Chapter 1

On the wall above the television set hung a picture that Susan cherished. It depicted a young man in his prime, an athlete, a handsome, eighteen-year-old hunk with a body that would wet the crotch of any female. He wore a high school football uniform, number seven, and was posing on the field in front of the goal post with a pigskin in one hand as if he was going to throw it. He was a quarterback. Through his helmet could be seen the laughing eyes and cocky smile that Susan had fallen in love with. She missed those eyes, missed that youthful, confident smile. She missed everything about that young man, most especially his body. He was dead now. He had been dead since the day she married him, some thirteen years ago.

A loud belch interrupted Susan's quiet remembrances of him. She turned her attention to the slug now inhabiting her living room sofa. Howard Keller now looked nothing like the younger version of himself depicted in the photograph.

At thirty-six, his hair was thinning and he had gained a paunch. His once hard, bulging muscles had all melted into flab. The most exercise he got now was getting up to go to the refrigerator or the toilet. He sat now with one hand clutching a beer can and another buried in a bowl of pretzels. It was Sunday and he was watching the Raiders game on television. He spared not a single glance for his sexy ex-cheerleader wife standing nearby.

"Howard, I'm horny," she said to the sofa slug.

Apparently, he didn't hear her. "Throw the fucking ball, you idiot!" he yelled at the television screen, spitting out pretzel crumbs. "Throw the fucking ball! Can't you see the guy's wide open?"

Susan sighed, half in resignation, half in frustration. She wore an outfit she had bought the day before in hopes of arousing her husband's interest. It was all flimsy red silk, lace, garter belts, and nylon stockings. More skin was showing than not. The girl at the counter had said that lingerie was the surest way to a man's loins, so she had decided to give it a try, along with a bottle of pricey perfume that cost damn near fifty dollars an ounce. So far, her expensive investment was not paying off.

"Howard, look at me. Do you notice anything different? Anything at all?"

Her husband rose to his feet and raised his arm high in the air, sloshing some of his beer onto the carpet. "Yeeeaaah!" he shouted. However, this utterance was not directed at his wife, but at the television set. The quarterback had finally found the open man. "Now run with the ball you skinny-ass receiver. Run with it! Go, go, go, go, go!"

Susan's frustration was now turning into vexation. Her husband would have shrunk from the look she gave him, if he had bothered to notice it at all. Susan didn't like to spend money to get all dolled up and then be ignored. The truth was that she was a beautiful woman. At thirty-five she retained all of her youthful curves. She had not fallen out of shape in the intervening years. Her face, showing few age lines, was still very pretty, her breasts still firm and ripe, her waist still narrow, and her legs were still long and slender and sensuously curved, marred by not an ounce of cellulite. A long mane of auburn hair, never once cut since late childhood, cascaded down her back to almost touch her gorgeous round ass, which was covered only by the thong of her dainty red panties. There was an intense yearning behind those panties which demanded to be satisfied.

"Howard, will you listen to me? I would like to talk to you about sex. As your wife, I think I deserve it."

But Howard's eyes remained glued to the boob tube. The receiver was making a long run toward the end zone. He was running as if his ass was on fire. It looked like no one was going to stop him. Excitement was mounting in Howard.

"Go, baby! Go, baby! Yeah, go!"

Annoyed now, Susan did something that was potentially dangerous. She stepped in front of the television screen. Her shapely white thighs now blocked her husband's line of sight.

"Howard," she began, choosing her words carefully for maximum impact, "I want—"

Horrified, enraged, Howard roared. He roared like a lion deprived of its prey. He did not like anyone standing between him and the fulfillment of a good play.

"What do you think you're doing?" he yelled. "Out of the way! Out of the way!"

Howard got up and shoved his wife aside. Kneeling down, he glued his face to the screen and watched his man run the final few yards and score.

"Yeah!" he hollered. He jumped to his feet and danced around the living room, sloshing more beer around. "Yeeeeaaaah! Clive Baumgard, you shithead, you owe me one hundred and twenty bucks! One hundred and twenty bucks! Fork it over, asshole!"

Susan Keller did not hang around long enough to watch her husband do his own version of the receiver's victory shuffle. She grabbed her purse, her car keys, and a jacket to throw over her near-nakedness and walked out the door.

Howard Keller didn't even hear it slam.