The Marine And The Beauty Queen Ch 06

Of course when I walked out of jail with my attorney, I wasn't thinking anything about how Susan and I had met, and how happy we had been.

To tell you the truth, I was thinking about killing the Reverend William "Billy" Thornton.

My attorney finally sat me down and started explaining the facts of life to me.

As I mentioned earlier, he told me my one opportunity to get away with killing Thornton was when I caught him in the act of having sex with my wife. They would have labeled it a "crime of passion," and I would probably never served even a day in jail.

Now, if I killed him, it would be premeditated murder, and I would spend the rest of my life in prison. That got my attention. I had read enough about Texas prisons to know that was one place I did not want to be.

My attorney, Huntsell Boone asked if there was anything I absolutely needed or wanted from either our house in Thornton or the ranch, and it was something of a shock to realize that without Susan, nothing else really mattered.

"Go, check into a motel, and don't go near Susan or Thornton," Hunt advised.

The next morning, Hunt called to let me know that Thornton refused to press any charges against me. The last thing Thornton wanted was any publicity about what had happened.

I drove to Hunt's office, and asked him to file the paperwork for my divorce.

Susan could have everything, and I had him include a phrase in the paperwork that as soon as she signed, my 25 percent interest in Williams Construction Company would revert back to her.

I wanted nothing, no money -- nothing at all.

That wasn't quite right. I wanted my life back, but knew that was now impossible.

One thing John had insisted on when I began running the business during what turned out to be his final year. When John first started his business, he deposited all his earnings into one account, which was the same account he used for the ranch. He would write payroll checks for his employees out of that account, and also for all his farm supplies. All personal expenses also came out of that account.

That worked fine, until he was audited by the IRS and ended up paying thousands of dollars in fines and penalties.

After that, he had one account with one bank for his business. Another account with another bank for his ranch. And three more accounts at a third bank, one each for himself, his wife, and jointly.

Susan and I followed his advice, and followed that pattern. Of course Susan always knew exactly how much money "I" had, how much money "she" had, how much "we" had, and how much both the ranch and business had.

In the seven years since John died, the business had grown from doing about $10 million a year, to over $70 million a year. My salary as COO was about $400,000 a year, plus bonuses. Susan, as president, earned $500,000 a year.

Neither of us actually spent a lot of money, so most of that money, for both of us, went into certificates of deposit, and retirement accounts. Again, in each of our names.

Susan had inherited several hundred thousand dollars when John died, and we used that to buy a house in Thornton and paid cash. As far as I was concerned, the house was hers.

In the past three years, Susan had scaled back on her time spent in nursing, and worked more on the ranch, raising horses.

I knew that Susan really didn't need to work. The income from the ranch would more than meet her needs, and anything she made from the construction business was just excess. But now it would be someone else running that company, because I was through.

As much as I had grown to love Texas, well Texas no longer had a hold on me.

I asked Hunt to follow me as I drove the company truck to the construction office to turn it back in, then asked him to drop me off at my bank. I cashed in all the different certificates of deposit, and left with a check for well over $2 million. I had left plenty in my checking account for my next two planned purchases.

I walked down to the nearest truck dealer and bought the largest, most loaded pickup truck they carried, which turned out to be a Ford F-250. I paid cash, then drove to a camper dealer and bought a top-of-the-line Airstream travel trailer. One of those big silver things you see being pulled behind trucks. This one was 28 feet long, and had virtually every option you can name, including a wide-screen TV.

Again I paid cash -- well debit card -- then drove to a nearby RV park and rented a space and started learning about my new home.

Shortly after settling in for the night, my cell phone rang.

Susan! I hit ignore.

Then she called again. And again. And again.

Then I started getting voice messages from her, then as I continued to ignore her calls and voice messages, text messages. I deleted them all.

Finally I turned the damn thing off.

I am not sure if I got any sleep that night. Every time I would close my eyes, all I could see was Susan -- with Thornton.

At about eight the next morning, I turned my phone back on and had 27 missed calls, all from Susan, 15 voice messages and over 50 text messages. I turned the phone off again without checking any of them.

At nine, I drove over to the attorney's office and parked behind his office since I had my travel trailer with me.

I read over the divorce papers and signed them, then signed a power of attorney giving Hunt my permission to act in my behalf on anything having to do with the divorce, plus an additional power of attorney if he needed to sign any papers relating to ending my involvement with the construction company.

After I finished signing all the papers, I turned my phone back on, and now had a total of over 50 missed calls -- all from Susan. I didn't even check to see how many voice messages and text messages I had.

I asked Hunt if he had a hammer. He looked at me a little strange, but found one. I took out the battery, put the phone on the floor and smashed it.

I asked Hunt to mail the phone to Susan. Yes, I know it was incredibly spiteful, but I was still seething inside.

"What are you going to do now?" Hunt asked.

I told him to look out his window. He pulled the blinds and when he saw the trailer I told him that was my new home.

"Where are you going to go?" he asked.

"I don't know . . . but if I ever get there, I'll give you a call," and walked out the door.

I drove to Dallas, and deposited my check at one of the giant, mega banks that have branches throughout the United States, then waited a few days for my new debit and credit cards to arrive.

I've always heard that the fall leaves in New England are spectacular. It was still several months until fall, but I now had all the time in the world.

Over the course of the next two months I slowly made my way up the eastern seaboard, stopping when and where I wanted, and seeing anything I wanted to see.

The fall leaves in New England are spectacular. In fact I saw so many beautiful, awe-inspiring sights I can't remember them all.

But I knew, deep inside my heart, that none could match the simple beauty of a certain canyon in Texas.

From New England I drove to North Carolina and spent a few weeks with my parents, then drove down through Georgia until I stopped in Florida where I spent the winter.

And during those first five months I would . . . well, I would fuck anything that wore a skirt.

Young, old, thin, fat, short, tall -- it didn't matter.

And I really didn't care if they enjoyed it or not.

I wasn't abusive -- but I frequently wasn't very gentle either.

Some liked it rough, some didn't. I didn't care.

Not until one day while a middle-aged woman was putting her clothes back on while wiping her tears.

"You must have really loved her," she said.

Then when I glared at her, she gasped, "Oh my God . . . you still do. You're still in love with her."

I think in that moment I came about as close as I could ever come to killing another human being with my bare hands. Oh, yes, I had killed in Iraq. But with a tank, or with my M-16.

The only thing that saved her was that I was able to (barely) turn my back and just yelled for her to get out.

"I really feel sorry for you," she said as she left.

During the next three months I drove up to, and all around, the Great Lakes area, and again saw so many beautiful . . . empty spots.

During those three months I became almost celibate.

I kept hearing those words again and again. "You must have really loved her," then, "Oh my God, you still do. You're still in love with her." And most damning of all, "I really feel sorry for you."

Rarely would I pick up a woman. And I would try to be very tender and gentle.

Next I spent two months touring throughout the mid-west. Again, rarely would I pick up a woman.

And one day I realized that when I did pick up a woman, it would almost always be someone who was tall . . . and slender . . . and had long dark hair.

By now I had been gone for over 10 months.

I drove to Oregon, and rented a camp site overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

I bought a laptop and started writing, determined I would expunge this hold Susan had over me.

I was angry, and I knew if I started writing and put my anger on paper I would realize the best thing that ever happened to me would be catching Susan with Thornton.

The first anger filled words I wrote were: "I have always heard there are three kinds of people in the world."

I wanted to put her betrayal on paper, but soon realized that it really would not mean as much unless I first told how much I had loved her, and how I thought she loved me.

By the time I started writing about John's sudden death, and his will, I knew it was perfect.

Could anyone . . . anyone . . . doubt how much I had loved Susan?

Now I could write about her betrayal. How she had nearly destroyed me. Destroyed everything in my life, destroyed our love, and destroyed how I was trying to build her company and her father's company. Destroyed all the sacrifices I had made to make her proud of me!

But something went wrong.

Somehow, when I wrote about how many times Susan and I had visited Rosewood Canyon during our first three years . . . well it started me thinking about how many times we had visited it after John died.

During that first year, without John's help and assistance I began working even longer days, and was soon working six, and later seven days.

I was trying to grow his company, and make Susan proud of me. And make people forget those hated words, "disabled," and "handicapped."

During that first year without John, I think we only visited about 30 times.

For year two, I think it was down to about 25.

Year three only saw us in the Canyon about 20 times.

The next year was about 16, and perhaps 12 the year after that.

Year six was maybe . . . three?

And the last year? It was always, "maybe next month." Only next month something else came up.

When Susan started asking about adopting children, I told her now "isn't a good time. Maybe next month we can visit an adoption agency." Of course, "next month" never came.

My 12 hour days became 14, then 16, then 18 hours.

I was driven to build John's company, and make Susan proud of me. That I was as good as I had ever been, despite the words, "disabled veteran."

It was with a complete shock that I realized that every day -- every day -- I would leave the house while Susan was asleep, and not get home until after she was in bed and asleep.

I could not remember the last time we had put our palms together and intertwined our fingers.

And I kept hearing that woman's voice in my head: "I feel sorry for you."

Six weeks after I had started writing, I got in my truck and . . . started driving.

At about nine o'clock one morning I called Hunt's office. When I told his receptionist who I was, she immediately put me through.

"Dennis, my God, I have been trying to find you for a year," I heard him say. "I have a check for two-and-a-half million dollars for you."

Completely stunned, I could barely stammer out a reply.

"What? What check? What are you talking about?"

"Susan sold the company for $10 million, and this represents your share," he explained.

"But I signed over my share," I said.

"Susan said her father would have wanted you to have it, and it is now yours. By now it is probably a good bit more, since I deposited into your old checking account. Even with the measly percentage amount they pay, it has to have grown."

"And . . . and I suppose Susan and . . . and Thornton are probably married by now?" I asked.

"My God, Dennis, where have you been for the past year? Don't you ever watch the news?" he asked.

When I told him, not really, he began explaining that when news got out about what happened, over 20 women from the church came forward all repeating similar stories involving Thornton.

They were having problems in their marriage, but when they enrolled in supposed marital counseling sessions, Thornton took advantage of the situation and instead of strengthening the marriage, actually seduced each of the women.

"He was a very slick, very professional sexual predator who used his position of authority to seduce these unsuspecting women," Hunt said. "The women really had no chance. One of the ironies was that the stronger these women were, the more likely they were to become victims of Thornton."

When Hunt began using words like "seducing" and "victims" I realized with a growing sense of horror just what a fool I had been.

I had also been seduced. No, not by any person, but by success, by my growing sense of importance, by being recognized as an authority in my now chosen profession. Money had never meant anything to me, but power, and the trappings of power did.

I had told myself for years that everything I did was to make Susan proud of me. Proud of what I was able to do with her father's company, how I could make it far more successful than he had ever been able to do.

As I listened to Hunt, I admitted to myself -- for the first time -- that I wasn't doing it for Susan, but for myself.

For the very first time I realized that part, in fact most of what drove me was to disprove those two hated words: disabled veteran. I was determined to prove to everyone that there was nothing "disabled" about me and what I could do.

And when he added the word "victims," I also realized that yes, Susan had been a victim. At first, a victim of two rapists, and at the end, a victim of a sexual predator. But in between she had been a far worse victim. She had been a victim of my ambition. She had been a victim of my inability to reconcile my mental image of myself with the words "disabled veteran."

By now I was crying.

"What happened to Thornton?" I finally asked.

Hunt said the board of deacons of the church kicked him out, so he had moved to Dallas. There he became an associate pastor of another large church, and a few months later began his marital counseling sessions again. But this time he seduced the wife of a very jealous man. When that man caught the two of them together . . . well he killed Thornton. Never served a day in jail, not in Texas.

"And Susan?" I finally asked, "I suppose she has moved on and remarried by now?"

"No, Dennis, she hasn't," he said, very softly. "It's a little hard to marry someone else when you have never been divorced from your first husband."

At first his words made no sense to me.

"What do you mean, never divorced?" I questioned.

"Susan has never signed the divorce papers," Hunt related. "She said she will never sign them until she can talk to you in person. Just for 10 or 15 minutes. Then, if you still want her to, only then will she sign."

"Why?" I asked, "Why does she want to talk to me?"

"She won't tell me, just says until she talks to you in person, she will not sign," he again said.

"How . . . how is she Hunt?" I finally got up the courage to ask.

"To be honest, Dennis, not good. She has aged a lot in the past year. Her black hair now has a lot of gray, and for a while she lost a lot of weight. At one point I believe she dropped below 100 pounds."

I was shocked. Susan was always slender, and only weighed 120 when we met. She later gained about 10 pounds and looked better . . . healthier . . . than ever. I couldn't imagine her losing that much weight.

"Where are you Dennis? Please, tell me, where are you?"

I could hear the concern in his voice.

I told him to look out his window, and when he saw me, my truck and travel trailer in his back parking lot, he insisted I come inside.

I told him I needed a few minutes to . . . to compose myself but then I would be in.

Ten minutes later his receptionist ushered me into his office.

What I didn't know was he used that 10 minute period to make a phone call.

"My God, Dennis, you look like you have aged 20 years," Hunt said when he first saw me.

I knew it was true. The past year had not been kind to me. My once salt and pepper hair was now only gray, and I was beginning to lose some on top. I had also lost a lot of weight, and was probably down to about 150. Gaunt would probably be the right word.

My limp was worse than ever, and some days I had to use a cane to get around.

Hunt and I talked for about 15 minutes, and he again told me much of what we had discussed over the phone, adding additional details. Then his receptionist came in and said, "Your 9:30 appointment is here, Sir."

Hunt told the receptionist to show the client into the office next door, and he would be there in a few minutes.

"Dennis, I learned a long time ago that you can tell a lot about a person if you can watch them for a few minutes without their knowing they are being watched. I had a two-way mirror put in his wall years ago. I can also hear anything being said in that room.

"Please, just sit here until you see me motion for you to come in."

With those words, Hunt slid back a curtain that I had assumed was for a window, and flipped a switch I assumed was for speakers.

I gasped out loud. Susan was on the other side.

"She's aged 10 years," was my first thought.

Her once jet black hair was now streaked with gray. She was so incredibly thin, and I doubted she weighed more than 110 pounds. As I saw her look around, I could see an almost haunted look in her eyes.

Susan was still beautiful, but when I saw what the past year had done to her -- what I had done to her -- I began to cry.

I saw Hunt walk in, and watched as they shook hands.

"I promised you that I would call if I ever heard from Dennis," he said, "and early this morning he called me. As soon as I got off the phone, I called you. Luckily, I saw your truck at the coffee shop, so I knew you were in town."

"How did he sound Hunt, how did he sound?" Susan asked.

"To tell you the truth . . . he sounded old. Old and sad and defeated," he said.

"He wants to know why you want to meet. You have to convince me, then I have to convince him," Hunt added.

Susan nodded, then looked down. I could see her shoulders tremble. When she looked up at Hunt, she had tears in her eyes.

"I want him to know how sorry I am for what happened. I want him to know how much I love him, and have always loved him. I know what I did is almost unforgivable . . . especially for a proud man like Dennis, but if he can ever find it in his heart to forgive me, I would like to give us another chance."

I was not feeling very proud right now, and had tears streaming down my face as well.

"I'll let him know, Susan, that's all I can do. The rest is up to Dennis."

Susan stood up to leave, when Dennis asked her to sit back down.

"I know this might not be the best time to ask this, but did I hear you are looking for a general handyman for the ranch?"

Susan sat back down and smiled a very sad smile, then explained that a couple of weeks earlier some horses had knocked down a section of fencing.