Love Letters Ch. 01

I'm not sure of the wisdom of submitting a story in the Loving Wives category, as from the little I've seen in my short time as a reader on Literotica, it seems to be a case of damned if you do and damned if you don't, but, hey, I've always liked to live dangerously! So girding my loins...

Myself, I've enjoyed some BTB styled offerings as well as some reconciliation ones, but, I must admit, the willing cuckold ones leave me cold, so you definitely won't find that in the story below. If that is what you're looking for, this is not the tale for you. Some of the BTB ones shocked me with their ferocity so you won't find that either, but I do like justice and it irks me to see the bad guys getting away with doing wrong -- happens far too much in real life so I'll use my bit of fiction time to even the score.

Lastly, I'm an Australian, and though I've read a lot of American fiction, I felt more confident dealing with divorce laws I was familiar with—less chance of screwing it up! They are a little different to American laws and I hope the way I incorporated them doesn't sound too much like an information dump. One thing where we're quite different is in the way monies are put aside toward retirement. You guys seem to have 401K's and 403K's, we have Compulsory Superannuation. Basically, and employer is obligated by law to put aside into a superannuation fund chosen by the employee the equivalent of 9.5% of their gross wage, excluding overtime. There are a few quirks to it but the above is all you really need to understand about it for Danny's story.

I had thought to put the story up in its entirety but the characters kind of got away from me and I do tend to enjoy really exploring their emotions so I let them run unchecked. That being the case, it will go up as two, or, at the very worst, three chapters, depending on exactly how rogue Danny goes, hahaha.

I haven't used an editor as I do a bit of freelance beta editing for authors in my not so free time, so any mistakes are my own!

# # #

God, how I wished I never got around to building my wife, Claire, the bookcase she'd been nagging me for ever since we'd moved into the old Federation cottage. The cottage she fell in love with and just had to have when we were finally financial enough to upgrade from our apartment to a house.

When you read the words "old Federation" decode that to meaning I needed to spend nigh on every weekend, and more than a few evenings, performing repairs and maintenance—once again, an understatement. Thank God, I'm a carpenter-joiner by trade, and, as much as it may have frustrated Claire, I thought a workable kitchen and replacing rotten floor boards was more important than building a bookcase, no matter how much she loved to read and how many books she wanted to be able to unpack from the boxes stored out in the old shed.

So, yeah, idiot me for getting all romantic and wanting to do something sweet for my wife for our upcoming tenth wedding anniversary. As if buying the old cottage and spending just about every spare moment making it beautiful for her wasn't enough of a display of my love and commitment. Enough proof of my desire to please her and make her happy. While she planted a herb garden out back and pretty roses to line the path to our front door, I had to practically gut the inside and rebuild it. But that, apparently, doesn't spell devotion the way gifting her a long weekend at a beauty spa does.

Long story short, while she prepared for the celebration of our landmark anniversary by having facials and massages and generally being pampered, I sweated over a custom built bookcase to line one entire wall of our living room.

I was thrilled with my planned surprise until I tripped when bringing in the fifth box from the shed, throwing the whole carton six feet in the air. The box filled with romance novels; Claire's weakness. Books flew everywhere; one even hit the light fitting sending it swinging wildly. So did pretty pastel paper.

The place to store love letters, I soon discovered, is within the pages of books about love conquering all. Makes sense, I guess.

How I wished I resisted the temptation to read the opening paragraphs of the first one I picked up. But I didn't resist. How could I? Page after page fluttered to the floor like petals thrown in the air like confetti. It actually reminded me of our wedding day. Sweet and innocent and romantic. So promising of happy-ever-afters. And inviting. How deceptive.

I thought they were from Claire's youth, from one of her high school boyfriends. Something she'd kept for sentimental reasons, and remembering one or two sappy love notes I'd penned myself as a lovesick fifteen year old, I read one.

Big mistake. Huge.

There was a problem. An enormous problem—the love letters weren't from a childhood sweetheart.

That wasn't the only problem.

Two more instantly came to mind.

The letter in my hand was written by my cousin Zack.

The other problem... the one I'd picked up was dated only a matter of weeks prior to our move to the cottage a year ago.

That bit of information raised a host of questions. How long had they been having an affair? Were they still seeing each other? Was she with him now? Was Claire hiding more letters? No. No. No. Surely not. Not while I'd been slaving to give her her dream home. My labor of love for her. My heart recoiled in absolute horror from the questions, from the possibilities. My brain, my ever logical brain, told me it was all too probable and that at some point I'd need the questions, no matter how abhorrent, answered.

As that first letter slipped from my nerveless fingers I wanted nothing more than to turn back time so as to never having read it. It gutted me. Winded me, like a massive blow to the chest. I tried to breathe but it felt as if my ribs were broken. The pain took the strength out of my legs and I staggered back, sliding to the floor. I sat slumped against the wall with my head between my knees, willing the contents of my belly to stay within the confines of my body.

I lost that battle.

I managed, with only a second to spare, to roll onto my knees. The assault on my senses of the sour smell prompted more gagging and retching until there was nothing left inside of me.

I crawled away from the mess, not trusting my legs to hold my weight, to sit with my back against the now hated bookcase. I eyed the other letters spread across the floor like a pretty patchwork of pastels pinks, blues, and creams. They looked rather lovely against the dark of the hardwood floor. Another lie. Another deception. Their contents, I knew, would be anything but lovely.

I debated whether to read them. The cowardly part of me, the part that was in agony, didn't want to, didn't think I could face more hurt. It wanted to crawl away and hide. It wanted to dig a hole for me to slot my head into. It said to read them would be like sticking hot pokers in my eyes and heart.

The braver, more rational side told me told me to rip the blindfold from my eyes in one fell swoop. It told me to get that painful part of the journey I'd now been thrust onto out of the way. It told me there was no point in prolonging the agony. It whispered to me the logic of gathering all the information I could for the upcoming battle, for a battle, a confrontation, was inevitable.

I listened to my brave side.

On my hands and knees, I gathered all the letters and sorted them into date order. Zack, the ever-so-helpful bastard, had been kind enough to date them. I'd have to remember to thank him later... maybe with my fist. From the look of things he only wrote two or three a year to coincide with things like Valentine's Day or her birthday. I swallowed to see one dated within days of my thirtieth.

Yet another problem made its presence known—most were written after Claire's and my wedding date.

I moved to my favorite armchair. The bitter smell wafting around me from my vomit seemed appropriate. It fit my feelings. I closed my eyes and, in spite of the acrid smell, took a few deep fortifying breaths. Starting with the oldest, written when Claire and I were still dating, I read.

Words and phrases leapt from the page, branding themselves on my heart, filling my mind with unwanted images. Images that had me biting my lip to hold back the sounds of my pain.

I thought I was the birthday boy when you managed to slip away from old Danny Boy at the party. I think the quickie we shared out in the alley was the hottest sex I've ever had. Thank you, my beautiful naughty girl. From the date I knew he was talking about Claire's 21^st. We'd been dating a year. She'd looked so lovely that night. I clearly remembered the white dress she'd worn that night and the way it floated about her as she danced. It was the night I'd decided to ask her to marry me.

You looked so sexy in that red bra and knickers. And you shaved for me! Every time I picture you I can't help getting a hard-on. That from Valentine's Day eleven years ago, we'd not long been engaged. And the lingerie? She'd only ever owned one set of red lingerie—a set I bought her. A set she'd had the hypocritical gall to tell me was a bit too slutty for her and had only worn for me the once. Bitch.

And then something else dawned on me. And you shaved for me! That Valentine's Day had been the first time she shaved her pussy. She'd said it was for me. Another lie.

I remembered how surprised I'd been at the time because when I'd asked her to do it on an earlier occasion, when we'd gone away for a romantic weekend and I'd proposed, she'd refused. Instead of questioning her change of heart, I'd been excited by the vision. I'd looked at her in wonder; as if she was a mystery.

Interesting word choice. Mystery; meaning something not understood or beyond understanding.

They certainly applied to how I'd seen Claire that night, but, silly me, instead of being curious about her sudden turn around, I'd been aroused. Her actions had shown I didn't know her as well as I thought I did, that she was, in fact, still, in some small way, a bit of a stranger.

Rather than being alarmed at the notion that there was clearly much I had to learn about my fiancée, my future wife, I'd found it intoxicating. I'd seen it as another layer to peel away, another facet to learn and love. Discovering she had thoughts and motivations I wasn't privy to hadn't set any alarm bells off—it had, if anything, made me even more enchanted with her.

I'd been such a gullible fool.

The first fingers of anger clawed at my gut, fighting with pain for possession of my body.

Standing by Danny, watching you walk down the aisle, knowing you were full of my cum, is the kinkiest, most perverse thing I've ever known. I had to think of dead puppies to stop from cracking a boner. You're such a naughty, nasty girl, Claire-Bear. I love it!

After reading those lines I had to stop for a moment while my stomach tried to find something else to vomit up. Pain engulfed me—even my fingers and toes hurt. No. Please, God, no! Our wedding day? She'd screwed him on our wedding day? And him? My cousin? Family? Christ, we'd grown up together. I'd thought of him as one of my best friends. He'd been one of my groomsmen.

I had to take a breather at that point. I made my way shakily to the bathroom and splashed cold water on my flushed face. I barely recognized the man looking back at me. I couldn't look at that man. Seeing his pain was too much for me. I concentrated on brushing my teeth in the hope of ridding my mouth of the bitter taste coating my tongue. Toothpaste didn't cut it. Nor did the mouthwash.

If they weren't up to the job, perhaps the brandy I kept on hand for my father would be. Normally, I was more a beer man, but when Dad visited, I'd share a snifter with him. He always maintained brandy was medicinal. I hoped he was right; I could certainly use some medicine for my broken and bleeding heart.

I settled back in my chair and continued reading, and each time I read something particularly painful I took a sip of brandy. I sipped a lot. I relished the burn. Dad was right—it was medicinal. It cauterized my wounds from the inside out.

The tone of Zack's letters were a direct contrast to the gently colored pastel paper upon which they were written. They should have been written on sheets of red. Blood-red for the perversity, for the wounds they inflicted, for the emotional blood they spilled. They were more sex-talk than romantic. A poet he wasn't. It made me wonder why she kept them. He never waxed lyrical about her beauty, never likened her to the moon and stars, never said she was his alpha and omega, or compared the two of them to famous lovers like Romeo and Juliet. He never declared his love for her. There were plenty of times he wrote that he loved something she'd said, done, or worn, but he never told her he loved her.

Oddly, that made me feel sorry for her. She'd thrown away our marriage, thrown away the love of a good man—and I was a good man—for sleazy fucking. For a quick, illicit thrill. It wasn't even as if he had a huge cock. I'd seen what he was packing a handful of times over the years and it was nothing special. On top of that he never seemed to be able to hang on to a girlfriend. In fact, more often than not, it was them leaving him, not the other way around. If he was such a stud, such a fantastic lover, such a great catch, why was he always being traded in for another model?

The last letter was in much the same vein as the others, and either the brandy had numbed me, or the sheer volume of loathsome shit I'd already read had deadened my capacity to be shocked. There was nothing in the tone or wording to suggest their affair had ended or even tapered off. Actually, quite the opposite—Zack had signed off saying he was looking forward to christening every room of the cottage with his sexy Claire-Bear. Mentally, I substituted the word slutty for sexy for that is what she was. A slut. Zack's slut. His sign-off suggested there was another two or three letters hidden somewhere in the house.

Based on my not-so-loving wife's previous filing system, I headed into our bedroom to the cheap, temporary bookshelf she'd set up against the wall on her side of the bed.

In the space of five minutes I found three more letters. I couldn't even muster a sense of horror that she kept them in our bedroom. That she made so little effort to conceal them. Did she read them while I showered in our ensuite? Did she use them to get herself hot before I made love to her? She'd shown herself to be such a brazen bitch of a slut nothing she did would surprise me anymore. I realized I didn't really know her at all. The girl I thought I'd married would never have done the things she had. That knowledge breached the pain already enveloping me to pierce a new wound into my heart. My wife was a stranger to me.

The last letter, dated only a week ago, shocked me out of my numbed state. It took several attempts to read it in its entirety as my vision kept blurring. I couldn't believe I'd actually read its contents correctly. It was too perverse, too cruel. And while blood roared in my ears I re-read it yet again, needing to confirm my mind hadn't conjured the words from some dark unmentionable place.

God, baby, you've got me so hot for you! Are you serious? Do you really want me to impregnate you? Man, the idea of you having my baby and getting old Danny Boy to raise it has my cock as hard as titanium. You are the nastiest, sexiest woman I've ever known, Claire-Bear. Nobody turns me on like you do.

Dear sweet Lord. She wanted Zack to father our kids. I'd been asking her when we could start our family since our fifth wedding anniversary. I longed to be a father. Each year I'd asked and each year she'd fobbed me off saying we—which really meant she—wasn't ready. She gave me all the expected excuses: we needed more time to be secure in our respective careers, we needed to be more financially stable, we needed to be in a house rather than an apartment. I addressed each roadblock she put up, and, finally, after our ninth anniversary she committed herself to us trying after our tenth—a week away. It was something I'd planned to remind her of at our celebratory dinner. This can't be true. Oh my God it can't be true. But it was. It was there in black and white. His letter confirming her words, her plans, her desires.

I was too stunned to even feel pain at the revelation. Or perhaps, more accurately, I was already in so much pain, this final blow was felt as a mere deepening of my existing agony.

Like an unwanted commercial break, I saw the scenario play out in my head. I imagined her sharing the news with him that their screwing had born fruit. That she was pregnant and he was going to be a daddy.

He'd kiss her, of that I was sure. And hug her, too, but would his face be a picture of joy or would he merely look triumphant because he'd won yet another victory over me? If he looked triumphant would he hide that from her? Or would she share in his victorious gloating?

I'd always pictured myself in the moment she shared such momentous news with me as my being like the guys in a sappy romcom movie—emotional, proud, happy. But I wasn't part of the movie. Not really. I was the foil. The stooge.

Zack had stolen my lines, my role, my future. The news, the hugs, the kisses, the twirling her in my arms, both of us brimming with happiness. It was meant to be my role. My part. All of it. I'd waited for years for her to be ready. What had Zack ever waited for? Who had he loved and nurtured and supported? Who had he sacrificed and compromised for? No one. Not one damn soul.

Perhaps, she'd never have been ready with me because she never wanted me to father her children. That possibility cut through the fog of pain to pierce a new wound.

Why did I choose to read the first letter? Why had I succumbed to my curiosity? Had I resisted, I could have remained in ignorant bliss. God, how longed to be in ignorance. I squeezed my eyes shut tightly as if to block out my new reality. I wanted my old reality. The one where I believed my wife loved me and only me. The one where I was happy.

Now, I was saddled with excruciating awareness, drowning in overwhelming pain. Now, I had to make decisions. Tough decisions. Now, I was faced with the knowledge my whole marriage had been one big lie. One huge farce. A sham. Now, I knew the last twelve years of my life had been wasted. I'd been made a fool of day in and day out for our entire relationship. My love had been squandered on someone who didn't appreciate or respect it, and most definitely didn't deserve it. Now, I knew I'd been used and deceived for God only knew what reason. No vow, no promise, no words of love had been true. None of it. All lies and deceit.

Image after image, like a film reel of favorite moments skimmed across my mind. Claire laughing up at me. Claire smiling. Her tears the day I'd gone on bended knee and asked her to marry me. Claire sleeping, the face of an angel. Claire's hand in mine, her face as I made love to her. Lies. All lies.

Who was this woman? What had I ever done to her to make her hate me so much? For hate me she must. No one could do the things she had without being filled with absolutely loathing for their victim.

I sat back, sipping the brandy, trying to reconcile the woman portrayed in Zack's letters to the woman I'd known and loved. My lacerated heart didn't want me examine things further but my brain defiantly set about trying to unravel the riddle. I couldn't seem to switch it off. It was determined to find an explanation. It couldn't live with the unanswered questions. The why and how and where. Mostly, the why.