Nancie Craig looked around the condominium she had shared with her husband for the past 10 years. It was a lovely home that had been full of life and laughter and good times and now it all seemed to be a lie. Every piece of furniture seemed to be yelling back at her "It was all bullshit, not one bit of it was real."
She felt herself tearing up and pushed it down. She was not going to cry again, she was NOT. She had done enough of that over the past few days, since discovering Cullen's horrible secret.
It had been Ashleigh who had broken the secret to her -- of course; it would have to be Ashleigh. To this day, she could not tell if Cullen's sister liked her or despised her. She hoped it was the former, because the attractive brunette was a fascinating woman, self-made and successful. Ashleigh ran her own media consulting firm and Nancie had done some freelance troubleshooting work for them over the years. That was how she had met Cullen. Cullen was smooth, funny, charming, with a whisky-soaked Irish brogue and an easy charm that got her into his bed on their second date. It hadn't taken him long to convince her to move in with him and even less time for him to propose. The sex was phenomenal and almost non-stop, if Cullen liked anything in this world, fucking topped the list. That suited Nancie just fine, because fucking was also # 1 on her list. You could have asked Tom, her ex, about that. They had not broken up about sex because from their first fuck until about a week before their split, they fucked as often as was humanly possible. One time, Nancie remembered with a giggle, they actually broke the bed in the middle of a heated fuck.
When Ashleigh broke the truth to her sister-in-law, Nancie hung up the phone and crumpled to the floor, weeping. Cullen could not be that cruel, Ashleigh must be lying to her, it was all some cruel prank the bitch was playing. That was it, it was a joke -- Nancie would do some digging and find out the truth.
She had never been a snoop, but on that day, she tore through their home and through all of Cullen's personal effects. To her sadness, she discovered that Ashleigh had been telling her the truth. For the entirety of their marriage, her handsome, older husband had been married to another woman. Her name was Brigid and to make matters worse, they had two children. That broke Nancie's heart, she had desperately wanted kids, but Cullen had told her that he was incapable of having them, "sterile from a riding accident", he had claimed. That lie stabbed her deep.
She got on the phone to a divorce attorney, although could she really get a divorce if her marriage wasn't legal? The attorney was a lovely woman who gave her terrific advice and made an appointment with her later in the week. "At the very least, we'll get that bastard for fraud," Mavis told her new client. "Sadly, you'd be surprised how often this kind of thing happens."
Nancie wanted to cry. She had loved passionately and she had lost it all. It was going to be hard to face people, she knew that word was going to get around. She composed herself and called her parents, better they hear it from Nancie herself. When she heard her mother's soft voice on the other end of the phone, she lost any pretext at composure. Nicole wasn't able to get her daughter to speak intelligibly, so she handed the phone over to her husband. As Nancie managed to blurt out bits and pieces of the story, she could almost hear her father's rage on the other end of the phone.
"That lousy
son of a bitch
," Daniel Williams raged. "I'll break his Irish ass in two." Nancie chilled because that was no idle threat. Her father was an ex-Marine and a police captain and, at 50, was still tough as nails. Nancie had no doubt that her father could easily do what he said.
"No Daddy, don't do anything rash," Nancie said, feeling comforted by the sound of her parents' voices. At times like this, they seemed so far away, even though Toronto was just 90 minutes away. "I'm going to ruin him Daddy -- he's going to be finished in this town. I've got myself a tough-as-nails attorney and she says we'll destroy him. To start with, because of some legalities when we signed our mortgage on the house, he knowingly committed fraud. As long as I keep up payments, the house is mine and he can't touch it. His stuff is going to be out on the lawn when he gets back from his latest tour."
Kayla Williams said on the other end "I never did trust musicians."
"Oh mother," Nancie sighed, laughing a little for the first time in a while. "Tom was a musician and you liked him just fine."
"That's true," Kayla answered her daughter. "That man could charm the birds from the trees; I never did understand why you ended it with him."
"I liked him too, sweetheart," Danny Williams echoed his wife's sentiments. "I thought he had a good head on his shoulders, he worked at the recording studio as a sound engineer and he didn't just rely on music to make a living. He always had money in his pocket and he treated you so nicely. Just why did you break up?"
Nancie had never told her parents the reason. Simply put, she wanted kids and Tom did not. As an only child, she knew that her parents would want to be grandparents one day and that would not be possible with Tommy. They thought he was perfect and she didn't want to spoil their illusion, so she made up some excuse -- now she couldn't even remember the lie -- and went on with her life until meeting Cullen a year later. She had hoped to bless them with children though her marriage to Cullen but his lie was even bigger than the one she had told her parents all those years ago.
"We -- we wanted different things, that's all, Daddy," Nancie sighed. "I really should get going -- I need to decide if I'm going to burn Cullen's classic guitar or his favorite suit first."
Kayla laughed on the other end and Danny said "There's my girl." She hung up and was feeling a bit better. She wasn't really going to do any of that, but she was going to have all of Cullen's stuff on the lawn and in the garage by Friday. She could park the MG in the driveway for a few days, it was also hers. Cullen was driving his Miata and she thought now it might be the only thing that he owned outright.
She felt a pang of regret for Cullen's other family. How many times had he left Brigid and his children behind to come to her? Were all of his "tours" real or had he lied about those as well? She thought of something else and called her bank. She needed to freeze her bank accounts.
"Already done, Ms. Craig," The bank manager told her.
"I didn't call and authorize that, who ...?"
"A woman named Mavis Parker handled it for you, said she's your attorney. Is everything okay, did we do something wrong?" He asked her.
"No -- nothing wrong, that's perfect, thank you Mr. Spaulding," Nancie sighed. Mavis had been a great choice; she was on top of things. Nancie finally relaxed, blowing an idle, stray strawberry-blonde curl from her forehead. She wanted a drink and then she would tackle getting Cullen's stuff together and out of HER house. Nancie went to pour herself a tumbler of whisky and then thought, "What am I doing?" Whisky was HIS drink. She poured the entire contents of the bottle of expensive whisky down the kitchen sink and got herself a glass of gin. 3 drinks later and she was re-considering her position on setting fire to Cullen's guitar and suits. "I could have a barbecue and invite my friends," She giggled to herself. "It would be the most satisfaction that fucker has given me all week."
With Cullen on tour, she had gone without sex for a bit too long to suit her. Cullen hadn't been very responsive to her overtures as late anyway, she wondered if wifey was wearing him out? That wasn't fair to Brigid, likely she had had similar experiences. It was not her fault Cullen was a gerbil-dicked, two-timing bastard. Then a new thought occurred to her -- if Cullen was a cheating bigamist, why couldn't he be getting some while he was on the road? Now she wouldn't have put anything past the scumbag.
The following afternoon, after a few hours of sobriety, she was putting most of Cullen's things out on the front lawn when, to her complete surprise, Tom drove up in a sporty new Corvette. She hadn't seen him in over 7 years and he still looked good, maybe even better. He still had those high, beautiful cheekbones, those green eyes that always seemed to be twinkling and those dimples. He was still gorgeous and tall and if there were any regrets in Nancie's life, losing Tom topped the list.
"I just heard about Cullen, that two-timing rat," Tom said as he got out of the car and hugged his ex.
"I was thinking gerbil, but rat will do," She giggled as she noted his puzzled expression. "Why are you here, Tom? You don't live around here anymore."
"Was visiting the 'rents and my mom still talks to your mom all the time," He smiled. "When I heard, I thought I'd see if there was anything I could do."
She smiled; he still had a huge heart. She looked over at every one of Cullen's possessions and asked "Got Gasoline and some matches?" She giggled.
"Nah gorgeous, they'd probably arrest you for violating some city ordinance," He laughed with her.
"It wouldn't be the first time, would it?" She smiled at him, wondering if he would remember.
"Oh yeah, back in university when we locked ourselves in the dorms until they re-hired Miss Winston," Tom grinned. "How could I forget that? We got arrested, but it worked -- with all the negative publicity, they had to hire her back and pay her for lost wages too."
"Yes, and as I recall, she was very grateful," Tom smiled.
"Six times," Nancie sighed before breaking into a naughty giggle.
"Really? I only got four," Tom kept it up.
"Women have more stamina than men," Nancie teased.
"Sez you," He shot back.
"Sez me and as I recall, I could always prove it," Nancie smiled. "Tommy sweetheart, it's been wonderful seeing you again, but I have to finish this. That son of a bitch is coming home late tonight or early tomorrow and I want it out of MY house. I'm having the locks changed in a few hours and I want to get this done."
Tom looked at his ex, in a halter tied under her breasts and shortie-shorts; she still made his heart race. The years had been good to her, her body had a few more curves, but her ass was still fine and she had those legs and
that
face. He had never fallen out of love with her and he wondered if she knew that.
Nancie felt pangs every time she looked at him. He had a beard now and it suited him, a bit of grey marked his dark hair, but everything else was just so ... so TOM. She still loved him and she always would. She wished that she could tell him as much.
"I'm going to make a deal with you," Tom smiled. "Seeing as it would make me very happy to help you erase that cheating bastard from your life, why don't you let me help you with this? I'll schlep all the heavy stuff and you can show me where you want it. In return, you let me take you to dinner."
