I waited a few minutes. I approached the front door in something of a quandary about what to do next. Two events decided my next course of action, one I was hearing the sounds of feminine sexual activity, and the door seemed to be not fully closed. I pushed the door, and it freely swung open. The living room was dark, but I still could make out Susan's dress and purse casually dropped on the sofa. In the first bedroom, the tall dude and Cassie were fucking like there was no tomorrow. I slipped my phone out and recorded a sample of their activity. By now, I had recognized the guy as the bass player shown in the string quartet online playbill. Even louder sounds were emanating from the second bedroom. Here, the violinist and violist were engaging Susan in a sandwiched double penetration. All of the players were oblivious to my presence. After taking a sample on my phone of the activity in the second bedroom, I decided to see if there would be a changing of partners. I hid in the coat closet near the entrance, and sure enough, the guys traded places. Once they were fully engaged, I took some film of Susan and the bass player. The bass player's endowment was of porn star dimensions, and Susan seemed to be on board with everything he did to her, as I faithfully recorded. On my way out, I also took a sampling of Cassie and her DP partners.

I went home, relieved the babysitter and went into our shared office to translate the video images from my phone to the cloud and then to both my work computer and my personal laptop. I then showered and went to bed although I fully intended to stay awake until I at least knew what time Susan returned to what I had once thought of as our love nest. Around two, I became aware of Susan's return. She was surprised when I turned the bedside lamp on, as I had parked my car behind the house rather than in its usual garage parking place.

She exclaimed, "Mason, you're home!"

I said, "Yes, did the concert run late?" as I noted her tousled hair, rumpled dress, and smeared lipstick.

Quick as a CEO, she replied, "Yes, I went over to Cassie's place for a nightcap."

I responded, "Not exactly the usual nightcap, was it?"

She asked, "What do you mean, Mason?"

I explained, "It appeared to me that you were fully enjoying the string quartet other than the cello player, or did you have a round with her after I left your afterparty."

She appeared shocked, "You were there?"

I confessed, "I was there, but you seemed quite involved, so I left and came home."

She started crying, "Oh, no!"

I admitted, "I did take some video, if you're interested."

She continued, "Oh, Mason, I'm so sorry."

I inquired, "Do you want to talk about it, Susan?"

She replied, "I'm exhausted. Let's talk about it tomorrow. Mason, I love you. This doesn't have to mean anything for us."

I responded, "I'm not so sure about that, but I can wait for tomorrow."

The next morning, I started off with a divorce attorney and a PI. The PI visited the SMU campus and found a guy who had second-hand information about the previous night's concert. The guy's roommate had attended the concert, which had a bar. It seems that a beautiful blonde had danced in her undies in the later stages of the concert.

I had never thought of Bach as being dance music, but I also had never been a big fan of classical music. The PI was following up to see if he could obtain video of Susan's performance. The attorney was quite happy with my videos, and said this definitely is fuel for a custody battle. It took him two days, but the PI finally located an undergrad that had caught part of Susan's performance on cell phone video.

My attorney was ecstatic, she told me we were now set to 'burn the bitch's butt.' I almost fell in love with my attorney who wasn't quite the looker Susan was, but close enough.

The night after Susan's 'performance', we sat at our dinner table and talked. It wasn't a pleasant experience for either of us. She told me about her frustrations at work and with my being out of town so much, but she might just as well have said, "Blah, blah, blah,...." I just was no longer interested in her excuses. If I was to benefit from her regrets or reforms, it would be post-divorce. I felt like she was in a bad place both from work and home, but it was mostly her own doing. I just didn't feel like I could be a pillar of support for her and at the same time tolerate her infidelity. It was clear to me, if not to her, that she was a serial cheater, and future escapades were no longer a matter of if, but only when. I gave her the hard talk.

I told her, "I realize that you are depressed from things not going well at CCSB, as well as your personal life seeming to crumble, although I think you are not entirely blameless in either case. It may seem to you like you are at the bottom, but I think you can bring yourself back up. I need to caution you that no one else can do it for you, although counseling may help you deal with at least some of the issues in your personal and professional lives. I hope you are successful, and I am not ruling out our getting back together; however, I think that for now, a divorce is just a formal recognition of the current condition of our relationship."

She replied, "So there's nothing I can do in the short term to keep us together."

I told her, "We're at the point now of resolving child custody issues. In your current condition, you're not the person I fell in love with, nor the person I married."

She responded, "That's harsh, but all too true. I understand what I have to do for us and for myself."

I explained, "Take care of yourself first, then you can think about us."

We decided in conference with our attorneys on a joint custody arrangement. Life went on. I dated but it would not be easy to replace Susan in my heart or in my mind. We communicated regularly but it was mostly about our children. I bought a house nearby and we pretty much shared custody equally. I made sure that the schools were the same for both our residences, although the children did have to ride different buses when they weren't attending the same school.

Two years passed after our divorce, and both our companies were becoming even more successful than before. CCSB seemed to finally be achieving its potential under Susan's leadership. At Spindletop, our experiment with the truck stop/travel centers was still going gangbusters, as we continued to rapidly expand, constrained only be management and financing. Even Good Sleep Hotels was exhibiting improved performance, and we bought a few existing hotels in new markets.

On the personal front, Susan seemed to have an improved outlook and was doing a good job with the children. We had a few disagreements over caring for our children and they were all minor and quickly resolved. I realized that I had been hurt by her licentious behavior, I also had a few counseling sessions to help me move forward in spite of her infidelity. We occasionally shared a meal with the children and were even able to discuss common CEO problems.

Professionally, I was beginning to look for acquisitions, as our network of truck stop/travel centers seemed to be filling in the remaining gaps on the interstates nicely. I felt that once we covered the major interstates, further expansion would likely meet the limits of diminishing returns.

I thought there might be some possibilities with merging some regional food market chains. One of the best run supermarket chains in the country was family-owned and the current generation of managers was past retirement age. The next younger generation had never shown interest in the grocery business. I convinced them that they could monetize their gains by merging with Spindletop. I hired a few managers from large national chains. Once they had their feet on the ground, we felt we had a model that could be profitably applied nationwide. We were able to make offers that couldn't be refused for two publicly traded regional grocery chains. The concept was to run the two new companies with the same principles that had led to great success with the privately held company. We merged the three chains into one entity Maximum Value Supermarkets.

Then we bought out America's Own Food Distributors, Inc. The privately held company had a high degree of vertical integration. The two publicly held chains did not. Having our own food distributor would help bridge that gap. America's Own not only had other regional chains as clients, but also serviced restaurants, hospitals, and other food purveyors. EverythingUNeed was a customer. We thought the real jewel in America's Own might be Your Food Supply Company, a warehouse style food distributor that not only served as a wholesale outlets for restaurants and small groceries and convenience stores but also serviced the retail consumer in competition with supermarkets but at lower prices due to the warehouse approach. Although Your Food Supply only had a few locations in the mountain states, we were confident that we could take it national.

Spindletop Financial was instrumental in securing the financing needed to upgrade the Maximum Value Supermarkets from the two previously publicly traded chains and the nationwide expansion of Your Food Supply. Another asset from this round of acquisitions was the knowledge of America's Own and Maximum Value concerning other grocery chains that might be ripe for acquisition.

Although Susan and I were developing a collegial friendship as well as a partnership in raising the children, I had to admit to myself that I no longer loved her. Although I had started dating and had occasional overnight guests, I hadn't developed any relationships that could develop into marital sharing. I began to talk about things I had done with other women when we shared a meal with the children. The only knowledge of the children about my dating was from half heard phone calls and the occasional bumping into someone at a grocery store or restaurant. I felt like Susan was growing to accept the fact that we would never again have a marital relationship. I was experiencing great professional success but only moderate personal success.

Then I found a real gem. A fourth-generation descendant of the founder of the privately-owned grocery chain was managing an outlier store. I was there with Maximum Value executives who were wrestling with expanding operations or terminating operations since the store was not economical in terms of vertical integration, because of the distances involved, since it wasn't located near any of our other stores. There was hesitation because the store continued to be very profitable. Maxine Trumbull was in her mid-twenties, unmarried and running a marvelous operation, according not only to my subjective view but the opinions of the Maximum Value executives based largely on objective measures.

I chatted with her about her management philosophies. I ended our discussion by telling her that she was fired. She had an excellent store management team several of which were capable of running the store. I told her to pack her bags and come to Dallas. I wasn't sure what she was going to do in our corporate office but I believed her talents indicated she was being way under-utilized as a store manager, even though it was one of the more successful stores in our Maximum Value chain. Her first responsibility I decided on the spur of the moment would be to work in the Maximum Value CEO's office on planning the expansion of the retail stores and distribution infrastructure to support them in the metro area for which her store was on the periphery. We would be sending trainloads of supermarket items to a distribution center rather than truckloads to individual stores.

Maxine

I don't know why but Mason McLemore was the most attractive hunk of man I had ever seen. He had a subtle way of exuding power and influence. I had never gotten wet just by meeting someone. I knew that the Maximum Value executives, following him into my store, had more to do with my future than he did. But once I met him, it was like everyone else was in black and white. Even better was his taking an interest in all aspects of my store's operations. I knew that I had trained my people well and they performed like the highly competent performers I knew them to be.

I was stunned when he announced that he was firing me. I thought everything on his visit had gone perfectly. He explained that I was only being fired as store manager and that he wanted me to pack my bags and come to Dallas to work with his top executive team in the corporate office. He explained that temporarily I would be a special assistant to someone, but long-term I would be a line manager in a much higher and more highly compensated position than the one I currently occupied. He followed my recommendations for promoting some of my team members to cover the gap created by my no longer being store manager.

Being single and childless, there were no problems with me picking up and leaving on a moment's notice. I didn't bother with my furniture. I had received over fifty million dollars of Spindletop stock when my company was merged into Maximum Value so I was unconcerned with whether my current furniture was retrieved or if I bought new when I had a permanent dwelling in Dallas. I was one of almost one hundred descendants of the founder of my former employer and received less than one percent of the Spindletop stock exchanged for ownership of what had been our company.

He explained that I would be planning the expansion of the Maximum value footprint in the metropolitan area that my former store was peripherally located in. I was put in a small office in the floor below the top management executive suite, but I still saw that handsome man almost daily. He would frequently inquire if I had everything I needed and if I was making good progress and I always told him yes to both questions. His actions made me feel that I was doing very important work. He still was having the effect on me of making everything else around him seem like it was in black and white.

It was exciting work, requiring me to study large amounts of data concerning competition and customer demand in each store's market area. He asked me for plans for twenty-five stores. It took me less than three weeks to work out what I thought was an optimum distribution of stores. However, there were only twenty-four stores in my solution. I decided to go for broke and plan a second distribution center and corresponding retail store network. I was becoming more efficient and so was able to efficiently do the preliminary planning for the eighteen stores which would be serviced by the second distribution center. I spent the last day and a half before my scheduled Friday afternoon presentation preparing slides with a few video clips for the very important, at least to me, presentation.

I was a little tense when I began my presentation but became more at ease as the presentation evolved. There were a few questions, but everyone seemed to be on board with what I had done. Then came the crucial part of the presentation. I pointed out that the twenty-four stores I had located in my presentation were not up to the twenty-five I had been asked to plan for. I then introduced the second distribution center with its eighteen additional stores, providing good coverage of the parts of the metro area not well covered by the first distribution center and its network of stores. There was a silence when I finished and asked if there were any further questions; I hoped the silence was from surprise, not approbation. Then, it was okay as I answered questions about why there were two distribution centers and why they weren't servicing equal areas. I was well prepared to answer and took a deep breath as I concluded my presentation with a request for additional questions. Instead, I received what sounded like almost thunderous applause from the twelve seated executives, including HIM. When the applause finally stopped, I was blushing, but proud of myself. HE told me it was an amazing presentation. The executives in charge of Maximum Value were almost as laudatory as he was. I was happy to sit down and gather up my backup documents.

Chapter 6.

Maxine

After my presentation HE lingered behind as the other executives filed out. He asked if I would be available for him to buy me dinner in congratulation for a job well done. I immediately accepted since I had nothing planned for my Friday night. Even if I had had a date or other social engagement I would still have accepted.

I was elated and excited beyond belief. Mason had asked me out. Maybe it wasn't exactly a date, but it was good enough for me. I told him I wanted to shower and change. He agreed to pick me up at seven. As seven approached the intensity of my preparations and my arousal increased. I couldn't believe how wet I was. I thought of masturbating but I wanted to spend the time getting ready. I went for dressing as sexy as I could while trying to stop just short of being slutty. I knew exactly what I wanted and I hoped that if I didn't get it tonight I would make some progress in reaching my goal.

During dinner we discussed a lot of things, including how I liked Dallas, did I miss my store, did I enjoy working in the headquarters office, and how great my presentation was. We sat in the attached bar after dinner, and he told me he thought he had found my successor. That was exciting but that had not been my objective. I went for it and kissed him as deeply as I felt I could. I could tell he was surprised, but he quickly recovered and demonstrated that amongst his many skills was knowing exactly how I liked to be kissed. Again, I went for the gold, and on the third kiss, I explored the contents of his pants. I was not disappointed with what I found. It seemed that his equipment was fully aroused and quite large; it must have been more than seven inches.

He suggested that we go to his home for a nightcap. I accepted, even though my main objective was not a nightcap. We drove into a large underground garage containing I'm guessing a dozen vehicles of various shapes and sizes. We smooched as an elevator lifted us to a living area. He started up a gas fireplace and said make yourself comfortable. I sat on a pillow in front of the fireplace and told him that I'd like a glass of sweet white wine. He moved a coffee table behind me and joined me on another of the pillows and throws scattered among the overstuffed chairs, couches, and love seats throughout the large living room. This guy knew how to live. He joined me on the floor and soon we were kissing and rolling around on the carpet. The white, deep pile carpet was as nice as a bed as he kissed me, caressed me, and made me feel very good. Soon we were shedding clothes. Ours was not a fiery passion, more of a slowly rising, steamy romance. He asked me if I would like to see his bedroom. I acquiesced and we spread the rest of our clothes on the way to the master bedroom.

I wanted only one thing, which was to be with this man, who had made an impression on me like no other. In spite of that he was very gentle and considerate. We laid on his bed and loved each other. We kissed, caressed, and fondled each other until I was about to orgasm. When he started not biting me but his teeth and tongue around my nipples I did cum. He then licked his way down my body to my honey pot. Almost as soon as he sucked my clit, my body was shaking in another delightful climax. I knew this was going to be a night like no other as I felt like he had touched, licked, and sucked most of my body parts. He had used his tongue on me like no one else, first on my nipples, now on my clitoris. At the same time, he was exploring the interior of my pussy with three of his fingers. Soon the in and out of his fingers and the rubbing of my button with his tongue was taking me to a place where I had never been before. The orgasms kept coming in rapid succession. Was this the continuous orgasms some of my sorority sisters had told me about. All I knew was that I didn't want it to stop.