It had been a proper rubbish day because nothing had gone right from the very start. Paul felt as though all the bad luck and the people that came with it were out to make his day a misery. The car broke down on the way to work, it was then he remembered that his AA cover had not been renewed. The recovery man had charged him seventy-five pounds call out, and a further thirty for the repair, the man had been there no more than five minutes.
When he did get to work and stepped into his office, he noticed that the decorators had moved his desk about the room, and all his papers had got mixed up. He switched on the computer, and that immediately crashed, sending all his documents into the cyber graveyard.
He was glad when early morning lunch break came, so that he could get a break in the canteen. He had to have time to pull his fragile mind back together because things about him were getting out of control. At that moment in time he felt as though his world was falling to pieces leaving him in debris from all the disasters.
Shannon had in another way told him the same thing the previous evening just after sex. Her words had been that the two of them were getting into a rut, and only after just five years of marriage. She had told him in no uncertain terms, “That they had to find a way to bring back the uncertainty. Their life was getting very repetitive, and was almost like a well read book, things had to change and change fast. Their marriage was as if they had both been chased and caught, so they had both lay down, and let the inevitable monotony take over.”
Paul knew she was right of course and she had a valid point. The last two years it was work, sex and sleep, and it was only broken by the meals and parties in between. He always felt that he was on a schedule not being able to slip away at any time. Nothing ever changed just like their lives had been choreographed with everything lasting the same length of time every time.
Paul walked into the canteen, and sat down with a coffee with his normal cheese and tomato roll. He looked at them both on the table, and thought ‘even my food is repetition every day.’ He didn’t want company, but life is not always as you want it. Tom Davey sat down opposite him, “Hello Paul no ones sitting on this seat are they?”
Paul sarcastically stood up, and bent over the table looking down at the seat, “If they were, you would have squashed them.”
“Dear o dear, what’s got your back up today?”
Tom was a bigheaded sod, and always talking about his sexual conquests with the opposite sex. Paul never liked the man as he was always taking the credit for what Paul did. Shannon always told him, that he was too soft and he will get walked over by Tom Davey. The way Paul always put him down Shannon also said that he was jealous of Tom. He always denied it when she told him, but inside he knew she was correct making him upset for thinking that way. “I’ve been thinking about my life that’s on one big straight track with nothing but the horizon in front. It seems as though I’ve got stuck in the rut.”
“I don’t know your wife Paul but she must be feeling the same way for you to be stabbing yourself in the back. Is she at home all day cooking and stewing as they say, boredom and monotony will make housewives do strange things?”
“Listen to the man that’s not married, what would you know about what housewives do?”
“A lot more than you think I know Paul because I have been with more married women than single. I was up in Oxford last night putting some life back into a housewife’s life. Her husband is so obsessed with his business that he is never there to give her the sex and love she needs, so she called me on the phone.”
“Come off of it Tom that’s going a bit too far, why would she call you? She’s in Oxford and you’re in London. You must have known her for some time, how else would she get your number.”
“Through the magazine you idiot, I thought I told you I advertise in a contact mag.” He pulled out a small book, and handed it over to Paul, “Page thirty-six and the second column.” Paul picked up the book, and went to the page that he had been directed to look at, while this was happening Tom said; “Keep it I don’t need it any more” and stood up. “See you at dinner” he added, and then walked away from the table. Paul quickly read through the book, and turned to the page that Tom had pointed out. There it was in black and white, for the whole world to see. He put the book away and stood up smiling has he moved away from the table.
Paul walked back to his office feeling a little better, but the office was still chaotic. It was twelve noon before he got the computer working once more. By the time he walked out of the office for the last time it was all back too normal. On the way home he wondered what to have for a meal? He thought about a carry out Chinese but decided against it.
Shannon was the same age as he was, twenty-five, and she looked the same now as she did five years previous. Slim build but with the correct amount of chest pointing out, long raven black hair that trailed down her back. She had nice hips and shapely legs, and she always covered them in tight fitting jeans that only exaggerated her figure. The only exception to her dressing like that; was when they went out to the club, or he took her to dinner at one of their parent’s houses.
They were madly in love with each other, and also got very jealous when their partner was talking to the opposite sex. She was a horse fanatic, and was out riding every day on one of several horses she owned. She had been left a large farm by an uncle, and they used it for a second home. Most weekends the two of them would go down to the farm as it was out of the way. They both enjoyed the peace at the same time she taught him to ride a horse. They went for pick-nicks on the two- thousand acres surrounding the farm, as she had inherited the land along with the farm and house. They had no need to work because the farm produced enough for them to live on the earnings. There was five hundred acres of forest on the farm, all in one big lump right in the centre.
It had been a long day, and he was surprised to see Shannon sitting at the table when he walked in. “Hello love, you must have got back from the farm early, I hope there isn’t anything wrong.”
“No love, I never went today, I had some mail to catch up on and things to do. I have been thinking on what I said last night, but we should talk about that later. How was your day?”
“I’ve been thinking about that too and I don’t know how we are going to get out of this rut that we are in? You have your horses and friends all day that I might add I have never seen. You talk about them all the time, but if I met them on the street I would pass them by without knowing. The same as you have never seen my friends or work associates. Our life is like a long-playing record and on continues play, the same thing over and over again. The person I hate and despise the most has a better life than we do. His life is a never ending stream of sexual adventures because he is always having sex, but never with the same person.”
“Is that what you want to start doing, swinging, and having sex with all and sundry?”
“No of course not” he said in a shocked voice, “I was just pointing out to you, as he pointed out to me this morning. He leads an exciting life, and he has no chance of getting stuck in a rut. I know why he gets all these sexual encounters, because he told me today that he is advertised in a contact magazine.” He pulled the magazine out and read the advert out to her.
“I am a male stud and ready to please you with my ten inches of solid flesh. Are you bored or not getting love or lust, or husband not doing his duty? I am discreet and will travel.”
I asked him, what if the woman is old or grotesquely fat, or if she was ugly what do you do? Carry on as normal he told me, one night of love will not kill me. We have got to spice up our lives soon, and in some way give back to us the excitement with the thrills of uncertainty, or this marriage will come to a premature demise.”
“You look terrible, have you had a bad day love?”
“Awful, it started off bad and just kept falling away until I left the office. I’ll go and get a shower while you sort out what we are going to eat if you would please?”
It was a good two hours later, and Paul was sprawled along the couch with his head in Shannon’s lap. The film had stopped and Shannon switched the TV off. “If you did not do your duty Paul, and you were not giving me love for any reason, would you feel cheated if I had a one-night stand? Put your mind at rest, it has not happened, but hypothetically would you.”
Paul’s heart sank, and then he thought it could never happen, “I would be very badly hurt, but I love you too much to let it spoil things between us. What about you, how would you feel if it were a reversal of roles?”
“I would feel the same way as you just said, but as you have said on many occasions our love is too deep to be destroyed by a night of lust. One of us has to take charge of the situation with no more rules and no subject is taboo. We have to put the element of surprise and shock into our daily life, the element of suspense and the elements of mystery and imagination. Treat every day as a sexual awakening, not knowing what the other has installed for you to do. To be the domineering and strict or the submissive and passive, but whatever your choice you do it to the full without question.”
“Have you any idea how all this would take place Shannon, or how you or I would go about it?”
“So you are in agreement to what I have just mentioned Paul?”
“Well sort of, something like this cannot be thought of and agreed upon in one sitting. It would have to be very cleverly thought about making sure that neither of us was hurt in any way. At the end there would still be the two of us, and we would still be married and together. There is no game or activity that is bigger than our love for each other.”
“Yes, that is a positive thought, and one that both of us must keep in mind all the time. I will be home again tomorrow, and I will try and write up some sort of draught that we will both stick to. We can go down to the farm this weekend and have a pick-nick, the weather is supposed to be fine on both days. I should have something sorted by then, and we can go into more detail.”
Two days had gone past but nothing more had been mentioned on the subject. The two of them were now in Cambridge on the farm. They had arrived on the Friday evening and it had been late, Shannon knocked up a quick meal and they went to bed both of them being tired. When Paul sat up in bed the sun was shining through the window and Shannon was already up. She always got up early to feed and look after the horses, as there were no stable maids on the weekends. He looked at his watch and saw that it was nine-thirty so he reluctantly got out of bed.
He walked to the window and looked out, taking in the sprawling hills and forest. It was a strange place to put a farm but very secluded, there was not another house within three miles in any direction. The house also probably held the record for the longest drive in England. There were no animals on the farm only crops of vegetables, and acres of wheat and barley, there was not one hedge on the farm. There was however a six-foot wall that ran around the perimeter, and there was only one set of entrance gates which were electric. The foreman had the code, and so too did the five permanent staff. All others had to ring the house to be let in by the switch inside the office. In all the years the two of them had come to the farm at weekends, no one had disturbed their privacy. As Paul looked down into the courtyard, Shannon rode through the gate on a white show jumper. He knew that this horse was her pride and joy. She looked up to the open window and saw him standing there and shouted, “Get down here you lazy bugger.”
‘I’ll be down in a moment” he shouted back “But I’m having breakfast first, I’m starving.”
Shannon shouted back “Well make me some while you’re at it, I will be in soon.”
Paul dressed and walked down the stairs, and put the frying pan on the gas. Shannon walked through the door just as he was putting it onto plates. “Now that’s what I call good timing, or were you looking through the window watching me, sweating over the hot stove? Working my fingers to the bone just to give my lover the breakfast she deserves”
Shannon laughed, “Looking at the way you have burnt the sausages once more, you must think I don’t deserve a great deal.” She laughed once more and added, “I have better things to do my love, and than watch you make a hash of frying the breakfast.”
“Now that was not very nice and I know you don’t mean it. What are we doing today?”
“I have got the other two horses ready, and I thought we might go for a ride over to the forest.”
“It’s a nice day for a ride, even I have to admit” Paul answered and then asked, “Should we take some food or are we going to live off the land?”
Shannon was still when she answered his question, “We are only going for a few hours not a marathon expedition, and we only need a few sandwiches.”
“Have you ever been in the forest?”
“Only once, and it’s not really a forest inside, it’s quite open, and it is possible to ride a horse through from one side to another. It’s just wood land and shrubbery, but it does need thinning a little, I might get the gamekeepers brothers to thin it out for me. The family have a bad name among the locals, but my foreman told me that they are good hard workers. If they give their word they have never been known to break it. I also have no doubt that they could do with the money I pay them. I have also taken their advice about some of the horses that I could have bought. It was they that tipped me off about White Heron being up for sale, they knew the Bell-Smiths needed the cash. I have it also on good authority that they are very good builders, and I might have need of them.”
“You make me laugh calling him the gamekeeper, he keeps it all right, because he takes it home and eats it. It is a known fact that his family the Greens are the biggest rouges in the district, and no one but you have trust in them. He has probably been poaching the game ever since he has been your gamekeeper, and you pay him to do so.”
“That might be true Paul, but he has always been respectful to me, and at least while he is my gamekeeper we only have one poacher” and she laughed. “Lighten up Paul because you have a bad habit of putting people down, and without really knowing them. He also looks after this house and the property surrounding it while we are back in London. I would rather have a crook on my books, than have a crook running away with my property. His family always helped my uncle do the harvesting and gathering of crops as they do me.”
“How come no one comes here the weekends we are here, I always found that very strange?”
“Because after I have entered and get in the house, I change the code to the electric gates, then before we leave I change them back. I also tell the foreman before we come down here, so that he passes it on to the permanent staff. If anyone wants to see me they have to press the buzzer or page me on my phone. We have not got long out there, as Ted Green is coming here to see me this afternoon. I want to tidy up the place, as there is a lot of scrap machinery that needs taking away. I wish to clean this farm up, and turn part of it into a riding school with stables. There is over four hundred acres of fallow land, and that is land not being used at the moment. At the moment we sell all our straw and hay, but we can make more money, if we keep some of it here, and sell it to the people that keep horses and ponies here. I have now got planning permission to build forty brick stables if I need them. I will also be getting a security firm in here, just to look after the horses and tack during the night. I have all ready had sensors put down around the inside of the walls, and another security fence that if cut it will send out an alarm. They cannot be breached without an alarm going off, there are also other safety things but they are secret. The type of people that will be bringing their horses here will expect nothing less. There will also be a cross-country course to equal Hickstead, and an outdoor jumping arena.”
They finished their breakfast and walked outside to the horses, Shannon had saddled them and they were ready to ride, and that was a good thing because Paul had no idea how to do it. Ten minutes later they were riding away from the farm.
As they were riding out they passed a large building, it was on their right and Paul was curious. “What is that building for Shannon?”
“A film company built it, and left it there when they went away; it was built for a musical. The whole building is sound proofed; I have no idea yet what I can use it for.” It was a slow ride to the woodland because they stopped on many occasions, so that Shannon could mark down the many pieces of broken farm machinery to be scrapped. Once there, Shannon rode straight into the wood land with Paul following closely behind. It was cool inside and the air was fresh, the sun was filtering through the branches giving plenty of light. There were wild flowers shooting up all over the vacant spaces of ground.
“See all those ash saplings and the hazel too, well they have to be cut out and thinned down. The smaller shrubs will have to be thinned out, as they are suffocating the large ones. Most the windblown and felled trees must be taken out of the wood, and I have an idea for them. I also have an idea on the games that can be played here.” She then glanced at her watch and said, “Good grief, look at the time, this has taken longer than I thought. We haven’t time to eat sandwiches, as we have to get back to the house. By the way, Simon, one of the people at the stables where I keep my other horses, will be here tonight, don’t worry about the way he talks only he is gay”. She turned her horse and rode out of the wood, and into the open field. “Are you ready for a gallop Paul?”
“No you go ahead” he answered “I will slowly make my way back eating the food.”
“See you back at the house and she galloped off.”
He rode through the courtyard gates just as Ted Green was getting out of his truck. As Paul walked his horse into its stable, he heard Ted Green say “Good day to you Miss Shannon. I received a message that you wished to see me, is there something wrong with the game? All the pheasant pens are full, and there are some lovely trout in the stream ready to eat if you need any.”
“No Mr Green we are fine and there is nothing wrong with the game.”
“He looked at Paul as he came and stood next to Shannon, good day to you sir.”
“Yes, good day to you Mr Green.”
Shannon started to tell Ted what she wanted, and showed him the map where the scrap to take away was. Paul was looking at the man, thinking ‘he was not the best looking bloke he had seen, but there was something about him.’ Paul looked at the man’s chest were his shirt buttons were undone, and the man had masses of black curly hair. He was well built, and was the wrong side of forty with a dark complexion. It was however the way he was looking at Shannon that caught Paul’s attention, he thought he could see lust in his eyes.
“If you want to go inside Paul, I will just take Mr Green and show him the things in the barn that want taking away.” Paul walked off glad to be away from the man, and as he was walking towards the house, he heard Shannon say “If you will go around to the barn, I will just put my horse away.”
Mr Green shouted “Andy, Tim, come with me” and Paul turned to see two strapping men of about twenty two step from the truck. They must have been his sons by the way they were talking to Mr Green.
Ten minutes later Shannon was walking around to the barn, when she heard them talking. “Well I’ll tell you pop, I would give her a portion” “So would I” the other one chimed in “Just part the hair and open those lips.” Shannon felt a little twinge between her legs; she had never heard anyone speak this course about her before. She knew what they were both talking about, and it was making her feel strange. She then made out to cough, and walked heavy so there was no mistaking her whereabouts.
As she walked around the corner she spoke, “Sorry to keep you waiting. All the machinery is to be taken from this barn, and I want it empty by the weekend coming.”
“What do you want us to do with it Miss Shannon?”
“Whatever you want; sell it or scrap it, as I am giving it to you to do with as you please. I have enough work for you all after that for a long time to come if you want it.”
“Thank you Miss Shannon we would love to put your farm in order for you.”
“Right then, I will tell the foreman that you will be here on Monday.” They all walked back to the courtyard, and Ted’s two sons went back to the truck.
“Mr Green, I know that you take game home to eat, and I expect you to do so. I also expect you to keep an eye out for people that might think there are rich pickings in the house. I know your family have a bad name in the village but it does not bother me. You have always looked after my uncle and me up until now. I trust you to keep your family in order while on this farm, if you can do that there is work here as long as your family needs it. I am turning some of the farm into a riding school which means I need to buy ponies, can I rely on your help?”
“Of course you can Miss Shannon, and about the other things you spoke about, your property is as safe from intruders as my own is.
“Then that is all, if I think of anything more I will let you know, so I wish you a good evening.”
“The same to you Miss Shannon” and he turned and walked over to the truck. She watched them pull out of the courtyard, and she went over to the house and stepped inside.
Paul looked up from the table where he was sitting and said “I heard what you said to him. Do you think you can trust him Shannon?”
“Yes their family has always helped my family without any trouble, so ok they take home some of the vegetables that we grow, and some of the game. Compared to what we make in the markets, its just pennies. They have too much too lose by messing me about and they know it. The foreman half trusts them, they know that I know what they do and respect me for letting them do it.”
The buzzer sounded and Shannon went to the intercom, “Yes how can I help?” “Can you let us out Miss Shannon?”
“Yes of course Mr Green, I forgot you were on your way out.” She switched off the intercom and pressed a button, once they were outside the gates automatically closed.
“What are we eating Shannon?”
“Simon will be here shortly, and he is bringing with him an Indian take away. I am going up to change while you drink your tea.” It was an hour later when Simon arrived with the food, Paul was not to sure about his intentions, and so he didn’t get to close. He was there for a reason and only he and Shannon knew what it was. The food over with, they all sat down and talked for a while, and sipped their drinks at the same time. Paul was half way through the Jack Daniels, when he fell over on his way back from the toilet. Simon and Shannon helped him upstairs, and undressed him ready for bed. Simon stripped off while Shannon got the camera. Then Simon held Paul by the waist as if he was bent over the bed, then Simon got close to him as if they were making love. Shannon snapped two or three photos, and some looking as though Simon was pulling out, and also looking shocked as if he had just been caught in the act. They then put Paul to bed and walked down stairs, “Thanks Simon you are a diamond. You don’t know how handy these photos are going to be, when I show them to him he will be bloody furious.”
“It’s a good job I am working in New York for the next four years then.” Simon kissed her on the cheek and added, “I must be off.”
“Thanks again Simon, push the buzzer at the gate and I’ll let you out.” Simon then walked out of the house, and Shannon heard his car start and pull away. Moments later the buzzer went, and Shannon pressed the button to open the gates. Taking hold of the other half bottle of Jack Daniels, she stepped over and poured it down the sink, she turned the tap on for a while to get rid if the smell. She then walked over to the computer and downloaded the photos off the camera; afterwards she stood up and smiled, then walked up the stairs to bed.