This story is based on a set of true events that went down in the spring of last year. I started writing it as as they were happening. The story was completed when the couple involved came for a visit during Christmas. Of course, the names have been changed and the location changed to the Mid-Atlantic coast.
Yes, he had a deposition that had caused him to miss another open house. This time it was his daughter's senior year in high school. Their third and last child, it was the last school open house that he would be expected to attend until they had grandchildren. Norman A. "Hutch" Hutchinson, Attorney at Law and Certified Public Accountant listened to his wife go on and on about how he had missed almost all of their children's school events. It was the usual spiel he had heard incessantly over the last six months about how he was an absentee father and not a very attentive husband. Lately, since she was promoted to Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Sports the look about her and tone of voice was almost condescending. As if she really didn't need him around anymore.
"I told you about it two weeks ago. I know I did." stated Lorna, emphatically.
"Oh I'm sure you did." responded Hutch. "Some where between your text messages and phone calls. If you would turn that damn cell phone off , we might be able to actually communicate." Hutch glanced at his watch, then continued, "It's only ten thirty in the evening. Isn't there someone out there that just has to get in contact with the District's Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Sports?"
Lorna stood in the middle of the bedroom, arms crossed over her chest, legs spread slightly, glaring at him, "No worse than your practice. I can remember when calls you just had to take when we were out to an anniversary dinner."
Hutch, a pillar of self control calmly asked, "That's why I turn mine off when I get home. How about yours? Is it on or off, right now?"
She continued to glare at him thinking, "Yes it is on and I will take it into the bathroom with me tomorrow morning because I know that the calls and text messages will start at about six am." Then she stamped her foot and raising her voice said, "Damn it, I don't know why I even try to discuss anything with you, the accomplished trial lawyer. I see more of you in the newspapers and on T.V. with your clashes of corporate titans than I do here at home. So, forget it, let's go to bed."
In bed, he lay on his back and went to sleep. She lay on her side, facing him. Stretching one arm out over his chest, she whispered, "I do love you, Norm. I just wish you would place me and the kids on a higher priority. Twenty five years of marriage, a wildly successful practice, can't you give us a little more of your time." Then she drifted of to sleep.
Tuesday Morning
As Hutch drove into work that next morning, he thought about his wife's overall attitude over the last six months. Especially over the last five weeks or so since her promotion. She seemed almost like a different person, as if he were living with a stranger. And the sex, it was just that, sex. It had been six months since they really had fun making love to each other and the sex was simply the wonderful conclusion of a great time together. Lately, he would give her enough foreplay to get wet and she would suck him up. Then, he would shove it in and pound away. She would lay there until he was done and that was it. Once in a while she would get into it and go orgasmic. But that had not happened since she was in the running for the position she now held. "Could she be having an affair? Is there someone else? Then his thoughts turned introspective, "She doesn't give me much reason to get into foreplay. Not like it once was...What's happening to that sweet Georgia peach I married a quarter century in the past?"
Stepping into the elevator of the building where his law offices were located, Hutch almost hit the button for the top floor and to his office. He changed his mind and pressed the button for the floor below his level. On this particular floor was the office the man Hutch called their "IT executive." Fred Smith, actually one of Hutch's staff attorneys, was also a very accomplished computer hacker. Since joining the firm ten years ago, he had brought them firmly into the computer age and kept them on the cutting edge of technology. According to the retired government agents Hutch had hired into his forensic audit department, their computer networks were as good or better than any government agency.
Knowing that Freddie was a single man and was one of the first to show up in the morning, Hutch was not surprised to find him in his office, "Hey Freddie, how ya doin' this morning?"
"I'm just great, boss. How are you?"
"I'm alright, I guess. Ah Freddie? On email? Ah, can you get into email accounts?"
"Oh sure. Who's?"
"My wife's!"
"Lorna?!? Ah, boss? Why would you need to do that?"
"She's been acting strangely different over the last six months, or so. Lately, she's given me reason to believe that there is someone else."
"You think she's having an affair??" asked a astounded Freddie.
Hutch gazed at Freddie for a few moments. He had hoped that he could make it through life without ever having the concerns about his wife that he had at that time, "I don't, ah, I don't know for sure yet, Freddie. Ah, you've got to keep everything I say to yourself right now. It is just between you and me. If there is nothing there, then I don't want Lorna to know that I was checking up on her.. Ah, can you get into past emails, sent and received, even if they are deleted?"
"Oh yeah, boss, unless she has taken some steps that most people don't even know about. But, I'd haveta get into her computer..."
"OK. How about tracking down the person behind an email account?"
"Oh yeah. I've taught people up in the forensics department how to do that and a lot of other stuff I learned from the retired FBI and CIA agents you have on staff."
"Yeah Freddie, that's right, you have. Ya know? You are a real asset to this firm."
"Thank you, sir."
"I mean it, Freddie. Look when we get passed all this, I'll make sure your help and silence is rewarded."
"Ah, you don't haveta do that, sir. It's compensation enough knowing that I've helped out the number one man around here."
"Well, that's alright for now. I'll tell you what. I am going to go round up a couple of bugs. Then about eleven this morning, let's go spend some time on her computer. I'd like to bug the room where it is located and the kitchen. I have watched her speak in low tones on her cell phone in both of those rooms."
"Well boss, I think it would be better if we went to a shop I know of where you can buy everything you will need to do what you want to do. That way there is little or no chance that anyone else will know what you are doing. We can pick up a jump drive and I will load it up with everything I find today. Then I'll get up a shadow account that will get a copy of everything she sends or receives."
"Good ideas, Freddie. The district gave her a lap top, but I don't think she would allow any of this to get on there. Anyway, good thinking. Meet me in the parking garage, first level at eleven."
Later that day, Hutch perused his wife's email of the last month. Keying in on her correspondence with kbprinme3. He concluded that they were corresponding in a way that would lead one to believe that this was her lover. It made him angry and a little sick. Lorna was letting this person in on her most inner thoughts. Much of it, he felt, should be reserved for her husband, if she still loved him. As he stewed over what he was going to do about it, Freddie called, "Whatcha got for me, Freddie?"
"About forty percent of her personal emails are to or from kbprinme3. You were right about her district account. I got in there, it's all business."
"Yeah, OK. I have a feeling that may be her lover. Do you have an I.D.?"
"Yep, sure do, boss. One Kenneth Burns. He's the principal at Madison Elementary. It was the third elementary school built by the District. That's bold, writing that stuff using your work email. A real hot shot though. I see where he was one of the main speakers at the Admin. Conference last year. Probably thinks he is above it all. I went on the district's website. He is certainly their fair haired boy. Published in the state's School Administrator's magazine. Speaker at several of their conferences, he has put the District on the map."
Hutch lean back in his desk chair, "OK yeah, that conference was about eight months ago. I think Lorna rode up there with him and another principal. Reading some of the most recent email, I would say that he is about too, or already has gotten into her pants. I would never thought Lorna would fall for someone else, but it is becoming hard to deny it..."
"I'm sorry sir. I would have never thought it, either."
"Listen Freddie, I want you to pick out someone in forensics that you can work with, closely, have worked with, that I can trust like I do you. I don't like where I feel this is going. So, I need a person good at gaining information from multi-sources. I'd like to be able to listen in on all Lorna's phone conversations with this guy. Anyway, how are you for tomorrow at ten am?"