The Anger of Love: A Novel

By Lou DeCaro

This is the authors sixteenth romance novel. The Anger of Love is also a study of the human psyche and the means by which people deal with the various negative components associated with love. The Anger of Love will capture the readers attention from the very first page. Lou DeCaro has once again crafted a novel that is an absolute must read.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 17, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543478976

Lou DeCaro

Lou DeCaro is the author of In The Dim Light Of The Day (Xlibris, November 2012), Marshmallow Dreams And Bitter Tangerines (Xlibris, October 2013), Anthony (Xlibris. January 2014), The Blind Eye of Love (Xlibris, October 2014), Once A Widow, Ever A Wife (Xlibris, January 2015), The Champion of Love (Xlibris, April 2015), Forever and a Day (Xlibris, August 2015), The Rose of Cuba (Xlibris, November 2015), The Writer of Lies (Xlibris}, January 2016), The Lonely and the Disabled (Xlibris, March 2016), Like Father, Like Son (Xlibris, July 2016), Maria (Xlibris, October 2016), The Pharaoh Club (Xlibris, January 2017), The Love Armada (Xlibris, May2017), Infirmed (Xlibris, October 2017), The Anger of Love (Xlibris, January 2018), A Moment in Time (Xlibris, March 2018), Johnny Reb's (Xlibris, May 2018), Jar of Broken Hearts (Xlibris, September 2018),Tears from the River of Love (Xlibris, September 2018),and False Love (Xlibris, June 2019).

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

S HE WAS THE most beautiful woman I ever met. And of all places, I met her at a gas station. I was on my way to meet a friend and wound up getting lost. I had just moved here, so I pulled into a gas station to get directions. I got out of my car just as she and her husband got out of their car and asked them where Parker Road was. I found out during the course of the conversation we lived only one block apart.

In addition to being beautiful, she was intelligent and articulate. At first, I completely ignored everything she said. But when I realized the only thing I was doing was admiring her physical beauty, I came to my senses. Her husband noticed what I was doing and gave me a condescending look.

It must be extremely difficult to be married to a woman like Betty Cunningham. To begin with, I couldn’t imagine any man not wanting to have a relationship with her. Her body was beautiful, and she carried herself in a way that could only be described as sheer perfection. At least that’s what I thought at the time. Appearances can be very deceiving.

Her husband wasn’t the type that would allow anyone to flirt with his wife. Jealousy can destroy a person. John Cunningham was an extremely jealous man. While I was very confident I could seduce her, I decided to take things slowly. So I befriended John Cunningham as quickly as I could. Because we lived only a block apart, I could see the Cunningham’s front yard from my back yard. That made it easy to keep an eye on her. Also, by becoming John’s friend, I was able to gain access to his home and get to know Betty. I made sure I was polite whenever I was in her presence.

Betty and John had a daughter who had difficulty with some of her subjects in school. Her name was Melissa. As a result, I offered to tutor her three times a week. That gave me even more access to the mother. Eventually, I was considered a member of the family. I was invited no less than two times a week for dinner. That, along with three days of tutoring, made me a regular in the house. But all Betty did was take advantage of my presence by going out to meet new men. I felt rejected. She made me feel like a glorified baby sitter. Beautiful women cannot resist the temptation to periodically reassure themselves that they are still desirable.

Just as I was about to make a move on Betty, another man named Peter Pope came into the picture. I was put on hold. So, I decided to sit back and watch what John Cunningham was going to do. Cunningham eventually got the guy to leave his wife alone. After things quieted down, I was welcomed back into their home. In fact, I was treated with even more respect than before. By now, John trusted me with his wife completely. A couple of days later, Betty asked me what I thought of her. Stunned and embarrassed, I told Betty I respected her. Truthfully, I really didn’t care about her one way or the other. I just wanted to sleep with her, so I was prepared to tell her that I loved her or anything else she wanted me to say. The next time I saw her she asked me another question. She wanted to know if there was any way I could help her get rid of her husband. The following morning the police called to tell Betty Cunningham that John was found in the road about a quarter of a mile from their home. He was barely alive.

CHAPTER 2

B ETTY CUNNINGHAM DID very little to make her marriage work. She didn’t want to attend counseling, and refused to even become involved with the church. I didn’t do anything to try to change her mind. At the same time, I was very frustrated and even a bit angry. I was growing increasingly impatient with Betty because she hadn’t shown me any affection. I started thinking of what I would say to my family and friends once they learned I was involved with her. I hadn’t given it much thought, but now I had no choice. I now realized I would be the object of rumor and innuendo by a lot of people in my life for getting involved with a married woman. Come to think of it, it didn’t take long for people to voice their opinions. I started to feel the eyes of the world were upon me.

John Cunningham was recuperating very slowly in the local hospital. Betty visited him several times to save face, but didn’t stay very long. The police had barely begun an investigation into his mugging. Because I was friendly with him and was at his house a lot, I fully expected the police to come knocking on my door.

The Cunningham’s closest friends on the block were the Wilsons. Like John Cunningham, Rob Wilson was a successful lawyer. His wife, Mary, was a social butterfly. She would spend much of her time frequenting coffee bars and cafes with other wealthy socialites. If there was a woman that should not have gotten married, it was Mary. The fundamental difference between Betty and Mary was simple. Betty had no conscience. Mary didn’t know what a conscience was. Their husbands, on the other hand, were very compatible. Both were avid golfers. Both were always away golfing somewhere on weekends. That didn’t sit well with Melissa Cunningham. She missed not seeing her father on weekends. And as she grew older, she resented her parents for not doing things as a family. What hurt the most was seeing her friends doing things with their parents. By the time she was sixteen, she no longer cared. She resented them for not taking a greater interest in her. As a result, she started hanging out with other malcontents, and even started using drugs.

CHAPTER 3

T HERE WAS A time I truly believed marriage was a sacred act. While most people still do, things have changed. Certainly, the traditional wedding vows don’t hold the same meaning as they did years ago. But unlike now, marriage meant everything to me in the beginning. It was the step I had to take before my parents would consider me an adult. If you weren’t married by the time you were twenty-one, something was wrong with you. Maybe it was different for men. If a woman couldn’t find a husband by then, she had no one to blame but herself. Society considered a woman an old maid at twenty-five, and a total misfit if she was thirty.

But I was twenty-one. A lot of people asked me why I got married at such an early age. After all, what does a twenty-one year old man really know? I guess I wanted to be like all the guys on television that played the part of the tough guy. It was an idealistic lifestyle defined in simple terms. I would be the breadwinner. My wife would be the homemaker. We