Changing Life

CHANGING LIFE

CHAPTER 1

By SwMoHermit

Jack Johnson took off work at noon on Thursday, July 3. He was going to be on vacation for the week after the fourth and intended to enjoy the holiday weekend and his vacation to the max. Jack almost ran from his office to his eight year old Ranger 4X4 extended cab pickup. Most of his camping and fishing gear was already inside the truck and he was almost ready to go. All he had to do was rush home, load the perishable food he and his fiancé were taking and they could leave.

As he drove through the already heavy pre holiday traffic Jack let his mind wander. He could picture his grandfather's old cabin nestled in the hills alongside the stream that fed into the lake just feet away from the front door. It had been four long hard years since he enjoyed the peaceful, secluded cabin. He still thought of the cabin as his grandfather's even though it and the 100 acres it sat on was left to him in his grandparent's will when they died.

This was the first time he had convinced his fiancée Bonnie to go to the cabin since he inherited it almost three years ago. She was a city girl through and through and hated the outdoors. Jack and his deceased first wife spent almost all their weekends and vacation days there and he missed it terribly. He still could not believe Bonnie agreed to spend the whole ten days of his vacation there with him. He looked forward to sunning nude, skinny dipping in the cool water and fishing. Well, those were the in between sex activities he looked forward to. Above all he looked forward to the chance to reconnect with Bonnie and have hours on end of wild monkey sex. For the last couple of years it seemed as if Bonnie was withdrawing from him. Their sex life declined drastically and now Bonnie only grudgingly let him make love with her. Most of the time when Jack was allowed to make love to her Bonnie just lay there as if it was a chore for her.

Sometimes Jack thought about dropping Bonnie and trying to find another woman to keep him company. He would do that in a heartbeat if he found someone more compatible. Unfortunately, his criteria for a girlfriend and wife were particularly hard to meet and Bonnie was the only woman that came close since his wife died. Besides, not many women were too interested in a 33 year old middle manager with no prospects in the company he worked for. He had potential for upward mobility until Patrice died. After all, he was the Son in law of the man who owned the small company and the Brother in Law of its Chief Operating Officer. Now, not so much. It was made pretty clear to him when he elected to keep working for the company that another brother in law who was married to an older sister would be getting the next upper management position.

Finally Jack reached his home. He backed his truck into his driveway and rushed into the house. As the door slammed behind him Jack yelled, "I'm home Honey. I'll get the food and coolers loaded while you check the doors and windows then we can get on the road." Jack immediately grabbed a cooler and began throwing frozen foods into it from the deep freeze. When it was half full he stopped and placed fresh refrigerated food on top of the frozen items.

After that cooler was full he carried it out and put it into the bed of his truck then returned for another. He filled three coolers in the same manner then carried out a few items that were waiting to go into the bed of the truck also.

Jack rushed back into the house. He still had not seen Bonnie and yelled, "Bonnie? I have the truck loaded. Come on, let's go. Hurry. I want to get there before dark so we can get unloaded and enjoy the evening. If we leave now we can beat the traffic when the work day ends."

He still did not hear Bonnie and began walking down the hallway toward their bedroom. The house was strangely quiet. Bonnie was not in the bedroom or any other room in the house. Jack walked back into the kitchen and opened the door to the attached garage. Bonnie's car was gone. He thought, "Where in the hell is she? She knew I wanted to leave as soon as I got home from work. I told her last night I was taking off at noon."

Jack pulled his cell phone from his pocket and quickly dialed Bonnie's number. It rang and rang then defaulted to her mailbox. "Fuck!" Jack muttered. He quickly redialed her number. Finally Bonnie answered her phone. She snapped, "WHAT?" when she answered.

"Where are you Honey? I'm ready to go. How much longer until you get home?"

"Where do you think I am Jack? I'm at my Quilt Guild meeting like I am every first and third Thursday of the month. What do you want? I have to get back to the meeting."

"Damn it Bonnie. I told you I was taking off at noon so we could get to the cabin early this afternoon. How long will it take you to get home so we can leave?"

"I'll be home about five or five thirty like I usually am. You know when I get home from guild."

"That's bullshit Bonnie. You knew we were leaving early. We talked about this off and on for the last three weeks. I told you I wanted to leave early."

"Yeah, you told me and I told you I had guild this week. Besides, I'm not sure I even want to go out to the cabin now. Why don't you just go by yourself and leave me here?"

"Damn it Bonnie I want to go there with you."

"Well, I don't want to go there with you so you go on. You know I hate being in the woods with nothing to do. I'll see you when you get back. I have to go now." Jack heard Bonnie giggle as she ended the conversation.

He stood in shock and with mounting anger while he replayed the conversation with Bonnie in his head. He was so angry he was almost shaking. His teeth were beginning to hurt from clenching his jaws together. He quickly walked to the refrigerator and grabbed a beer. He drank it in six huge gulps and threw the can toward the trash receptacle. It hit the rim and bounced back onto the floor. Jack never noticed. He was already out the door and let it slam behind him.

Jack crawled into his truck and drove down his driveway and onto the quiet street. He headed toward the small town fifteen miles from the town in which he and Bonnie lived. It was almost exactly opposite the direction he needed to take to get to the cabin but his anger was such he decided to confront Bonnie before he left. He had a half baked idea to force her to go with him.

Finally Jack arrived at the business in which Bonnie's meetings were held. It was a small privately owned building that had once been a house. The owner was an older woman who loved to quilt. She converted the living room into a quilting room and one of the bedrooms into a store where she sold quilting supplies and cloth. She lived in the rest of the house with her brother who was retired.

Jack stopped in the parking area and looked around in disbelief. Bonnie's car was there as he expected but there was only three other cars in the lot. He thought the guild had thirty some members. The lot should be full of cars if there was a meeting going on.

When Jack opened the door into the building an older woman looked up from her quilting machine and asked, "Hello Sir. May I help you?"

"Uh. Yeah, I hope so. I thought there was a guild meeting today? I came to talk to my fiancée for a few minutes."

"Oh, you missed her I'm afraid. The meetings always end at noon. Some of the ladies have lunch together then they go home. I'm sorry."

"I didn't know. I mean I thought the meetings were all day."

"Oh, no Honey. Oh, some of the ladies hang around for a while visiting after the meetings but they didn't today. I think all of them wanted to get home so they could start the holiday weekend early. Which one is your fiancée? Maybe I can tell you where she was going after the meeting and you can catch her there. Or I might have her phone number... OH, you would have that though wouldn't you? Why didn't you just call her and save this trip?"

"She's Bonnie Parker. I did call her but she said she was going to be here until about 4:30 or so and would be home by five. We were supposed to leave for the weekend about one and I came to get her for our trip. Where is she? Her car is still in the lot outside."

The woman jerked a little when Jack told her who he was hunting. Her voice quivered slightly as she said, "Oh, Bonnie." The woman licked her lips and looked away from Jack then continued talking. She said, "I think I heard Bonnie say she and a friend were going to go do something this afternoon but I can't remember where they were going. She wasn't talking to me and I really didn't pay any attention. I'm sorry."

Jack turned and pulled the door open. As he stepped out he said, "Thanks. I guess I was mistaken. Sorry I bothered you."

Jack walked over to the car he thought was Bonnie's and looked at it closer. Yep, no doubt about it. That was Bonnie's car. Now where the hell could she be? Had she gone to lunch with someone in their car?

Jack didn't know why he did what he did next. He heard voices and laughter coming from behind the ten foot tall privacy fence and found himself walking toward it. The fence completely blocked his view of the back yard of the house/business. As he got closer he heard moans and giggles. They seemed eerily familiar. He heard a gasp then quiet for a moment before he heard a slap, slap, slap. The sounds were in a rhythm that could not be mistaken. The slaps were powerful sounding. He heard a feminine grunt after every slap. Jack looked until he found a crack in the fence he could see through.

When he looked through the fence Jack's anger surged higher and his heart broke. Bonnie was lying on a lounge mattress thrown down beside a swimming pool. A large silver haired man was pounding the largest cock he ever saw into her. Bonnie was moaning and screaming in pleasure while she pulled the man tighter to her with her grasping arms and feet.

Jack maneuvered his phone around until he got a partial picture through a larger crack. He felt his anger surge even higher when the man fucking Bonnie turned his head slightly and he saw his face. It was Roger, the asshole that was married to Patrice's sister, the asshole that got the promotion that once was promised to Jack. He took more pictures. Jack heard Roger say, "Take it you slut. You're my woman now." He laughed and continued, "I took that assholes job and now I have his woman too. God, life is sweet!"

Bonnie moaned and pulled Roger tighter to her then finished eviscerating Jack with her next statement, "Don't talk about that Dweeb honey. Just fuck me. I just hope he isn't home when I get there this evening. I can't believe he thinks we would have fun if we went to that damn shack in the woods this weekend like he wants to do. Hell, there isn't even any television out there! We have to drive nearly a half hour just to find a crummy café."

Jack tried to find a gate into the yard so he could confront his soon to be ex fiancée and attack his tormentor but the only one he found was locked closed. He then tried to jump up and climb over the ten foot fence but he couldn't jump that high. Finally he went back to the house intending to go through it and into the back yard. When he got there the door was locked and had a closed sign on it.

Finally, in anger Jack left and headed toward the cabin and his solitude. The trip to the cabin, while never an enjoyable drive because of traffic, was pure hell for Jack this time. Between the holiday traffic and his seething anger he almost got into two accidents during the drive. It also took him nearly an hour longer to make the drive from his home town than normal because of the congested highways. The added nearly two hour drive to the quilt store and his time spent there made him even later of course. All during the drive Jack kept seeing Bonnie and that asshole fucking beside the pool. His mind ran over and discarded numerous ways to get revenge on them during the four hour drive. He vacillated from wanting to kill them to doing them bodily harm to just kicking Bonnie out of the house and spreading the word on what kind of woman she was and what kind of man Roger was.

Because of the delay it was almost dark when Jack reached his cabin. He moved his cold food into the building and put it into the refrigerator and freezer then quickly made a sandwich. He took his sandwich, a bag of chips, and a couple of beers outside where he could sit beside the stream and watch night fall while he had his late supper. In spite of his anger he felt strangely at peace when the silence and peacefulness of the forest wrapped itself around him. It soothed his tortured soul and allowed him to truly think about his life and current problems.

During his meal Jack's thoughts revolved around his disgust and shock from finding Bonnie fucking Roger. He also finally admitted to himself he was deeply unhappy with his job and had been for some time even before his wife Patrice passed away. No matter what he decided to do about Roger and Bonnie he made the decision to quit his job and move on. The decision to quit was made easier by the memory of his conversation with Patrice's father when he told him Roger was being given the promotion previously promised to Jack. Patrice's father said, "Jack I've decided to give the promotion to Vice President to Roger instead of you. I think he is a better choice for the job since this is a family owned and operated business."

Jack replied, "What? You promised me that job just before Patrice became ill. You know I'm better qualified for the job also. I have an MBA in Management with an undergrad degree in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering. Roger only has a Bachelor's degree in General Business. How can you say he is a better choice for the job? That just doesn't make sense."

"Well Jack, he has worked for us almost as long as you have so he knows the business and he does have a business degree. Besides, he is family and is married to one of my daughters. You really can't say that now can you? You were married to one of my daughters but she is dead now so Roger is closer family than you are."

Jack never really got over the slight of not getting the promotion he was promised. He was always made to feel as if he was an outsider since Patrice died. He had not received a raise since her death either. In fact, he almost quit his job after failing to get the promotion but talked himself out of it. Jack harbored enough animosity against Patrice's family to enjoy the thought of damaging the company when he took his revenge on Roger. Now his thoughts revolved around how he could combine his revenge against Roger with his desire to make the company pay for the many slights and broken promises he suffered over the years. This last failure to be promoted was not the only promise made and broken; it was just the most recent and most painful one.

It was after midnight before Jack felt he was tired enough and drunk enough to go to sleep. To his surprise he almost enjoyed his thoughts about revenge and the half baked plans he considered and, for the most part, rejected. He walked unsteadily into his bedroom and undressed then almost fell into bed. Even as tired as he was however, Jack woke as dawn was breaking. He strode into his kitchen naked and made his coffee. While the coffee perked Jack got out some homemade cinnamon rolls and heated a couple. He took the rolls and his large coffee mug outside to watch the sunrise, not bothering to dress. The morning was crisp and a little damp from the heavy dew. Jack watched the fog rise over the lake and stream and steam rise from the plants as the sun hit them evaporating the dew.

Jack looked out over the small valley and saw some deer and turkey getting their early morning snack. The sun glinted off the small lake the stream fed into. Even after his discovery yesterday he said to himself, life is good. Jack admitted to himself he wasn't too broken up over his ensuing break up with Bonnie. Most of his anger and need for revenge was because she cheated and hung the horns on him. If she had broken up with him and left he would have been a little hurt and lonesome but would not have the seething anger he now endured. Of course some of his anger over her cheating came from who she was cheating with and the trash talk he overheard too. During much of the rest of the weekend Jack did nothing except try to relax and to plan how to handle his problem with his boss and his ex fiancée. He decided on a scorched earth approach in one way. He was going to make sure the entire office knew what a cheating asshole Roger was and what a cheating bitch Bonnie was. Of course he intended to make sure Roger's wife and her family knew what he did with Bonnie also in hopes he would end up fired and divorced. He was even working on a way to hit him in the pocketbook.

When Jack got back home it was all he could do to be civil to Bonnie and Roger. For his plan for revenge to work however he had to hold it together for at least six weeks. At least with Bonnie he could pretend his anger stemmed from her broken promise to accompany him to the cabin. He delayed the implementation of his revenge because he intended to get better pictures of Bonnie and Roger to distribute if he could and he also needed time to get into Roger's office computer so he could make a few little changes. Jack's first love was computers. He took his undergraduate degree in computers and electrical engineering but got an MBA in Management before he went to work for his deceased wife's families company as a mid level manager. He still kept up on new technology and systems and felt confident he could search through the company's computer system without a trace. In fact, sometimes when he was caught up and bored he surfed through the system just to see what was going on. Now he had a reason to enter the system and he intended to do much more than look.

At first Jack thought about taking some money from the company and keeping it but making it look as if Roger took it. Then he decided he was too honest for that. He decided to skim some funds from the company and put them into an account he set up in Roger's and Bonnie's names in a bank that the company, Roger and Bonnie all used. He would send some e-mails from Roger's computer to Bonnie at their home that were highly incriminating. He planned on leaving a trail from Roger's computer showing the false disbursement of funds.

Finally, all was ready for his attack. Jack caught Roger and Bonnie screwing two more times, once at the quilt guild and once in a local motel. He had pictures and even some sound clips of their meetings. He took off work early on quilt guild day and went home to box up and move Bonnie's possessions. He stored them in a storage locker about two miles from their home.

This was payback day Jack chortled to himself. He changed the locks on his house after moving Bonnie's belongings then went to Roger's home to implement the rest of his plan. Jack plugged into the outside phone jack to access the internet. After he was online using Roger's phone line and running through Roger's home computer Jack stopped and grinned to himself. His revenge would be ever so much sweeter now than he ever anticipated. While he was rambling through the computer system at the office and Roger's home system he stumbled onto something much better than he could ever have put together to get Roger in trouble. He found evidence that Roger was negotiating with a rival company to quit and move to their business bringing as many customers as possible with him as well as some proprietary information. All he had to do was forward the damning e-mails to all the family members and Roger would be toast. Granted he would not be in prison but in a way this was much better. Jack could live with himself doing this and he was not sure he could have lived with himself if he fabricated a theft to get Roger in trouble. This trouble was all Roger's doing and would be legitimately dropped on Roger's head. Along with the e-mails of Roger's business treachery Jack also sent the damning e-mails with attached pictures of him and Bonnie. He used a separate e-mail account set up solely for this purpose and signed himself as a "friend". He made sure he also got a copy of the e-mails so he could evade suspicion.