Tom was just about at his wit's end. Ever since Ann had had her miscarriage, she had been distant, almost cold. Tom had tried everything he could think of to get her out of her funk. He had tried to be as understanding as possible, but Ann just didn't seem to respond. Tom had tried to get her to go to a counselor, but Ann had flatly refused, telling him that there was nothing wrong with her, and to leave her alone.
Tom was a partner in a private investigative firm, his specialty being in computer and network security. For that type of work, he really didn't need a private investigator's license, but he had gone ahead and gotten one, just so he could help Stan, his partner, with the other side of the business. So when Ann had her miscarriage, he was able to get a considerable amount of time off to stay home with her, and just be there for her. After two weeks, however, he went back to work, the same time Ann did.
Ann would get up in the morning, leave for work, and when she came home she didn't want to talk any more than was absolutely necessary. Often she would spend virtually the entire evening sitting in her chair, staring off into space.
The last time Tom had suggested that they go to a marriage counselor, a couple of weeks earlier, Ann had shown the first real emotion she had displayed in weeks, if not months. Unfortunately it had been anger, and they had wound up in one of the few real fights they had ever had. Tom had tried to explain that he felt there was something going badly wrong with their marriage, and Ann had told him that she just needed some time to get things straightened out, and that he should just leave her the hell alone.
Sex was virtually non-existent. Ann would submit periodically, but there was no passion, or really much in the way of response. At times Tom felt that he would get as much response out of a blow up doll. Ann had never been particularly responsive sexually, and in fact had seemed to treat sex as more of a duty than anything else. However recently, her lack of involvement had dropped to a completely new low.
Then last week, Tom had been given four tickets to the charity ball at the local country club by one of his clients, and thought he had something that would at least give him a chance to get her out of the house to do something other than go to work, and mope around the house.
Tom brought up the subject, telling Ann that they could give the other two tickets to her sister and her husband and all go together. Ann was initially responsive, but on Wednesday she had announced that she wasn't going, she just didn't feel like it. Tom got mad, and another fight started, with Ann finally storming off into the bedroom, locking the door behind her.
Thursday, Tom was still irritated about the whole mess, so when an out of town client called about a security breach on their network, instead of sending one of the people that worked for him, he just decided to go himself. He called Ann, told her that he had to go out of town, and that he probably wouldn't be back until Monday, although he would try to get back sooner.
By Saturday night, he had identified and plugged all the security holes, and run his final checks. He called the airline, and found that he could get a flight home very early Sunday morning. Tom called Ann, first at home, then on her cell phone, leaving messages both times that he would be back about 7:00am, and home about 8:00. Tom thought it was quite strange that Ann hadn't answered at least one of the phones, but felt that there just wasn't much he could do about it until he got home.
Tom arrived just as he planned, but when he got home he found that Ann's car wasn't in the garage. He went into the house, and saw that the answering machine still had his message on it, and that it hadn't been picked up.
Getting a little worried, he called Ann's sister, apologizing for calling so early, and asked if she knew where Ann was.
"We were finally able to get Ann to go to the ball last night, and she had a bit too much to drink, so she is sleeping in our guest room. Do you want me to wake her up?"
"No, I'll see her when she gets home. Did you all have a good time?"
"Yep, it was great getting out like that. Bob and I really enjoyed it, and Ann was actually dancing."
Tom thought Pat sounded a little strange, but didn't pay a lot of attention to it, and after a few more pleasantries, he hung up, got the morning paper, and settled down to read the paper and drink his coffee.
After reading the news and sports, Ann still wasn't home, so Tom was idly paging through the paper, when he saw the coverage of the charity ball on the society page. He just glanced through the story, when he noticed that there was a picture of Ann dancing with some man. She had her body molded to his, and when he looked at the other pictures there were two more pictures of her dancing with the same man. He could clearly see that the man had his hand well down on Ann's back, actually really more on her buttocks, pressing her against him.
Tom was more than a little angry. First she had refused to go to the ball with him, then she let some jerk paw her. Finally, by the time Ann got home at nearly noon, he was calmed down, and had convinced himself that it was really pretty innocent. After all Ann certainly wouldn't have been doing anything out of line with Pat and Bob there.
When Ann finally arrived, she came in pretty bouncy, and told him all about the ball, and how much she had enjoyed getting out of the house. She thanked him for getting the tickets, kissed him, then invited him into the bedroom for what turned out to be some pretty good sex, well maybe that was an overstatement, but it was certainly better than it had been for the last few months.
By evening, however, she was back to her moodiness, and over the next month or so, she was still going off into her own little world, rarely talking about anything that didn't need to be discussed.
Tom did notice however, that while Ann had always been quite a nice dresser, she seemed to be back to paying more attention to her appearance, which he took as a positive sign. She hadn't become a slob by any stretch of the imagination since her miscarriage, but she had not been paying as much attention to her looks as she had previously. Now she seemed to be coming back to the Ann that had attracted him in the beginning.
Early one Friday morning, Tom's partner, Stan, called, and told him that Steve's wife had just delivered a baby, and so of course Steve would not be able to do the surveillance that he had been scheduled for. Stan asked if Tom would do the morning shift until Stan could get another man out there. Tom agreed, went by the office to get the paperwork he would need, and to pick up the surveillance SUV.
Tom's relief showed up a little early, and as Tom was heading back to the office, he realized that he was going right by Ann's office. He pulled into the parking lot, picked up his cell phone and called, thinking that he might take Ann out to lunch. Tom's call was answered by Ann's secretary, and when Tom asked for Ann, Susan told him that he had just missed her, that she had left maybe five minutes earlier, and had told her she would probably be gone all afternoon.
"Oh, I wasn't aware that she had anything going this afternoon."
"Let me look and see where she went. Huh, that's odd, normally I would have her meeting listed on my calendar, but there isn't anything there."
"Don't worry about it, it isn't anything urgent. I'll see her tonight."
Tom was just getting ready to start his car again, when he saw Ann come out of the office building, and get into a little Mercedes coupe. Tom now was a bit curious about where Ann would be going to a meeting in someone else's car, so he let the coupe get out of the parking lot, then turned out and followed them, not really sure why he was doing it, it was just a hunch he had.
He wound up just behind them, which wasn't very good technique on his part, but he could see Ann and what appeared to be a man quite clearly through the rear window. When they stopped at a light, he could also see Ann lean over and kiss the man.
Tom's initial reaction was to simply ram the coupe with his car, but reason prevailed, and instead he simply turned on the video camera that was mounted on the dashboard of the SUV. Then he picked up his phone and called in to the office asking for a license check on the Mercedes. Within five minutes he had a call back, telling him that it was registered to a Russell Anderson, at 1521 Alta Vista Way.
Tom followed them for another ten or fifteen minutes, grinding his teeth every time they hit a stoplight, because Ann and Russell would spend the entire light cycle kissing and hugging. By this time Tom was so angry that he could hardly function. Here he had been worried sick about Ann for months, and now she was showing more emotion and love with this asshole than she had showed him since her miscarriage. He didn't know whether he was madder at Ann or at the asshole in the car with her.
Just before they got to the Hyatt, Russell changed lanes just before the stoplight and Tom couldn't change lanes with him, so he wound up alongside the coupe, looking down into the car. He couldn't see Russell, but he could see that his hand was on his wife's thigh, stroking it, and sliding up under her skirt.
Russell turned left into the Hyatt, and Tom was forced to continue down a block and make a u-turn to get back to the Hyatt. He pulled into the parking lot just in time to see Ann and Russell disappearing arm in arm into the hotel. Tom parked, got out of the car, and walked toward the entrance. As he entered he could see Ann and Russell leaving the check-in counter, and walking toward the restaurant. Tom waited until they had disappeared into the restaurant, then went up to the check-in counter, and asked if Russell Anderson had checked in.
"You just missed him sir. He and Mrs. Anderson have checked in, but the room isn't ready, so they are having lunch. Would you like me to have him paged?"
"No, that won't be necessary. I would like a copy of that registration though."
"Sir, I can't do that, it is strictly against our policy."
