The End of Something

We had our usual bantering dinner. I told her about my experience with Faith and the faculty lynch mob. I tried to keep it light I don't think that Sasha had any idea that I was a little upset.

I should have confronted her about the discrepancy in her story. But it's kind of unnatural to go from happy and trusting - to water-boarding. And I am the kind of guy who believes that sleeping dogs are better off left that way. Nonetheless, it was in the back of my mind.

That was why I was more alert then usual when a couple of weeks later Sasha got a call at 10PM.

She grabbed her cell, looked at the caller ID and disappeared out onto the balcony. That was not abnormal behavior. When she is discussing business she doesn't like distractions. But it was almost bed time and as she stepped out she seemed to be a little agitated.

She was only gone a minute. When she got back inside I said, "What was that all about?"

She looked perfectly innocent when she said, "Oh nothing. It was a robocall. I hate those."

I didn't believe it. I had seen the recognition in her eyes.

I said earnestly, "You know you can tell me anything - right?"

She said, "What's that supposed to mean?"

I said, "It looked like you recognized the number. Why be so mysterious?"

She said semi-sarcastically, but with a smile on her face, "You're delusional - I was just wondering who would be calling me at such an ungodly hour."

I was certain that she had just lied to me again. But any more questioning was going to let the cat out of the bag. So I said, "Well I hope you told them to not call back."

Her eyes looked a little troubled. But she gave me her thousand watt smile and laughingly said, "It was a R-O-B-O-T dear!"

It is normal for married people to lose track of the details of each other. There is always that initial romantic period when you are cataloguing your beloved's every nuance. It's part of the mating ritual. Then after you have settled into comfortable married routine you kind of lose track of all of the things that made your spouse so special in the first place.

I get reminded how exceptional Sasha is every time we go to a party or social event. She is always the best looking woman in the room. And she is world class at working people - especially the men. Folks just gravitate to her like she is running for Office.

Me? I'm an expert in covert operations. Clandestine is my stock in trade. I have to talk in generalities about tradecraft to students - that's my day job. But in reality I am only effective if people don't know I'm there.

I was getting uneasy about my wife. Once-in-a-while she seemed to be off the grid. It might be work related. But it is hard to have an open and laid-back married life if you are eaten up by suspicion.

I laughed at how disturbingly easy it was to slip back into insecurity. It had been a dozen years. But I guess I never got over the idea that Sasha outclassed me. It's the hot-wife paradox. Every guy wants one. But you are also constantly aware that every OTHER guy wants her too.

So I made a snap decision. Private Investigators are so dreadfully '90s. In the year 2015 all it takes is a simple force pairing.

Getting a forced pair is not as easy as it used to be. Sasha has a modern phone. And the hole in early Bluetooth security has been fixed. But it was still easy for somebody like me to port-scan her, crack her PIN and drop a little piece of Bluebug malware on it.

Now, anything that happened within range of its microphones would be recorded. And, everything from the camera to her e-reader was under my control. That took me approximately ten minutes - nine and a half of which was the brute-force PIN-crack.

I know. The ethics of that are abysmal. I am supposed to trust the person I love. But my philosophy mirrors the Gipper, "Trust but verify."

Sasha had clearly not been telling me the whole truth. And suspicion is toxic to marriages. So for both of our sakes I thought it was incumbent on me to root it out.

I went upstairs with my little betrayal of her trust still nagging at me. It was dark as I slipped in next to her. But the minute that I settled she rolled over so that she had one leg flung over mine and her head on my chest.

Her hand was making its way in the general direction of old Lucifer, who was suddenly very interested. It was obvious that she wanted to get back to making the baby. I slid my hand down her smooth muscular back to those rock hard buns and pulled her to me. There was an incredible amount of heat emanating from the area where my fingers were

She moaned and started agitatedly kissing my chest. She must have been impatiently awaiting my arrival. Her other hand had reached its target and she was frantically pumping it like she was churning butter. At that point it could have probably been used to drive railroad spikes.

I pulled her completely on top of me. She put both hands on the bed above my shoulders, straddled my hips looking down on me with eyes that were absolutely stoned with lust. She is five-five and probably 115 pounds. I am six-four and closer to 220. But when she is in one of those moods she is fucking me, not the other way around.

She reached between us and I slid into that hot silky place with ease. She threw her head back, groaned and sat fully erect with me buried in her. She was literally dripping and the smell and heat was giving every hormone in my body a hard-on. Then she started plunging up and down with those exquisite boobs of hers flopping as she did it.

Sasha is very noisy when she fucks. She moans almost continually but she also hisses like a cat where most women would gasp. It is an aggressive sound that communicates how profound the sensation is for her.

As she gets closer to orgasm she starts telling me how she feels. That is expressed loudly and in no uncertain terms. She was jamming herself on me so hard that I was afraid she was going to hurt herself. Her hands were gripping my shoulders and her exquisite breasts with those big brown nipples were dangling in my face.

Meanwhile Sasha was in a galaxy long ago and far away. She was so locked in her own passions that the meteor that extinguished the dinosaurs could have landed in our living room and she wouldn't have noticed.

She started just yelling, "That's it baby - so good - so close - can you feel it?" And then she went off into a frenzy of bucking and writhing while her insides just fizzed.

I wasn't finished yet so I reversed our position, she let out a low growl of pure lust and shot her legs wide. Then I power fucked her for another five minutes. It was so intense that it felt like five hours.

She appeared to be orgasming throughout the entire episode. Her pussy kept grabbing me with the grip of a gorilla. And she was making animal growls, loud strangling noises punctuated by the occasional shrieked, "Ahhhh."

When I came, it was like the entire universe regressed back to the single point of light that produced the big bang. And then exploded back to its present state - all in about twenty seconds. It was the most intense fuck we had ever had.

She lay underneath me completely limp. I moved quickly off her in order to not crush her, pulling out of her with a distinct squishy pop.

She just lay there gasping and sighing. The hellcat of fifteen minutes ago was now a newborn kitten.

Finally she popped one eye open and looked at me merrily. She said, "I'm pretty sure that did it." I knew what she meant. If THAT didn't make a baby nothing would.

I said with meaning, "I love you." I took her in my arms as she turned into a spooning position and we slept that way for the rest of the night.

I would have taken the Bluebug off her phone the next morning. It just seemed so ungentlemanly to bug a woman who had recently fucked my brains out. But she got out the door before I could do the technological hand waving. Then I went off to class and forgot about it.

When I got home around 3:30 there was a big file of call captures on my computer. I should have just mass deleted them but curiosity got the better of me - unfortunately.

What I needed to know was in the third call that day.

Her voice said, "Tom, why are you calling me?" I would have skipped to the next call but her tone caught my attention. It was both angry and a little frightened.

The voice said, "Hey baby. How is the hottest fuck in DC?" My heart dropped right out of my chest and lay there beating on the floor.

Her next words stomped on it and then ground it into dust with her stiletto heel.

She said with anger and panic in her voice, "What part of leave me alone don't you understand? I told you that I made a huge mistake. My marriage is everything and I love my husband with all my heart. I don't know what I was thinking. But I am going to spend the rest of my life making it up to him."

The voice said pleadingly, "Come on baby. We had so much fun. One more time won't hurt and I know how much you love it." The last part was said with a smirk in his voice.

He added with menace, "Just one more special lunch and I'll never bother you again. I would sure hate to have hubby find out about us so late in the game."

Sasha made an exasperated sound and said, "You are a despicable slimy bastard. I was an idiot to give in to you in the first place and I am not going to let it happen again."

Then she added with venom in her voice, "And if you as much as approach my husband I will tell him myself and let the chips fall where they may. I never want to be in the same room with you let alone the same bed. It's over you asshole so deal with it!!"

I heard a little sob and the call was abruptly terminated.

This was one of those watershed moments when the ground crumbles and all your certainties disappear into the depths of Hell. I was sitting there with the smoking gun in my hand and I didn't know what to do with it.

Of course there was jealousy and pain at the thought of Sasha with another man. That was bad enough. But nobody is prepared for such an unexpectedly abrupt end to their life.

People who die from massive heart attacks must have the same thought. It's total astonishment. One day you are walking down a sunny street and then BANG the big one hits. The dominant emotion is just bewilderment. How could this happen to me?

The realization that my life had just ended turned me into an emotional basket case. For a couple of minutes, I just sat there and stared.

It was like the shocked state that somebody who has just been shot slips into. My whole life revolved around Sasha and our marriage. I had no other friends and all of my interests were conjoined with hers. So the landscape going forward looked as desolate as the face of Mars. I was terrified.

But then cold anger knocked on the door. Sasha had evidently had some kind of nooner fling with a dude named "Tom." It was not clear for how long. The first rule of counter-intelligence is to get situational awareness before you act. I am methodical and like most nerds I bury my feelings. So I was going to get the whole backstory before Sasha and I hashed this out.

And I was going to get it from this Tom character, himself.

Why would I do something so extraordinarily hands-on? There were a couple of reasons. First I wanted to take the direct measure of the man. It is just natural to want to find out what he had that I hadn't. And I really wanted to get a sense of what had motivated him to ruin my life

The other reason was more devious. I wanted to discuss this with Sasha knowing exactly what happened. She is a very smart woman. And also evidently an expert liar. So I was going to confront her knowing the exact details. Not what she was spinning.

Because the treachery appeared to be in the past I couldn't use my black-arts. So... The only source of information at this point would be this Tom fellow's eyewitness account.

First I had to find out who he was. That took no more than flipping through today's calls.

I was hoping that Sasha was not actually looking at her cell at the time. It might be a little disconcerting to discover that her phone had developed a mind of its own.

I ran through Sasha's call list for the day. At 09:22 she had received a telephone call from one Thomas S. O'Leary JD. That matched the time I had on the recording.

I ran him through the deepweb and discovered that Thomas O'Leary was a lawyer who specialized in contracts. He was 31 years old, four years younger than Sasha. He lived in Chevy Chase with his wife Lucille and sons Fergus 7 and Shaun 4. They had been married 8 years.

He had a law degree from Fordham and he worked in one of those big Pennsylvania Avenue law firms. From his credit information it looked like he was living the classic yuppie pay-check-to-pay-check life.

I had a work number so I pretexted him. A secretary answered on the fifth ring. I adopted my most businesslike tone of voice, "Hello - this is Bill Donovan with Booze Allen Hamilton. I was wondering if I could get in to see Mr. O'Leary any time tomorrow."

I assumed that neither of them had heard of "Wild Bill" Donovan - the World War Two head of the Office of Strategic Services and later the founder of the CIA.

The secretary said, "What is this concerning."

I said, "Booze is about to sign a major federal service agreement and I wanted him to look it over for us." That would spread some blood on the water. The fee for anything like that would be astronomical.

She did a cheerful and polite, "Please hold."

I sat there for a while listening to elevator music. She finally came back on the line and said, "I'm sorry. He is fully booked for tomorrow." I knew that he would be.

I said, "Could he meet me for a drink after work. Booze would make it worth his while?"

She said, "Please hold." More elevator music.

She came back with, "He can meet you at the Jefferson. How about 5:30?"

I said, "Perfect, I will reserve a table for us in the name of Donovan."

It was a little uncomfortable dealing with Sasha that night. She was in an amorous mood again. I had the sinking feeling that her honeymoon spirit had a lot to do with the conversation that she had with the good counsellor-at-law that morning. Sasha is very headstrong. And I could see that she was, "Working as hard as she could to make it up to me."

My fucking her had absolutely nothing to do with love. That ship had sailed, been torpedoed at sea, and sunk with all hands. I can be a cold-blooded, logical son-of-a-bitch. And I do not take any action until I already know the result. It's a German thing. You wouldn't understand it.

So I played along with her fairy tale until I had the whole story. Her performance was particularly intense, almost desperate. She came over and over.

Mine was a little rough. But I was fucking a whore so it didn't matter. She even commented on it afterward. I apologized and told her that I had a little aggression to work out - Snort!!

The next day I was sitting at one of those intimate little booths in the bar at the Jefferson. Given its location between the government buildings in the Federal Triangle to the south and east and the lobbying industry in the K Street/Dupont Circle area to the north and west, that place is an after-work meeting staple in the DC diet.

He walked in. The Maître' d pointed him in my direction. I knew a lot about him already but I had never met him. He was a cockhound for sure.

He was handsome in a pretty-boy kind of way, smallish, at about five ten and whatever "extremely fit looking" translates to in terms of weight.

He was wearing a four thousand dollar suit and he had a gold Rolex Yachtmaster on his wrist. I would almost believe he was a fast-track DC attorney, if I had not seen his credit report.

As he approached he looked very self-assured and arrogant. I wouldn't have liked him even if he hadn't fucked my wife.

He extended his hand and plastered a dazzlingly fake "hail-fellow-well-met" look on his face. We shook hands. I use my height to intimidate and the fact that he came to my chin was not lost on either of us. He slid briskly into the booth opposite and ordered a drink.

Seriously!!?? - An Appletini??!!

I said, "Thank you for meeting me Mr. O'Leary. I know how busy your day must be." That was patent bullshit unless you counted nooners. But I wanted to start out businesslike.

I added, "But I have to tell you up front that I don't actually represent Booze-Allen."

An angry look flashed across his face and he started to rise. He said with some heat in his voice, "Thanks for wasting my time asshole!!"

I said in my steeliest tone, "Sit down unless you want the details of your affair to get back to your wife."

He blanched underneath his expensive tan, and slowly sat back down.

I handed him one of my pretext cards. It looked authentic. I said, "My name is Bill Donovan. I am a licensed private investigator. I was hired to obtain information on an affair that you conducted with Sasha Schneider. This is not personal. Her firm is my client. She is being fired for malfeasance."

He looked relieved that the stink wasn't on him. I thought to myself, "What a self-centered son-of-a- bitch!!"

I wanted to encourage him to be as forthcoming as possible. So I flashed him a legitimate looking PI license. It was phony of course - but there was no way he would know that. His drink arrived and he took a sip. He was cool. He wanted to see what I was holding in my hand.

I planned to cold read him. That is not a skill confined strictly to carnival mentalists. It is part of interrogation tradecraft.

I started out with what I knew. I said, "Based on my observations you and Mrs. Schneider have been conducting an affair during work hours. I have a large collection of incriminating phone calls to substantiate that."

I fished in my pocket and pulled out a little voice recorder. I pushed the button and he heard his cheerful voice say, "Hey baby - how is the hottest fuck in DC?"

I abruptly snapped off the recorder, like I thought I had made my point. Of course I was actually trying to disguise the fact that sentence was pretty much ALL I had.

I looked at him candidly and said, "There is a lot more, none of which you would want made public."

His body language shifted from casual to tense. That reaction was a little more extreme than I had expected. Then it hit me.

I said with fake concern in my voice, "I am certain your wife wouldn't want to hear the hours of recordings that I have. But I am even MORE certain that you wouldn't want the Bar Association to hear them - since Mrs. Schneider was your client at the time."

THAT was a direct hit. He looked exactly like a cornered rat. He said, "How much do you want?"

I put on my most sanctimonious face and said, "Please Mr. O'Leary. I am an investigative professional. I would NEVER attempt to blackmail a client."

He looked like he didn't believe me. But he said, "So what do you want from me?"

I said, "I am completing my report for Mrs. Schneider's firm. We know the general shape of things but it would be very helpful if you could tell me the whole story from your perspective. I promise that this is only going to be used to support Mrs. Schneider's firing. It will be held in strict confidence. It will never be made public. And it will give you an opportunity to get your side of the story on the record."

I made a big show of taking the batteries out of the recorder. And putting it back in my pocket.

Of course - the micro-camera in the top button of my shirt had been recording the whole thing in glorious high definition from the minute he had entered. The picture and sound were being live-streamed to my home computer through the Gumstix mother board in my shirt pocket. It has complete PC functionality. But it is about the size of a stick of gum hence the name.