Simply Complicated (5 page)

One evening while he was working late Susan showed up at his office. He was surprised to see her. Fortunately for him, everyone else had gone.

“Hey baby. I thought since you were too busy to meet me for lunch that I would bring you dinner,” she offered, holding up two takeout bags.

“Thanks for the kind gesture, but it wasn’t necessary for you to bring me food. I have dinner waiting for me when I get home,” he said with a slight attitude. He wasn’t sure how to act. She was pleasant, but he was annoyed at her presumptuous behavior.

Ken thought it a bit odd that she dropped by without calling and openly took a chance that no one would be there but him. He was a little worried about her unannounced visit and didn’t try to hide it.

She could sense that he was a bit disturbed so she tried to make light of her visit. “I get the sense that you’re mad at me. I didn’t mean to make you upset,” she said.

“It’s just that I didn’t expect you to stop by without calling,” he replied.

“You’re right. I should have called. Forgive me?” she said, pouting a bit.

“I forgive you,” he answered.

“So shall we eat or do I have to take all of this back home and eat it alone?” she asked playfully.

“Of course we can eat together. Pull up a chair.”

As they ate dinner, they started getting reacquainted.

“How’s your family doing? Did Monica enjoy her vacation?” Susan asked.

She never mentioned their having sex. He could not believe she was avoiding the topic.

“Everyone is doing well,” he replied.

Her next move shocked him. She leaned over and kissed him. When he began kissing her back, she pulled away and started removing his pants, trying to give him extra special attention.

He was speechless as well as pleased. This was one of the fantasies that he told her about. When she finished she took a handkerchief out of her purse, wiped her mouth, and cleaned him off.

He sat there mesmerized. She then kissed him and on her way out the door told him to think about her when he went to sleep that night.

He was unable to concentrate on work after that so he decided to go home. He was hoping he could have sex with his wife to finish what Susan had started.

When he arrived home, Monica was in bed asleep with Marci lying next to her again. He was disappointed to find her in their bed. He was growing tired of coming home and finding Marci there; this had become a regular routine. Whenever he saw Marci in their room, he knew he and Monica would not have sex that night. It had been months since they had been intimate.

He often mentioned that Marci needed to be in her own bed so they could have more privacy. But it seemed as if Monica was more content with having their daughter sleep with them than having sex with him.

The next few nights Ken found himself constantly thinking about Susan. One night when he was supposed to be working, he decided to call her to see if she wanted to have dinner. She explained that she had already cooked dinner because she was expecting company.

When Ken expressed his disappointment, she offered to cancel her plans and told him to come right over. She decided that she was going to use all of her tricks to win him over. In her mind, she was going to make all of his fantasies come true.

From that night forward, they started seeing each other regularly. He began lying to Monica about working late just so he and Susan could spend some time together. The more time he spent with her the less he spent with his family.

In his mind their relationship was just sexual but Susan believed they were a committed couple.

Their relationship had gone on for nearly fifteen months without incident. Ken had come to expect Susan to be available whenever he wanted to see her. She stopped seeing other men because she believed he was going to leave his wife for her. She thought her plan had worked. She finally had Ken.

Initially when she suggested Ken leave Monica, he would change the subject. As time passed, Susan would not let him get away with avoiding her question.

He would tell her that he was working on it. She often told him that she had fallen in love with him. Instead of replying that he loved her, he would kiss her passionately each time she said it. He had developed some feelings for her but was not in love with her.

Susan had no idea that he never intended to leave his family. He only told her what she wanted to hear so she would remain quiet and he could still get what he desired from her.

Ken was enjoying the best of both worlds: a beautiful, sensual, and caring wife and a fiery, explosive mistress. His dreams had come true and the best part of it all was that he was able to keep his relationship with Susan a secret.

He believed he had everything under control. He thought he knew Susan very well and didn’t believe she would create any problems. He had no real idea of the type of woman Susan really was or what she was capable of.

Susan was a twenty-seven-year-old middle-school teacher. Because of her looks and figure, she never had any problems getting a man, but she was never able to keep one. Whenever a man showed her a little interest or they shared a casual fling, she assumed they were in a committed relationship. She had a history of calling men often and becoming angry when they did not reciprocate. Her behavior would become increasingly erratic and she would leave nasty voicemail messages.

She had never been married. The only serious relationship she had was in college with Tony. Their relationship lasted nearly two years.

She and Tony met when she was a freshman and he was a junior. He played basketball and all the girls wanted him. When he saw Susan he was instantly attracted to her. They were inseparable until she became pregnant at the end of her sophomore year. She wanted to keep the baby but Tony did not.

He was about to graduate and was being drafted into the NBA. She decided to have an abortion and never told anyone other than him. Their relationship ended and Susan was never quite the same. Tony joined the NBA and he never spoke to Susan again.

After graduating from college, she moved to Chicago and started teaching. She never viewed men the same way after Tony. She tried very hard to please the men she got involved with by doing everything she thought would keep them satisfied.

Since she typically slept with men shortly after meeting them, they only viewed her as someone to spend time with when their girlfriends or wives had them on sexual lockdown. Unfortunately for Susan, by the time she realized that the men she dated only wanted her for sex and not a full relationship, she had already fallen for them.

After years of following this painful, predictable pattern, Susan decided that the next man she got involved with—married or single—was not going to use her like all the other men had done.

She was determined to not let him easily walk away. She would do whatever was needed to get him to see that she would make a good wife. She decided that she was going to take control of the relationship and not let him dominate it as she allowed men to do in the past.

Ken was not the first married man she had been involved with. Her friend Jeff was married. She was preparing to go after him and try to break up his marriage when she met Ken.

When she first saw Ken at the restaurant with his friends she resolved that she was going to get him. Not only was he handsome, she could tell he had money.

She believed once she could get him to talk to her that she would be able to reel him in. Everything was working according to her plan.

In her mind, Susan finally had a man of her own. She gave Ken keys to her apartment and began buying his favorite foods so he would feel at home at her place.

She purchased his personal items for her place and a pair of pajamas for when he spent the night. She began talking about Ken at work with her colleagues. Most of her co-workers had no idea he was married.

She often bragged about how he was going to leave his wife for her. She even claimed she was the only woman that turned him on sexually. That he wished he had met her before getting married.

Ken did not know she was telling others about their affair. He had not revealed their secret, although Monica was starting to suspect something was different about him.

One evening when he and Susan had plans, he called her to cancel because Monica had been complaining about their lack of time together and he did not want to raise any suspicions.

Susan became angry. She could not believe he was choosing his wife over her. She felt betrayed and told him so. He could tell she was angry and explained he had no other choice and would call her later.

She began to cry.
I bet he hasn’t told her that he’s leaving her for me. I know one thing. When I call him he better see me after his dinner with her or there will be hell to pay,
she thought.

She was shocked that her call went straight to voicemail.

So he’s not going to answer my call. Okay. I see how he wants to play,
she raged.

She left him a threatening message.

“Ken, you need to call me back when you get this message. I know you saw my name on the caller id. I would hate to have to call you at home,”
she said.

When he failed to call her back after an hour, she called him again. He still did not answer.

After calling him obsessively for several hours on his cellular phone, she decided to try his home phone.

When the voicemail came on she thought about leaving a message but changed her mind. After she hung up she realized she had forgotten to block her number prior to calling and now he would know she called his house.

He and Monica arrived home about two hours after Susan called. Normally Monica would check the messages and the caller id. This time she asked Ken to check because she was helping Marci take off her coat and wanted to get her bathed and into bed.

As he listened to the messages, he came across Susan’s call. When he heard the dial tone on the answering machine, he decided to check the caller id to see who had called and hung up.

When he saw Susan Johnson’s name appear on the caller id he became angry and started to panic.

What would have happened if Monica had checked the caller id or answered the phone?
He could not believe Susan had called his house knowing his wife was in town.

When she and Marci went to bed, he checked the voice messages on his cellular phone. As soon as he turned on his phone, it started beeping indicating that he had some messages. His first message was from Jake. The next several were from Susan.

“Hello Ken, I hate to bother you while you’re having dinner with your wife but I need for you to call me,”
said Susan in the first message.

“Hello Ken, why are you avoiding my call? I need for you to call me back right away. You know who this is,”
she pleaded in the second message.

“Ken, stop playing. Why are you doing this? Don’t blow me off like that. Why haven’t you told Monica about us? I advise you to call me if you know what’s best,”
she yelled in the final message.

Ken became very angry that she would threaten him like that. He could tell she was getting out of control. He knew he had to come up with a plan to contain her.