The other shoe drops!
POV = Jesse Wright
The wife Mabel Wright sat, curled up on the couch, quietly sobbing so as to not to disturb her husband. Afraid of another berating, afraid of another beating. Afraid of being raped again. Afraid, afraid.
He was strolling around the house preparing to go out for the evening. He had a date waiting for him to swing by and pick her up. Snickering at the good fucking he had forced on his slave wife. Well, good for him anyway. She no longer had an opinion he had to consider. Jesse whistling as he stood in front of the bathroom mirror, carefully combing his hair back.
"Damn! It's Good to be the King!"
As he left, he growled at her "Bitch, don't wait up. Go to bed at ten tonight. Get your slut ass out of bed and have breakfast ready for me at seven, tomorrow morning. Go to work and see if the shop is going to open. If not, take the rest of the morning to start looking for another job. Be home by noon and fix me a hot lunch. I'll let you know about your chores for the afternoon and what I will expect for supper."
He shut the door firmly behind him without another word. She could hear him get in his truck, start it up and pull out of the driveway. Off to do whatever he wanted to do this evening. Off to do whoever he wanted to do it too this evening.
This was the next few days of numb despair and hopeless submission for Mabel Wright. Lucky for her, her husband was getting laid by somebody so he only raped her once more that week.
She endured.
What else can a woman do when the man owns her?
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POV = Mabel Wright
The ex-wife Kate Deever, had come looking for the alimony and child support owing from her missing ex-husband, Kenny Deever. Since there was no one else to accept responsibility, the Bank made it clear they would cooperate with her taking over the shop. They didn't want to have another embarrassing write-off due to their poor lending practices. She had worked there for years before she and Kenny had divorced. So Kate knew how to run the business.
There wasn't enough equity to settle the outstanding personal debts and business loans and the mortgage on the burnt house. The Insurance Company had made it clear that they refused to reward arson. What was left of Kenny Deever's house would eventually be bulldozed and the plot sold at no profit for anyone.
The shop did reopen, at least I still had a job and Kate is a competent and a fair boss. That took some of that pressure off of me. Of course this meant that I couldn't be home to fix my husband's 'hot lunches'.
Jesse just shrugged it off with a casual punch to my belly. Just to make it clear he was still the master of the house and I better not fail to prepare whatever supper he would order me to fix.
At least half the evenings I didn't even have to do that much. Jesse would call me and tell me he would not be home for supper and what time he expected me to be in bed.
Last night he came home roaring drunk. I think he had been celebrating winning a big bet in some football pool. He wanted to fuck but was too drunk to maintain his erection and of course it must be my fault. So my Loving Husband punched me around for a few minutes before exhausted he staggered to the bathroom and made a mess in there. Then he fell into bed and I had to get it all cleaned up before he awakened.
I have had one piece of good luck, one bit of peace. My precious little ones do not have to watch and listen to their mother being tormented. Jesse never even asked where they were! My Sister-in-Law Lucy and my Mother-in-Law were caring for James and Joan at Lucy's house for a while with her twins.
Lucy's husband Rodger Norris has also disappeared. He is presumed to have driven off into the sunset in a drunken stupor. Except it was just an old Nissan pickup he was last seen driving, not a Mustang.
The next morning, grumbling about his hangover, Jesse sneered at me as I cringed from him while serving his breakfast. He ordered me to go get dressed for work. I think he was going to be gloating all day, thinking of the humiliation for me having to publicly display his masculine dominance to everybody I worked with.
The other women, even Kate, commiserated with me, offering their sympathy for having to put up with my husband's abuse. The youngest girl, she was new to our town having married a local boy while they were both in the Service. She asked me why I didn't go to the Township Police.
That set off bitter laughter from all the rest of us women. "The cops here are all male and grew up together. Hell, probably most of them are related by blood or marriage to half the township. Here the police are a family business. They can't be bothered with domestic disputes."
In a small voice, Kate muttered "Sometimes, even the death of a woman at the hands of her husband will at worst, be officially recorded as an accident or suicide."
Then a couple of the women, in hushed tones, named two of the dead women they had known, who had been so callously, officially ignored.
That afternoon, Kate needed some paperwork from her missing husband's attorney and the lawyer sent Margie, who is a paralegal and the wife of my husband's best friend. She looked at my facial bruises and the awkward way I was walking, with horror on her face. Before she left back to her office, Maggie asked Kate if she could use her office to talk privately to me.
Marge bluntly asked "Mabel! Why the hell are letting Jesse treat you like this? Damnit, our office would give you a loan against your inheritance. You could get away, go to the Capitol, get a divorce attorney. Your husband would lose big time if you got a divorce before your Uncle dies."
Confused, I had to have her explain about my Uncles Last Will naming me his heir to all the main property he owned. He had it leased out to a neighboring rancher for an adequate annual income to pay for the hospice he is lingering in. Even the taxes and assessments were paid up.
I finally understood what she was telling me.
A faint flicker of hope went through me.
Then she dropped the Big Bomb on me. "Yeah, uh your husband and I. Uh,we, well dammitt! Jesse and I were uhmm, talking a few weeks ago and I told him about it. I thought he would have explained it to you by now?"