It all began innocently enough. When I first met Sandi I found her attractive, if a bit skinny. She was an incredibly bright woman, with her CPA and an MBA in finance. She managed the accounting department at a major manufacturer. Intelligent, capable women who are comfortable with their sexuality are a huge turn-on!
I sold the computer solution to her company and was responsible for delivering. I led a team of software developers and managed the project. I visited company headquarters at least twice a month. We were in the systems design stage, so Sandi and I were often together discussing requirements, reviewing design documents, meeting with staff. She was always professional, as was I. After all, she was recently divorced and still hurting. I was married; not happily, but none-the-less married.
I had been involved in what is best termed a "Christian cult" most of my adult life. My wife and I had limited sexual experience. While sex was never labeled "bad", neither was it something to relish. In fact, it was more than five years into our marriage before my wife would let me give her oral sex. Now, after twelve years married, we had sex maybe once every six months! (Frightening, isn't it!) As I approached forty mid-life crisis was about to rear its head.
For some time I'd been questioning the decisions I'd made at nineteen about the lifestyle I was living (no, not BDSM or swinging, but prayer meetings and communal living). I questioned my marriage, as my wife had little interest in pleasing me and more in pleasing the Christian group.
Life is the result of the choices we make along the way. After trying to live according to "The Will of God" for twenty years, I was about to exercise my own free will. Sandi would become the catalyst for the conflagration destined to consume the stone castle I had painstakingly constructed around my life.
Traveling for business is not much fun, particularly if you're on the road two or more weeks a month. Hotel rooms, even nice ones, become bland and eating alone is the social equivalent of removing a splinter. So after the fourth or fifth trip to Cleveland for this project I decided to ask an innocent (really!) question.
"Sandi, I know you may be way too busy, but I'm so tired of eating alone. Would you ever consider having dinner with me some night?"
"Sure Gary, that would be fun. We can do it tonight if you'd like. I've got a work-out for my race-walking group at 6:00, but why don't I meet you at Friday's around 7:30."
Race walking explained those stunning, long, heaven's-above legs and her slim figure.
"Sounds good – I'll see you then."
I went to check in to my hotel room. By now, the young ladies at the front desk knew me by name. "Nice to see you again Mr. Murphy. I was just telling Roseanne how you've lost weight. Have you been exercising?"
When the girls at the Hyatt are gossiping about you, you're traveling way too much! I graciously acknowledged the compliment and went to my room. Good news about part-time living at the Hyatt, you get the concierge level – cocktails in the evening, continental breakfast in the morning. (That will give you an idea of how long ago this took place. With the business travel slump, there is no more concierge level and no free anything!)
I wandered into the concierge lounge and asked for a Tanqueray and tonic. After a long day the cool, tartness of the drink was soothing, relaxing tension. I chatted with another road warrior, then finished my drink and went to my room to freshen up and lose the tie.
The restaurant was a short walk from my hotel, so around 7:15 I took the leisurely stroll in that direction. As I reached the front door, Sandi was pulling up. She stepped out of the car, sheathed in a sleeveless black dress that marvelously displayed her long legs. Her curling blonde hair hung long across her shoulders, framing a strong face graced with a charming smile.
"Great timing!" she said.
"Yeah, good karma I guess."
We were seated at a comfortable table conducive to quiet conversation. The first topic was the project and how that was progressing. Sandi asked about my marriage, noticing my ring. That led to discussions around the "community" in which I lived, her first impression being, "It sounds like mind-control to me!". How perceptive!
You, the reader, are probably expecting from there we went to my room and had a night of exquisite sex. Sorry to disappoint, but the evening ended without so much as a kiss. I returned to my room and she went home.
Our dinners became a routine, and at least once each trip I enjoyed Sandi's company. We talked politics and religion, relationships and marriage, running and walking, movies and books. In short, we got to know each other. I found her alluring, though at this point I was not contemplating an affair.
