Joe was a little bit pissed about Gin's comment initially until Gin held her arms up in a 'Come to Jesus' pose and a look of wonder in her eyes about the same time as she said 'this'. Good save girl.

"Yeah, it should be a walk in the park and it was there for a while, but I tell ya if the right money came along I'd flick this place in a blink of an eye."

I looked in Gin's direction and she had a 'Ok where do we go with this' look on her face so as she turned to reply I jumped in, "So Joe, in terms of money's what would we be looking at price-wise for your setup here?"

Maybe the over-eager buyer routine might help, it was, back and forth for a while and Ginia asked questions that were so pertinent about the running of bars that we had him convinced that we were maybe interested in looking at buying it, We had me convinced of it as well. So we had his ear, I don't know about his trust, I'd doubt it but he may be forthcoming with some information now. Gin had a phone with audio recording capability and she had set it up for that purpose. Because picking it up mid-conversation might have been obvious Gin had had hold of it for a while. So I asked the question,"Joe, If I could ask, why do you want to sell?"

"Ah, yeah well, It's got nothing to do with the bar, physically, at all. It's more a personnel problem, getting the right people for the job has been less than successful and we've hit a few pitfalls over the last six months, however some of those problems have been eliminated and others are... at the point of being solved as we speak."

And there it was. Ginia wouldn't of spotted it but I did in a flash. It wasn't anything but an eye movement, it was over in less than a second but it stood out because it was accompanied by a pause in Joe's speech. The eye's had opened wider than normal and then refocused on their target, sharpened and squinted and then in that split second his face showed true anger, of course the target was Benny. And then it was over and Joe continued his conversation, alleviated the moment by producing a wide smile and then he finished. It took me a few moments to process what we needed to do. Ginia kept the chat up while I finished my drink, I asked her if she wanted another - no, so I spoke first, "Joe, thank you for tonight, we will definitely think over what we've talked about and maybe get back in touch."

I held out my hand to Joe, so did Gin, Joe offered his hand and thanks and we left.

"M what's up? Why the rush?"

"We need to leave and we need to be seen that we're leaving."

"Why, Mitch why? What did I miss?"

"Honey, just don't worry about it, it's not important, do me a favour and smile and wave at the doorman."

Actually we both did and threw in a nod, wave and a 'Good night' as well.

We were in the car and driving away when Gin asked, "Care to explain."

"Nope!"

"Mitchell, what's going on? .....Mitch, tell me, ....please you're starting to scare me."

"Don't be, we're safe, don't worry we're fine, honey, ...okay we're fine." I gently patted her hand. Yeah, I know. Wasn't gonna fly. I looked out the side glass, 'geez Gin, just please don't ask', I looked back to the windscreen and I could feel her stare, I tried to look at her apologetically and forlorn-like. She looked even angrier. Fuck It, She can be such a fucking boy scout, girl scout, whatever.

"Mitchell,"she whispered, "TELL ME!" She yelled.

I took an exasperated breath, "It's Benny."

"The barman!, this is about the barman!"

"Yep."

"So tell me Mitch, what is it about the barman? Benny, the asshole! What?"

"He's no longer a problem."

She was thinking that one through, "What do you mean ..he's ..not.. longer? ...how do you mean..oh. ...Oh ..OH!!"

When we got to Ginia's place I turned the car off and we just sat.

Ginia went first, "What do we do now M? Where do we go?"

"I think we back completely off and see what happens over the next day or so."

"You think it's that serious M?"

"Yes, going by the look on Joe's face, yes. No way Benny's coming out of this in one piece."

"Oh my God, should we go .."

"No!! absolutely not."

"Oh and, Gin, while I think about it, that recording on your phone, dump it, delete it."

"What about the video on your phone you got sent? Shouldn't you get rid of that?"

"I'll chance it for now or might download it to my work PC. Don't worry I'll sort it."

"Mitch, this isn't all over Steph's little problem is it? I mean beating the shit out of somebody because they were having late night what-ever in your bar is a bit extreme, don't you think?"

"Yeah, no there's more to it, what, I don't know, but definitely more than late night pussy party's."

"The other thing I don't know Gin is how far the two event's or people overlap, maybe Dwight and Chelsea are more involved in this other stuff, I know for sure Steph wouldn't be but she could of well ended up stuck in the middle of it. One things for sure I do not want you to be caught up in it. If you hadn't got Joe talking tonight, and if we never went to that bar tonight, I hate to think what could of happened. I might of well lost my cool, said something I didn't mean tomorrow and ended up in jail on a murder charge for something I hadn't done."

"WHAT! MURDER, ARE ...are you saying you think they're going to murder Benny Mitch!?"

"No, no, no, sorry Ginia, wrong choice of words, no, no, not." Me and my big mouth!

"OK so we cool it and see what happens ok Gin? You can still do your thing with Steph tomorrow but other than that we need to see the repercussions and how far they go. Oh and our story is we were doing a look around for our Canadian friends with the thought of taking them to the club Saturday night, Ok?"

"Makes sense M, ok, are you going home now? You don't want to come in?"

"Honey, I'd love too, but I need an alibi and ironically Steph can give me one, well provided she isn't guilty, shit that doesn't bare thinking about, plus if it leaves you out of the picture all the better, no I'll get going. I need to see how Steph and Janine's chat went. Oh and I'm not gonna kick Steph's ass out, in fact I'm thinking I'll make her live in the house with Janine, that should be a lesson in itself for her cheating ass." We both laughed.

"So if you're serious about that Mitch, what will you do?"

"Don't know, one day at a time at the moment, got through today, tomorrow's another day. Wait and see, hell I might start writing a crime novel, I've got enough to start one."

All the lights were out other than one in Janine's bedroom and one in the lounge. I actually texted Janine to see if she wanted to meet in the home office, it was quiet and off the lounge in the opposite direction to the bedrooms, that way we could talk without Steph overhearing our conversation. She texted to put the jug on and we'd have a coffee. Janine was quite upbeat about her and Steph's talk, she said Steph was very teary eyed and had fits of bawling her eyes out which Janine said was frustrating.

When Steph explained what had happened, Janine said it was the Disney version but she had done a bit of reading between the lines to get a reasonable understanding of what Steph was talking about. Janine said even after their talking she didn't know how she felt about what her Mum had done, she was angry that Steph had been suckered into it all but when it came down to it she just felt empty. I knew what she was feeling and I told her I just seemed to go through waves of anger but at the end, just like her, emptiness. She said that Steph had said she had two good things happen today, she had been befriended by someone that had seen her crying at work and had taken her under her wing, and secondly I hadn't kicked her out of her home. So I told Janine what I'd thought about, me moving out and Her and Steph staying at least in the interim, Janine frowned at that, asking why I had to go at all, why couldn't I set myself up in the spare room and I said that was the plan anyway. I also told her at this time I had made no plans to seperate at the moment, there were a few things to go before that, like find a Lawyer, for one. We agreed to keep each other updated daily with a meeting like this, there were a lot of other things we could discuss but we both came to the conclusion we were working on the same page anyway, we called it a night.

Probably the biggest surprise getting home was walking into the spare room, I turned on the light to find Steph was already set up in there, she was in bed, but not asleep she sat up and spoke, "Mitch, you never betrayed your family, I did, so I have no right to be in the master bedroom or being able to share it with the man I betrayed having done what I have done. Whether I'm ever going to be able to call myself your wife again I will leave up to you. I sincerely hope that you will decide that I can and that is all I can do. Mitch know my love for you and our daughter never went away, I was tempted by evil and I submitted to it, I'm ashamed over it, what ever you ask of me I'll do without hesitation."

I promptly turned and flicked the light out as I made my way out of the room. I stopped with my back to her. "Good night Steph."