Old Fool

Was I an old fool? You'll have to decide for yourself.

Some of you might look at the bare facts of the case and decide that I had to be: Wealthy man, aged 44, marries a beautiful and sexy woman, aged 28. End of story, right?

But things were lot more complicated. In the end, maybe I was a fool—but it wasn't because I wasn't careful.

We didn't marry right away, for one thing—not until a year and half after we started dating, and almost a year after she moved in with me. And for another, she happily signed an ironclad pre-nuptial agreement. In case of a divorce she would get $50,000 for each year we'd been married, to a maximum of $500,000. That may sound like a lot, but she was marrying a man worth roughly $17 million—so I felt comfortable she wasn't doing it for the money.

I met Karen at a fund-raising dinner for the Opera Company of Philadelphia. I have a lot of money—I own a printing business—and I like the opera, so I'm a substantial contributor. Karen had recently been hired as a development officer for the opera and several other arts organizations in town. She was seated at my table, next to my friends Art and Kathleen, who seemed to know her already.

I was attracted to Karen right away—she's tall and stunning, with amazing dark eyes, beautiful hair, and ample breasts. And she dresses like a women who knows she's attractive, and welcomes the attention.

We talked some during the evening, had a couple of dances, and I decided she was worth pursuing. I'd been single a long time—my marriage to my high-school sweetheart ended when I was still in my early 20s—and the fact that I had succeeded in business, making a great deal of money, made me confident enough to ask out even a beautiful woman of Karen's age.

I also looked pretty good for 43. I worked out regularly, and ran six miles three times a week. I was no spring chicken but I was pretty fit.

From the beginning I liked her, and she seemed to like me. I admired her energy and her skill at her job; she admired my success, and seemed to enjoy my sense of humor and my pleasure in her company.

Of course part of the attraction for me was that Karen was young, beautiful, and very sexy. And of course part of the attraction for her was that I was rich. Nothing surprising there, and nothing to be embarrassed about either.

Beginning with our fourth date, I discovered that Karen was also a woman who really liked sex. She was passionate and abandoned, eager and responsive. I'd been with plenty of women, but she was thrilling in a way that none of them had ever been. She liked touching and being touched; she liked licking and being licked; and she liked fucking, in just about any position either of us could suggest.

Before long we were seeing each other almost every night, and after about six months I asked her to move in with me. Things just got better and better—we both worked hard, but it didn't prevent us from energetically enjoying one another at night. And though Karen was younger, she was intelligent and sophisticated, able to be completely at home with my older crowd of friends and business associates.

Marriage began to seem like the logical next step, and in March—on the anniversary of our first date—I asked her, and she said yes.

While I loved Karen, I wasn't blind. I felt able to assess what I was doing in a rational way. It was reasonable for me to worry about someone marrying me for money, especially a woman so attractive and so much younger. But she agreed to the pre-nup without a complaint.

I also knew that, while she was sexy and exciting and fun, she wasn't perfect. Karen was an intelligent woman, but not as smart as I am. To succeed in business you have got to be very good at assessing people, judging their motives and hidden agendas, and I am. Karen wasn't bad, but she didn't see into people as well as I can.

One night early in our engagement, I sat her down for a serious talk, something we did pretty rarely.

"Karen, I'd like to bring up something for you to think about, and I'd rather you not answer me right away. Maybe take an hour to chew on it, or even talk to me tomorrow, OK?"

She looked puzzled but interested. "Of course, sweetie."

"I love you very much, and I'm thrilled that you've agreed to marry me. But I'm also a lot older than you are. I'm more of a morning person, and I don't love a lot of parties, dancing, and late nights out the way you do.

"Also, I don't always have as much energy as you do—and in ten or twenty years that may be more of a problem than it is now. And while our sex life is terrific for me, I am concerned that I may begin to slow down long before you want me to."

She started to open her mouth, but I held up my hand.

"No, please don't say anything yet—let me finish first. I need you to think hard about these things, because you're about to commit yourself to 30 or 40 years with me. One thing you already know about me: I am a one-woman man, and I can only be married to a one-man woman.

"If you have the idea in the back of your mind that someday, as I start to slow down, you can quietly find a lover somewhere to give you what I'm less able to provide, then let's call things off right now. I won't share you. If you're at all worried that I won't be enough for you—sexually or in any other way—then let's kiss, have a good cry and go our separate ways.

"Please give this a little thought, and then let's talk again."

She just nodded, looking thoughtful, and wandered off into another room. I half-feared the result of my little monologue, but I knew that I had to say those things.

I was in bed reading when she came in, gave me a half-smile, and went into the bathroom to change. She came out wearing nothing but a short cami that cupped her ample breasts, leaving her beautiful hips and pubic triangle exposed. I marvelled again at how sexy she was!

Without a word she climbed onto the bed, pulled off my pajama bottoms, and began to lick and suck my cock. I reached for her to pull her up to me but she fended me off and continued to arouse me with her mouth, taking her time, smiling at me. When I was hard as a rock she rose, straddled me, and guided my dick into her moist pussy.

I lay back and let her fuck me, more gently than usual, enjoying the heat of her and the way her breasts moved in the cami. She seemed to have something particular in mind, because she continued to move on me at the same steady pace for a long time. Both of us rose gradually to the peak of our excitement; she brought me to a gasping orgasm without ever accelerating, and a moment later I felt the clutch and spasm of her orgasm around me.

Catching her breath, Karen snuggled down next to me, and we exchanged long, loving kisses. After a few minutes she rose up on an elbow and gave me a sly look.

"I figure that's the way old people fuck—nice and slow, very steady—so I thought we should try it. Now we know what it'll be like in twenty years!"

Before I could reply she leaned down and kissed me once more. "I've thought about what you said before, Eric. And here is my answer: You are all I want. I love you. You are more than enough for me, and I want to marry you and be your young chippy forever."

Our wedding was four months later, in August, in the sunny back yard of our house.

*** *** *** *** ***

As I said, I was in love, but I wasn't blind or stupid. While I loved Karen and enjoyed her, I also paid a lot of attention. If she was unexpectedly late, or there was a strange phone call, or she had a moody day—all of that got registered in the memory bank. I never had to call her on any of it, because there was never anything that added up to much. But I was watching, and listening.

When we'd been married about four years Karen started having an affair. She picked a really bad guy to have it with: one of my junior vice-presidents, a guy named Mark Thompson who was otherwise one of my most valuable employees.

I told you I was smarter than Karen—it didn't take long for me to catch on. The affair began in early February. Within two weeks I was almost certain, and with the help of a private detective I had all the proof I needed within another ten days.

The details tell the usual dreary story. She wanted to go out in the evenings, far more than I did. Sometimes she went to parties or fund-raisers without me, and I guess she had enough of a good time to feel she was missing out by being stuck with me. I was 48 and she was only 32—easy to see how she might have felt trapped.

Mark she had met at my office, and though he was crazy to pursue his boss's wife, Karen was hot enough that it seemed worth the risk. They were discreet, meeting only during the day and only at his apartment; but I read people pretty well, and I picked up the changes in Karen that she probably wasn't even aware of.

So we had our confrontation. I accused, she denied, I pulled out a couple of photos of her kissing Mark on the way into his apartment, she confessed, she cried.

All the usual. "I didn't love him, it was only sex, it has nothing to do with you, I love you so much, I'll do anything to keep you, I'm so ashamed ...."

I sat quietly, listening to Karen. I had already cried, in private. I had already taken the long walks, feeling empty and numb. I had already faced the pain of it, the knot inside my guts that wouldn't relax, the helpless fury, the physical agony of my jealousy, imagining her in bed with him, seeing her writhing under him, crying out as he pumped her.

What did I want now? I wasn't sure. Knowing all along that I was marrying a sexy younger woman, being semi-prepared all along for this to happen, meant that it hurt a bit less.

Yeah, right. About one-half of one percent less.

Finally I interrupted her tearful monologue. "Karen," I said wearily, "you say you want to stay with me. Why?"

She looked shocked. "Because I love you, Eric! I have always loved you, practically from the time we met."

"Yes, well, loving me didn't stop you from breaking my trust in the worst way you could, did it?"

She looked at the floor, saying nothing.

I sighed. Then I told her there was a chance I would be willing to stay with her. I told her she would have to meet all my conditions. She nodded eagerly, dried her tears, said she would do anything, hugged me tight.

I told her. First, she had to break it off with Mark, without telling him that I had had found out about the affair. He was never to know that I knew. Second, she had to agree to marriage counseling with me. Third, she had to know that if she ever cheated again, or even gave me reason to suspect her, she was out on her ass.

Yes, she'd do it. Yes, she was so grateful to me. She cried some more, she hugged me some more. I hugged her back. I felt empty. Did what I was saying make any sense? I couldn't tell.

We went to marriage counseling. For a few weeks it was helpful. Karen was remorseful and ashamed; she accepted the burden of guilt, and promised to make it up to me. Our counselor led her step by step through what her cheating had put me through, and she again acknowledged her crime.

Then we got into rougher waters. The counselor wanted to explore why Karen would have cheated, what that meant about our marriage, about her character and mine, about her emotional and sexual needs.

This level of self-examination made Karen uneasy. She resisted, got defensive, got angry. Then she stopped coming to the sessions.

I continued to go alone, for a couple more weeks. The counselor told me frankly that he was not optimistic about the future of our marriage.

"I believe that Karen loves you very much, and that she is sincerely sorry for what she did. But her unwillingness to look at why she did it is not a good sign, Eric. I'm not predicting the worst, but I don't feel very confident at this point."

I sighed. "I don't either," I said. "But I thank you for the help you've given us. From here on I'm going to be on my own."

*** *** *** *** ***

Karen worked hard to make it up to me. She refused some evening invitations, she spent more time at home with me, she got out the cookbooks and tried a few new recipes.

She also did her best to fuck me blind. Our sex life had always been good—I imagine our frequency tailed off much less than that of most married couples—but now I was living in the pages of the Kama Sutra. She knew that I was very attracted to her sexually, and it must have seemed that the way to her man's heart was through my cock.

I was able to have sex with her only by distancing myself. This was no longer making love with the wife I adored and trusted. Instead it was an exciting, athletic encounter with a very sexy and eager woman. The sex was fantastic, in its own way—but it was much more like some of the casual affairs I'd had back in my single days, when both the woman and I enjoyed the fucking without expecting much more from it.

While we were doing it, I enjoyed it. Afterwards, I frequently couldn't sleep. I walked around the house late at night, mourning the loss of the trust in Karen that had been such an important part of my feelings for her.

But I had to give Karen at least some credit—she was trying hard. I had no idea if our marriage would recover, but she was trying.

In June I suggested we get away for two weeks in the summer, go down to the Jersey shore and rent a condo. She loved the idea, and I found us a terrific one-bedroom place right on the beach in Avalon for the first two weeks of August.

A couple of weeks later Karen came to me, oddly shy and embarrassed, not looking me in the eye, and asked if we could change the dates. She said her sister and kids were going to come to Philly for a visit, but they couldn't come earlier than the beginning of August. So could we go to Avalon in July?

I said sure, and changed the reservations, but I was quietly suspicious. Everything made me suspicious at that point. I had no trust in Karen whatsoever. I didn't know what the change meant, but my already high state of vigilance went up another notch.

Our first week in Avalon was fantastic. We had lots of privacy and a fabulous view. I got up early every morning and ran on the beach. Then I picked up the newspaper, read it over coffee, and made breakfast for Karen and me. After that we'd usually make love, and then spend a lot of the day on the beach.

Sometimes in the evenings we'd find a casual restaurant, or else Karen would cook for me. We'd read or watch TV in the evenings, and maybe make love again. We must have had sex 10 times or more in the first week—not bad for a guy nearly 50.

I felt that things were going well, that we were getting closer and more comfortable with one another again, and I started to be hopeful.

But the next week everything was different. On Monday Karen was unaccountably antsy, distracted. She prowled around the condo restlessly, and about 1 pm said she was going out to shop for a while. When she returned about 5 she was a different person: glowing, happy, relaxed.

I didn't say a word, but I feared she'd gotten laid. By whom? where? I had no idea. I asked about her shopping, and listened to her plausible answers. I said nothing more, but watched her even more closely.

On Wednesday, nearly the same thing happened. After lunch Karen announced she was going to the Acme, the only supermarket in the area, to pick up some things. I asked if she wanted company, but she hurriedly told me just to stay and enjoy the beach.

She came back at quarter to 5, with two Acme bags of groceries, and made us a nice dinner. Again she seemed happy, full of life. She dragged me into bed early that night and we fucked energetically, joyfully. I was torn between happiness and deep, unhappy, suspicion.

The next morning I had my run, then walked back to the condo with the newspaper. I stopped short when I saw the headline: "THREE-ALARM BLAZE DESTROYS ACME SUPERMARKET".

Over coffee I read the story. The supermarket had caught fire at about 11 am and burned to the ground in less than an hour. Whatever Karen had been doing the previous afternoon, she hadn't been at the Acme!

After a little thought, I realized I needed to make a couple of phone calls to confirm my sad suspicions.

At about 8:30 I called Karen's sister. I said we were looking forward to her visit the next week, and casually asked why she hadn't been able to come earlier.

"Oh, any week was fine with me," she said absently. Then she hesitated, and stuttered, "I mean ... well, the kids had ... had some doctors' appointments ... and we ... really couldn't miss them."

I didn't press her further, just chatted on another minute or two and said goodbye.

Next I called my office manager Kathleen, and asked if Mark Thompson was in yet. She put me on hold, then came back on the line and said that he had taken the week off. I asked if she could find out where he was.

After a moment she said, "I asked his secretary, but she said she has no idea. He usually tells her where he's going on vacation, but this time he was very secretive about it."

I thought for a minute. Kathleen had been with me for 15 years, and I trusted her completely.

"Kathleen, I'm going to give you something rather unpleasant to do, OK? I'm firing Mark, effective immediately. Please prepare the usual letter and sign it for me. When he returns on Monday, I want you to have him met by two of our security people. They will escort him to his office, where he can have 30 minutes to collect his things, and then escort him out of the building.

"At the same time, I want two people to go to his home and confiscate his laptop. It belongs to the company, and there's proprietary information on there that I don't want him to be able to share with anyone."

"OK, Eric," said Kathleen, sounding a bit stunned. "Can you tell me what this is all about?"

"In a few days, Kathleen, but not yet. A couple more things: you know I'd planned to be back on Monday, but I think I'm going to be away a bit longer. I will call you from my cell phone to let you know where I am and how to reach me. If you hear from my wife at any time, please do not let her know where I am, all right?

"The list of credit cards and account numbers for Karen and me is in the top drawer of my desk. Would you please call the companies and cancel all the accounts except my corporate American Express account?

"Finally—would you find a reliable locksmith and have him change all the locks on my house. He can leave copies of the keys with you, and I'll pick them up when I come back to town."

"Sure, Eric—and if it's something bad, which it sounds like, I'm sorry."

I thanked her and hung up. Just a couple more moves, and this whole sad chess game would be over.

I made breakfast for Karen and me, and took it to her in bed. Sleepily, she gave me a morning kiss, and we ate together. After breakfast she wanted a shower, but I pulled her back into bed with me instead.

Knowing it would be the last time, I lingered over every touch, every kiss. I stripped off her nightie and enjoyed every inch of her beautiful skin, her large firm breasts, the smoothness of her thighs. I stroked and licked and kissed her, from mouth to breasts to pussy, until she writhed under me as she came.

Then I rolled on top of her and we fucked sweetly in the missionary position. She tried to urge me on, to more forceful thrusting, but I held back. In the middle of my intense pleasure I still had to blink back tears. All that love, wasted! Everything that I had poured into my relationship with her, gone!

Finally I tired of gentleness. I flipped her over and entered her from behind, thrusting harder and faster. She gasped, moaned, urged me onward. I cupped her breasts in my hands, then pulled hard on her hips, yanking her pussy and ass back towards me with each stroke. It stopped being "making love", turning into cold, hard fucking. Exciting, but nothing but sex.