Two Feet Above

Things progressed slowly those first few days, but after that, it was a perpetual whirlwind. Rebecca was served papers at home three days after I left. It outlined the plan that Zach and I had agreed to. A trial separation was underway and would remain in effect until she agreed to take a polygraph test.

Of course, my phone exploded. Exploded with texts and voicemails, that is. I only wished it had exploded. I had two more sessions with Mr. Dupree that week, and I was finally feeling better about myself. He was a very good listener, as opposed to telling me how I should think or act. He was also very fair, which gave him more credibility in my eyes. While he reassured me, he also refused to pass judgment on anyone, including Rebecca, until the verdict was clear. It's funny how our minds work. As worried, angry, and profoundly sad as I was, other thoughts kept seeping into my consciousness. I kept hoping that I was wrong.

I loved my wife, and I wanted so badly to be wrong, though it was looking more and more like Rebecca might be involved in a conspiracy of some sort, besides being Theodore's accomplice. If she knew she was drugging my food, or if she was alert during the diabolical sex acts done to me, I'd never forgive her.

What I didn't know, until Friday, five days after moving out, was that Zach had gone to the District Attorney, with evidence he'd accumulated on Margaret as it referred to her being complicit with her brother in covering up some of his misdeeds. It turned out Margaret helped 'smooth over' her brother's exposure with James, and the other girl's parents, who I finally learned was named Alicia. Zach had also had a forensic expert go through all of Theodore's holdings, including the offshore accounts, which he'd earmarked for Rebecca and me. The amounts available, and those claimed and stated by the two probate attorneys didn't match, and Margaret had made a large deposit into a separate account under her name.

Three days later, Monday, our three therapists were subpoenaed for Rebecca and my records. Our state protected the therapist/client relationship, so it was a calculated risk on the part of the DA. I learned later that day, all of their phones, including Margaret's, had been tapped by the FBI, since the alleged crimes were committed in two different states. I learned that only because Frank Williams had contacted the DA and local authorities, as soon as he received the subpoena, and sang like a canary. The scariest part for me was that Frank and Margaret were surveilled by phone, discussing temporarily institutionalizing me. Dupree would have been the counter to that plan, but it never happened.

By Thursday morning, one week after I moved out, Margaret had been arrested. There would be no polygraph test. My Rebecca was arrested the next morning. She wouldn't be mine ever again; that much was sure.

At the same time she was taken into custody, I found Zach Thorton and Douglas Dupree at my door. After only a few formalities, we all sat in the tiny living area of my room, and Zach began to lay everything out for me in a timeline.

Margaret was in fact, a patsy for her brother. She was complicit in keeping his deeds hidden or minimized. Williams, Tammy Whitley, Rebecca's therapist, and Dr. Toms, were all close friends and colleagues of Margaret and had been promised a substantial 'bonus' if they could help Rebecca and I stay together. That would have been copasetic if the intent wasn't to hide Theodore and Margaret's scheming. Related to Rasmussen's money, Zach told me, Margaret would likely be charged with a slew of 'white-collar' crimes.

Zach paused for several seconds, which felt like hours. I knew during the pause all was lost for Rebecca and me. The look on his face was pure pity.

"Marshall," he said sadly, "Rebecca wasn't in on Margaret's scheme." That gave me a thread of hope until he continued. "But Marshall, she was never hypnotized. I'm so sorry."

"After being detained," he went on. "Margaret started spilling and looked to lay blame for most of the problems at your wife's feet. Um, sorry.

"She told her interviewer that Rebecca was a silly little girl, with a silly teen crush that never went away. She said she'd transferred her patriarchal feelings from her father to Theodore Rasmussen. She went on to say she was only guilty of trying to help Rebecca and her child. When explained the details of the charges, she seemed shocked, and claimed none of this had anything to do with you. You were collateral damage in a case of twisted love gone wrong."

That was a lot to take in. Both men could see it on my face. Zach went to use the restroom, while Douglas consoled me. When Thorton returned, Dupree asked if I was okay to continue. I told them both that we might as well get it all out now.

"Marshall," Zach began again, "Margaret and the rest will likely get charged. It's too early to say the extent of your wife's involvement, but I think it's safe to say, the polygraph is no longer necessary. How do you want to proceed?"

I had no idea. I think Dupree realized in that moment, that I was in shock. He told Zach we'd had enough for today, and that he could go. Zach apologized to me, for how things had developed, and left. Dupree stayed for two and a half hours talking, but mostly listening to me, as my world disintegrated.

Epilogue:

Nothing got better for quite some time - except getting to the truth. Rebecca was formally charged with co-conspiracy to commit fraud the following week after Zach had come to enlighten me. I asked Zach about her purposefully drugging me. He said, even though it was captured on video, Margaret claimed to have destroyed the videos, and they had no way to actually prove I ate the meal. I looked at him like he was out of his mind. Then I realized if Margaret destroyed the evidence, then there would be no way to prove I was unconscious during my rape. I had Zach serve her with a divorce petition the next day at the jail.

Her father, James, blamed and hated me. We never spoke to one another again.

Rebecca didn't fight the divorce. Her only stipulation was a short meeting with me at my attorney's office on a day chosen to sign the documents. We were divorced before Margaret's trial even began.

My ex-wife looked sincerely sad as the lawyers left us alone in the conference room that day. If I spoke first, or maybe at all, I'd break down. I was determined not to give her the satisfaction of seeing me like that. It was eerily quiet until Rebecca took a deep breath.

"I want you to know," she began with a brave face. "I'm truly sorry for what this has done to you. I'm a selfish bitch that never expected you to find out, let alone end this way.

"My crime, my life-long regret will always be the way this turned out. I fell in love with Theo, right from the start. My father turned his back on me, at the time I needed him most. With my mother gone, and with no one to lean on, I soon befriended Theo in the neighborhood. I know the sex, or 'acts,' are all most people will remember, including you. For me, Theo was a friend, a godsend, and my rock. We spent hours talking, about everything. He literally shaped my life. I miss him every day since he's been gone."

She started to sob, while I felt like vomiting. I'd given my word to let her speak, but I couldn't help myself.

"Why then?" I asked in disgust. "Why marry me in the first place?"

She looked up and straight into my eyes. "Because he told me to." She saw the confusion I was feeling. She shook her head as if to start again.

"Not you, personally," she clarified. "He told me that he was too old to have a physical relationship with me. He said he wanted the very best for me, He told me he loved me with all his heart, and that included finding the love of my life. I wanted to please him. I set out to find a man just as he'd described - the love of my life. That was you."

She was deadly serious, and I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "Still, the two of you decided to have a child and make me raise it. Fucking pathetic liars!" I said in a raised voice.

"Don't you dare!" she said raising hers too. "Don't you ever call Trinity an 'it.' She could be your daughter if you'd just try to understand. He didn't want a child with me. That's why he told me to find someone. He didn't even think he could father a child. But then, you pissed him off, and he had to make you pay a price."

"Understand," I said venomously. "Understand that he was your one true love. That you married me just because he told you to? That you helped him rape me? Drugged my food so you two could do it? Yeah, I understand perfectly."

"That's on me, too," she replied more quietly. "I never saw what he did - masturbating on my bare feet - as anything wrong. It was the least I could do to repay all he'd done to help me get through the loss of my mother. The first time he tried to hypnotize me, I realized how much he loved me too. He was always protecting me. I went along with it and pretended.

"Alicia, my friend, was easily hypnotized the very first time." She was a delusional bitch, as far as I was concerned. "What I let him do with her was a reward - a gift - really. No one was harmed. I mistakenly looked at what I let him do to you in the same way. You were out of it, and would never know. I had no idea that he would be so vindictive against you. The baby was his idea, but I happily went along. Even now, with all that's happened, Trinity is my greatest life accomplishment."

"Anything else?" I asked apathetically. Rebecca shook her head.

"You've had your say, Rebecca," I told her. "Now get the fuck out and never try to contact me again."

She stood sadly but didn't hesitate as she walked out the door.

I never got any revenge on Margaret, just like her despicable fucking brother. She was convicted, oddly, for fraud, not crimes against me. She defrauded the probate and her brother's estate. At sixty-eight, she'd go to prison for five measly years. Hopefully, something bad would happen to her in the joint.

Zach destroyed her in the civil suit, and we ended up with most of Theodore's money anyway, after legal fees, of course. I walked with one-point-two million.

The other therapists went under formal review, and then two years' probation. Rebecca caught a break, being seen as more of a victim than a co-conspirator, and was let off. I never saw her or Trinity again, but I did move forward with my life, thanks to Doug Dupree and others.

Sorry if this ending seems unsatisfying to some. It was not for lack of effort. With the dominoes falling all around the conspirators, it struck me that they probably felt a lot like our MC, when Margaret dumped a world of shit in his lap. I decided to make the fall fast. Unfitting karma, was how I finally saw it.