Goose & Gander

I had kind of figured that she would be supportive, maybe. What I hadn't counted on was her swearing herself to our cause!

"Thank you, Janet!" Cynthia said, hugging her soon-to-be ex-mother-in-law.

"Anytime, sugar." Janet said with a smile. "Do you think Phil will take my Divorce case?" She asked me when Cynthia sat back down.

"I think he could be persuaded." I nodded and smiled. "Mrs. Greene..."

"Janet, Cal. You should know that by now." She admonished me with a matronly smile.

"Ok, Janet, I hope you don't think less of me for taking up with Cynthia here." I said, a bit apprehensive of how she would see this arrangement.

"Nonsense, Cal!" She laughed. "You two deserve to be happy, and with what Julee and Jimmy did to you two, I have a feeling that making each other happy is in the cards for you two."

Now, I KNOW I could have sued Jimmy, his father, and possibly even both of his uncles for Alienation of Affection, but why bother? It's a shit lawsuit, most of the time, and damn near impossible to prove. No, what I had in mind for Jimmy and his father was much, MUCH worse. After all my investigation into the hows, whys, and wherefores, I had established that Mayor Greene, in collusion with his son, had conspired to break up my marriage. Procurement was one charge that I was thinking of filing, as well as solicitation by proxy. The Judge, while having knowledge, was only guilty of not telling me what I needed to know.

Julee would have nothing to do with Jimmy, and moved out of town shortly after our divorce was final. Her boss had gotten her a good job in another town with an old friend of his from law school. She had followed my advice, and un-assed the A/O before the Shitstorm destroyed the fan.

Bart cooperated with me fully on everything, and apologized to his sister for his part in what had happened. He confirmed my suspicions finally that Mayor Greene himself had told him that if he didn't go along with Jimmy's plan, he would lose his job as Sheriff, and be replaced by an idiot of the Mayor's choosing. No matter his faults, Bart has ALWAYS been a damn good Sheriff. Any replacement handpicked by Mayor Greene would be a detriment to the Force.

And so it came to pass that one night, Bart and Janet were sitting down to dinner with Cynthia and me, and we had some damn good fried chicken, cooked by Cyn herself. Yes, she's amazing in bed AND she can cook! And Jimmy gave her up for Julee?! Well, no accounting for taste, sometimes.

After dinner, while having some beer, we went over the plan. I outlined the basics, and told them that the timetable was being pushed back slightly so Mayor Greene could be Served with the Divorce papers first. This whole town was about to get a fuckin' enema.

The first order of business was to check in with Phil and see what his P.I. had been able to dig up. I called him up, and the report was good. He'd managed to gather a LOT of dirt on our illustrious Mayor and his shithead son.

Janet went through some self-recrimination about how she'd raised Jimmy, but after we assured her that he was His Father's Son, she finally relented. I couldn't blame her, really. She told us of how her husband had changed over the years, and gone from a kind, wonderful man into a sleazy tyrant. I thought of that old saying. "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts, absolutely." It fit with Mayor Greene and how he ran our town.

What it boiled down to in the end was that, with his son as his proxy, he had shown everyone that no woman was immune to them. I felt badly for Julee when I found out about that tidbit. The conversation on the tape made me sick to my stomach as Phil played it for us in his office.

Mayor Greene: Just divorce her, Jimmy. Give the bitch what she wants, and I'll get her out of town.

Jimmy: But dad, she just doesn't get to divorce me! She's mine to do with as I please!

Mayor: Jimmy, let's cut our losses here. People are starting to talk, and we need to sweep this away as soon as possible. Don't worry about Cal. I'm going to get him fired, and ran out of town on a rail. We need Cynthia to go with him. You've already fucked up enough.

Jimmy: How the fuck can you say that, dad?! You were the one who told me that Julee was primed and ready for me to fuck! You were the one who got Bart to give him extra hours and extra calls!

Mayor: Well, you were the one who let her get away.

Jimmy: I was in JAIL, in case you don't remember! How the fuck was I supposed to know that Cynthia was going to rat me out for correcting her! That bitch needs to die!

Mayor: Don't worry about Cynthia. I have plans for that bitch. You just worry about yourself, and lay low for a while.

Jimmy: Ok, dad. Just make sure she doesn't go through with this Divorce. Make it look like an accident.

Phil stopped the tape there. I looked at Cynthia and Janet, then to Bart.

"It's enough to prove conspiracy." Bart said, and Phil nodded in agreement. Bart then looked at me. "Want to do the honors, son?"

I grinned, and checked my Colt. "I would be honored, sir." I grinned. Then I looked at Cyn. "Sweetheart, stay here with Phil. Bart and I have some rabid dogs to put down."

Cynthia came into my arms and kissed me deeply, throwing her entire heart and soul into that kiss. "Be careful, baby." She whispered. "I love you."

"I love you too, sweetheart." I said, smiling at her reassuringly. "Don't worry. Bart and I got this."

We got into Bart's car outside Phil's office, and he hit the lights and siren as we flashed on over to the Mayor's Estate, where Jimmy was now living. On the way, he called Judge Reinhold (still no relation), and got a warrant for their arrests based on the P.I.'s wiretaps. Gotta love the Patriot Act.

When we got there, Mayor Greene was just finishing dinner with his son, and they didn't even hear us coming after Bart cut the siren. We pulled up in front of the mansion, and went in guns drawn. Bart proved that he still had it when he kicked in the door.

"What the hell is going on here?!" Mayor Greene demanded. Jimmy just had a look of pure terror on his face when he saw my .357 and Bart's .44 Single Action Army pointed at them. I kept Jimmy covered as Bart advanced and leveled charges.

"Frederick Greene, you and your son Jimmy Greene are hereby under arrest for Conspiracy to Commit Murder. You have the right to remain silent. If you choose to waive that right, anything you say can, and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an Attorney, and to have an Attorney present during questioning. Do you understand these rights as I have recited them to you?" Bart holstered his Colt and cuffed Fred behind his back, making sure the cuffs were good and snug, and the keyholes away from his hands. He then sat the Mayor down and covered Jimmy while I read him his rights and cuffed him too.

Once they were both cuffed and stuffed in the backseat of Bart's Charger, we flashed on back to the Station and processed them. Jimmy, in a rare show of brains, kept his dumbass mouth shut.

Once Fred was in the holding cell and Jimmy was in the Interrogation Room, I walked in with Cynthia beside me. I threw the paperwork down in front of him, and then played the tape of him basically confessing to have his wife murdered.

Jimmy listened to all of it, then paled considerably. Every drop of blood turned to ice in his veins as he realized how inextricably deep he was in The Shit.

"Th.. That's not admissible in Court!" He tried.

"That doesn't matter, Jimmy." I shrugged. "What matters around here is the Court of Public Opinion. If we invoke the Patriot Act, having suspicions of you and your father harboring domestic terrorists, and show Homeland this conversation, it could easily be misconstrued as planning an execution as an act of terror." I was laying it on thick now, but I was having a shitload of fun doing it!

"What do you want me to do?" He asked, broken. He knew we had him bent over a barrel, and he knew he was going to get the Big Green Weenie, with no lube and sandpaper condom if he didn't play ball.

"Once your lawyer gets here, you are going to sign this paper, giving Cynthia everything. He is going to witness it, and then it's going to the judge. The Judge is going to give Cynthia everything. You will be going to prison for Spousal Battery, and then you will get out and get on with your life, such as it will be. Do you understand how this is going to go down?" I asked, and he just nodded in reply. It felt damn good to see Golden Boy brought down a few dozen pegs. "Jimmy, if you hadn't gotten it into your head to seduce my wife, none of this would have happened. You fucked with the wrong man's wife, asshole."

"Man, I'm sorry!" He cried, for the first time I'd ever seen. Jimmy Greene was CRYING! I looked at Cynthia, and she looked at me, and our expressions were pure shock. Then we shared a smile and looked back at the sobbing, bawling, apologizing Jimmy Greene.

"Shut up, Jimmy." Cynthia snapped. "You and your shithead father were going to kill me! You're just sorry you got fucking CAUGHT!"

That snapped Jimmy back out of his funk, as he FINALLY realized how fucked he was, and his brain pretty much shut down. He just stared at the wall between where Cyn and I were sitting.

When his lawyer arrived, I played the tape for him, and he closed his eyes and let out an exasperated sigh. When I outlined my plan to send it to the local News stations, and even to the Big Networks, he managed to get Jimmy out of his self-imposed catatonic state and have him sign the Divorce Papers.

We had the same success with Fred Greene, and he signed without a fight once his lawyer arrived. And since we never put it in writing that we would withhold the evidence if they cooperated, we went ahead and sent copies of the tape to the News Stations, the Big Three Networks, and even one to Fox News, and then sent a copy to the State Attorney General's Office.

It was like a small thermonuclear device had gone off in our quiet little town. The News vans were everywhere, and Law Enforcement agencies ranging from State Troopers to the FBI inundated out little town, and the Motel Industry was thriving! For a small farming community, we were raking in the dough for the City Coffers, and it turned out to be a helluvalot of fun for all... except for Jimmy and Fred Greene.

The Feds dug deep, and found some shady Tax practices in Fred's past, and some strange shit in Jimmy's day to day dealings at City Hall. When the dust had finally settled, Bart was cleared of any wrongdoing, even though Jimmy and Fred tried to throw him under the bus about the Affair scandal, but he came out clean. Julee got subpoenaed to testify about the whole mess, and was slightly vilified by the News assholes, until I set the record straight, and painted her as a victim in this too. She was young, and naïve. I was asked in an interview if I would reconcile with her, to which I gave a firm No.

I wouldn't budge on that. Cynthia Got All of It in the Divorce from Jimmy, and Janet Got All of It in her Divorce from Fred.

For their parts in the Conspiracy, and other charges that the Feds found to throw at them, they ended up with some hefty prison time. They would likely die in prison once all the Guilty verdicts came back and the sentences handed down.

Cynthia and I got married, with her folks coming back into town for our wedding. Julee showed up, having been invited, and brought her new boyfriend along. I talked with the guy, and he was actually a good man! Go figure. I was actually happy for her.

Well, Jimmy found love again, as I heard it through the grapevine. His cellmate was a very large, yet very loving man, as it turned out. Jimmy's farts stopped making noise after his sixth month in the pen.

Jimmy's uncle, Judge Roy Greene, got investigated along with his brother and nephew, and the Feds found some irregularities with his cases and the verdicts he rendered. As it turned out, he was taking bribes and other nefarious activities. It also turned out that Alice had been the one to turn him in to the Feds. Gee, I wonder why. Anyway, he ended up in Club Fed after Alice took him to the cleaners in their divorce too.

As for Fred, the former Mayor, he went on to star in many prison musicals, usually singing the soprano parts.

Julee ended up marrying the boyfriend she brought to my and Cyn's wedding, and they live in the city now. Last I heard, she is having a baby. Good for her.

Bart retired, and is now living out his golden years with his wife. They're empty nesters now, and he still shows up at the office occasionally.

Me? I became Sheriff after our new Mayor was elected. Mayor Barton is a divorced lady who, when her ex-husband abused his power, stood up to him, thereby earning our town's trust. Yep, Janet took over her hubby's job, and appointed me Sheriff after Bart retired.

Now here I sit, several years after that fateful day when I got called away from Date Night with Julee, and here I am holding my baby son in my arms while a very pregnant Cynthia is feeding our two year old daughter, and life is good. We've turned the Guest Room into a nursery, and our toddler has her own room. We have four bedrooms, and Cynthia has already put her foot down that this will be the last kid. She's planning to get her tubes tied after this one pops out, or as she puts it. "The Baby Factory is closing down, but the playground will still be open."

I love my wife. Let me just get that out front right now... *grin*

The End