My Trophy Wife

Ashley is trembling as I look upon her through the bars of the cell. The door to the death chamber opens. Through it, pushed by a guard, the stretcher bearing Regina Klein in a black body bag enters the corridor and zips past my wife's cell. Her jaw drops as she regards what she assumes are the remains of a woman with whom she had been conversing fifteen minutes ago.

"That's Regina?" Ashley inquires, her right hand over her mouth, her lacquered nails matching the burgundy lipstick that adorns her lips.

"I told you we could only do this on an evening my friend was working." I reply.

"I thought I'd come here, sit in the electric chair with the video camera turned on and let you strap me in, get a couple of jolts of the juice, and that would be it. Then someday you could watch me getting electrocuted while I'm sucking your dick in that chalet in Aspen you promised me I could have if I did this. You never said anything about me talking to some dead person while I was in here."

"Obviously she wasn't dead when you were talking to her. Everyone has their time. Her time just came a little sooner because she decided her husband's continued presence on the planet interfered with her plans to spend the ten million dollars of insurance money that was to be hers when he kicked the bucket."

"But she was nice! We could have been friends."

"Then a good reason for you two to have met under these circumstances, perhaps."

"I'm not after your goddamn money! I have three million bucks you can't touch invested in T-bills from that television series I costarred in. And I'm still getting royalties from reruns."

"Just three million bucks? Try buying a place in Aspen with that. Maybe you better get your agent to get you another television gig."

"The place in Aspen would be for the both of us. All you'd have to do to buy it is sell some stock or something and it would be ours, free and clear."

"You mean mine, unless you want to throw some of that three million bucks of yours at it."

"I worked hard for that money! And all the shit I put up with from the producer. 'Lose some weight.' 'We're going to shoot this over because the star doesn't like the way your character made his character look like an ass.' 'Look like you're in love with him.' He had the chutzpah to say that last thing after he made me get an abortion because the timing was wrong for my character to be pregnant on the show.

"So no, I ain't letting no man touch that three million bucks. If it's still there when I pass, it's gonna be split between whatever kids I have or going to PETA.

"If I stayed lucky I could have made another few million from my tits and ass. But I gave it up because I loved you. That's why I signed your goddamn prenuptial agreement without even having a lawyer read it. I want to have your kids and I don't want you or anyone else thinking I'm a gold digger. I can live off that three million for the rest of my life if you fall for some other hottie. So no one's touching my stash. Please don't ever bring that up again."

"So you don't think I worked hard for my money?"

"No doubt you did when you started out, but now you can choose from all the projects that come your way. Your money goes to the good ones and when they're hits you just make more and more."

Riled, she is standing barefoot on the concrete floor in the middle of the cell, clad only in a black brassiere and g-string. The top barely contains her breasts and the imprints of her nipples on the fabric remind me what is underneath, but now standing with her arms folded across her chest, angry that I have demeaned the small fortune she has earned as an actress, I regret having caused her to spoil my view of her luscious bosom.

There is fire in her brown eyes and I hope I have not gotten her so pissed that she will call off the scene. Although never a diva as an actress, admission to the ranks of the super wealthy is known to have that effect.

Dark blue eye shadow adorns her eyelids. Her Sephora powder has given her face the precise tone needed to fully bring out her beauty and the hint of blush on her cheeks enlivens her face, increasing the pathos of the story of a vibrant young woman waiting to have her life extinguished in the electric chair for a crime she didn't commit.

Her dark brown hair hangs only to the nape of her neck. It will be tragic to spoil her hairdo by shaving a bit off the top to apply the scalp electrode. But she has decided that acting in this little scene that will bring to life one of my adolescent fantasies is a price worth paying to become an occupant of the chalet in Aspen with which she has fallen in love.

My friend Ross emerges from the death chamber and walks up to Ashley's cell. We have been buddies since the First Gulf War during which we served in the Medical Corps.

I went to film school, began making movies, and ended up a Hollywood mogul. Ross studied electrical engineering, couldn't find a job in the field, and became a prison guard when a new lock-up was built near where he was living. His electrical engineering degree allowed him to become a savant on the effects of electricity on the human body as well as the means to deliver a lethal jolt. Given the rarity of electrocutions, he is now the only man in the country qualified to operate the electric chair, and he travels from state to state for the purpose of meting out this uniquely American form of justice.

"I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" Ross inquires, having heard a bit of the end of our tiff.

"Oh no, we're fine," Ashley assures him.

"My wife's spunk is what attracted me to her. The rule is that arguments will have no ill effect on our marriage as long as she wins."

"He doesn't want to buy us a chalet in Aspen."

"Chalets in Aspen are a little out of Ross's pay grade, I'm afraid."

"Little lady, if I were married to a woman as good looking as you, I'd buy you two chalets in Aspen even if I had to rob every bank in America a half dozen times to get the dough."

"Well, every problem has a solution. My wife lets me make a movie of her getting a fraction of the juice the other woman just got, and after she gets out of jail tomorrow, we fly out to Aspen and sign the papers to buy the house. Right, Ashley?"

"That's the deal."

"How many people have you done in the electric chair?" I ask.

"Six here, two in Alabama, three in Ohio, five in Virginia, two in Georgia, three in South Carolina, one in Nebraska, and four in Tennessee. I think that makes twenty-six."

"That woman I was talking to in that cell across from me, Regina, she's dead now, isn't she?"

"I did my job. It went without a hitch."

"So she didn't suffer?" Ashley asks.

"No one really knows; certainly not for more than a fraction of a second."

"Did they cut off all her hair?" my wife inquires, fretting about losing her own mane.

"Yeah, she cried a little when they were shaving her head. I guess that's when it hit her that this was the end, that she was really gonna get buzzed tonight. But she got over it and when they brought the witnesses in she told her victim's brother's and sisters how sorry she was; gave a real nice apology in her final statement..

"She didn't give us no trouble when we were putting the electrodes on her. Even when they're strapped in, sometimes they try to delay the inevitable. It's a bit of a pain in the ass holding a wet sponge on a person's head when they're moving. We got a big strong boy who can hold them still but when you're dealing with smooth wet skin and a person fighting for their life, sometimes they can even slip out of his grip.

"After they're ready I don't waste any time giving them the juice. Maybe ten seconds after the electrodes were on and her mouth and head restraints were in place, I turned on the current. And then she was gone. That's all there was to it."

"Did she say anything about me while you were getting her ready/" Ashley asks.

"Yeah, she said you were plumb crazy."

"Bruce, can I have a cigarette, just this one time?"

"I'd like one myself, but there's no smoking in the facility, not for the corrections staff, not even for inmates before they go to the chair. Could lose my job if I let you have one. But mister big shot here, if he wants me to give you one, since he's paying for this project, there'd be no way I could refuse."

"'Fraid not. The deal we made was that you never could have one again ever, period."

"And I haven't. But you aren't the one who's gonna have to sit in that damned chair. It's pretty fucking scary to think about. What if he can't turn off the juice? I'll be dead. And it's not like that ever would have mattered before."

Ross turns to us. "Are you ready?" he asks, first looking at me and then to Ashley.

"I love you, Bruce!"

"Ashley, I love you too. After the divorce, I figured I'd just end up screwing starlets who wanted parts in my movies for as long as my pecker worked. That may not sound too bad, but once you've done it with someone who you think loves you, there's just no going back to one night stands and short flings. But there was no way I would fall in love again. Linda had just hurt me too much.

"And having been raised Catholic; I figured I was going to go to Hell since I couldn't be celibate for the rest of my life. I'd always figured I'd somehow get Last Rites before I passed and slide through the Pearly Gates with a pure soul. But the divorce closed that avenue to me. I began counting how many mortal sins I committed every day, and worried how much worse my eternal torment would become the longer I lived. Imagine me, the producer who has to beg the MPAA not to put an NC-17 on most of my films, worried about his immortal soul!

"After I convinced myself that I was damned because that cunt of a wife I married cheated on me and liked the guy's dick who had cuckolded me more than mine and wasn't coming back, I drank myself half to death.

"And then you came along. Your love saved me. When I fell in love with you, life made sense again. Our love is pure. There's nothing to feel guilty about. Living and loving; that's all there is, that's what we were created for."

"I'm doing this to make your fantasy come true. The place in Aspen is just an excuse now. When you told me you wanted me to do this, I knew I had to; not because I was afraid you'd stop loving me if I didn't but because it's my duty to make your life complete."

"I guess she's ready."

"We shackle their wrists and ankles before we take them to the chair, like we did to the woman who just passed. You wanted this to be as real as possible, you said."

Ashley and I shake our heads yes. Ross goes to the empty guard's station and returns with shackles and a bottle of pepper spray.

"Impressive!" I exclaim as my eyes survey the shiny metal chains and manacles that will soon encircle Ashley's wrists and ankles.

"Do you want me to put them on her or do you want to have the honor yourself?"

Ashley pleads with her eyes not to let another man touch her.

"I'll do it."

"Ma'am, we're going to open the cell door. Any biting, scratching, hitting, or kicking is gonna get you a blast of this pepper spray. If I were you, I wouldn't want to be getting a shock in that chair when my eyes are already on fire."

To gain access to this correctional facility, Ashley had walked out of a store I owned without paying for a tee shirt on which was written the name of my movie studio. I pressed charges; she pleaded guilty and our lawyer arranged for her confinement here at the state penitentiary tonight.

"I'll be a good girl. You don't actually think I'd do anything to so I'd have to spend a minute longer in here than the twenty-four hours the judge gave me, do you?" Ashley retorts, throwing up her hands in the gesture of surrender

Ross inserts the key and opens the door to the death cell, pepper spray immediately pointed at the victim's face. I follow him inside bearing the chains. My wife stands motionless before us.

"I don't know if you noticed what we did with the other woman. What you need to do first is clamp the shackles around her wrists."

"Am I allowed to talk?"

"If the inmate's being cooperative, considering the circumstances, we don't enforce strict discipline."

"This is so creepy. I was having a pleasant conversation with a woman who's now dead and soon I'm going to be sitting in the chair where she was sitting when she died, the same straps holding me down, wearing the same electrodes that were on god knows how many other people did when they died. And now I'm talking to the man who killed her, and would kill me too if some judge told him to. How goddamn much do you get paid per execution?"

"Two thousand dollars and travel expenses."

Ashley offers me her wrists and I clamp the manacles around them.

"She won't be getting out of those," Ross observes as my wife tests her bonds.

"Do you ever feel sorry for them; I mean those people you execute-what if one of them turned out to be innocent?" Ashley blurts out.

"I don't get to form much of a relationship with them, but I probably would feel bad if we became acquainted and found they were a decent person despite whatever they'd done. It's best not to get to know them, I guess. Just take the two thousand dollars and go on and do the next job."

Ashley is holding her shackled wrists below her waist. Three links connect her wrists. From the middle link runs a long chain connected to a shiny metal ring about an inch in diameter. From the ring extend two more chains attached to shackles that are larger than those now encircling her wrists.

"Wrap that chain around her waist and when it's tight, we'll put a padlock through two of the links so that it stays that way. Then clamp those shackles around her ankles and she'll be ready to go."

Ashley cringes as the cold metal touches her midriff. I wrap the chain around her belly as she stands before us like a wax figure, and quickly take out the slack. Ross takes the loose end of the chain from my hand as I hold her wrists in place, and pulls it even tighter around her waist, forcing her to suck in her gut. I then thread the arm of a padlock into two adjacent links in front of her navel and bury it into the body of the lock, pinioning her wrists in front of her. I then bend over and clamp the leg irons around my wife's ankles while admiring her trim legs and the burgundy lacquer on her toenails.

"Are they too tight?" I ask.

She shakes her head no.

"We can tape her mouth shut too if you want," Ross offers.

"That would spoil my makeup," Ashley frets.

"I don't think we have to. Remember, she said she was going to be a good girl."

"If she was that good, she wouldn't be here. That was a fool thing she did, walking out of a store without paying for twenty bucks worth of merchandise. And now you're gonna get the biggest hard on of your life seeing her fry; funny how fate works."

He looks at the shackled prisoner.

"You're gonna get a good goddamn lesson, little lady. Crime doesn't pay! And if you don't believe that, just see me!"

Teaching my wife a lesson was how I convinced my army pal to give Ashley a few jolts of current after admitting to him that I was turned on by the notion of seeing a woman in the electric chair. He is unaware that the shoplifting caper was a charade.

I walk into the death chamber, focus the camera on the electric chair, and begin recording.

Ashley is standing motionless in the cell, looking nervous on my return a few seconds later.

"How are you going to explain it to the cops if I die?"

"My lawyer says he'll plead it to involuntary manslaughter. Ross and I will probably end up with five years each. And my cohort in crime will have a half million dollars in the bank when he gets out."

"How much is he getting to do this to me?"

"Fifty grand."

"You should have asked for a hundred grand. He can afford it."

"So I should sell the diamond necklace that's waiting for you in the glove compartment of the Maserati and give my buddy here the cash?"

"No Bruce, I don't think that will be necessary. And thank you in advance."

"It's time ma'am," Ross announces.

I take Ashley's right arm and nudge her forward. She hesitates and then takes her first step toward the electric chair.

Outside the cell, she looks in both directions down the corridor. I then point her in the direction of the death chamber.

We cover the thirty feet or so at a slow pace, Ashley's chains clinking with each step. Ross opens the door to the death chamber and my wife looks upon the electric chair.

The oak chair is dark brown and the grain of the wood is visible through the stain. Black leather straps hang loose from arms and back of the chair, beckoning their victim.

We cross the threshold into the death chamber. My wife stares at the empty witness box.

"Didn't you invite any of our friends to watch?"

"No, I thought this was just for you and me."

"You, maybe," she mutters and then takes the final steps to the electric chair unescorted.

Ashley stands with her back to the electric chair. She is helpless, ready to place her life in my hands. On her countenance is written defiance, as if she is daring the fictional court that has condemned her to death to exercise its lethal power to end the life of an innocent woman. Her beauty strikes me in the same manner as on the occasion I first had the privilege to lay my eyes on her. Her skin is radiant; her makeup having been perfectly applied.

"We'll have to take off her chains before we let her sit down," Ross explains as he hands me the key to her shackles.

I unlock the cuffs on her wrists and Ashley's arms fall limply to her sides. Ross hands me the key to the padlock. I turn the key and the belly chain falls to the floor. She rubs her wrists as I unfetter her ankles.

I see that Ross is holding the can of pepper spray inches from Ashley's face. My wife's countenance is expressionless, betraying neither fear nor anger.

"Little lady, it's time for you to ride the lightning!" my buddy exclaims gleefully in his southern accent.

"Let's get it over with. This is a bummer but that's the way shit goes down sometimes. I'm ready. If the governor calls while the juice is on, you don't have to bother turning it off."

"Sit down in the chair, ma'am," Ross commands.

Ashley descends slowly and gracefully into the electric chair, placing her forearms on the armrests and scooting her butt all the way back so that she is sitting up straight, her back flush with the back of the chair, posture perfect as a model. Her eyes look straight ahead, her expression one of resignation as she awaits the next phase of her preparation for electrocution.

I take the right wrist strap, place it over Ashley's wrist, thread it into the buckle, and then tighten and secure it to the arm of the chair as the victim looks on, her eyes wide, the mascara and heavy eye shadow hinting at the sadness of a life unlived, silently pleading that her sentence not be carried out, that she be given just a little longer to live, despite the bravado with which she had entered the death chamber.

She grimaces as she attempts to free her wrist, but finding the strap securely holding it against the armrest and Ross's meaty hand holding pressing her other forearm down against the armrest, exhales deeply, again resigned to her fate. Realizing that her nightmare will not end until a lethal surge of electricity courses through her body; the sadness that had just been written on her countenance fades away and her empty eyes drift to the can of pepper spray pointed at her face.

She remains stoic as I restrain her other wrist. I then apply straps above her elbows to attach her arms to the stiles of the chair. Through the fabric of her bra I see that her nipples have become erect as I bring a pair of thick leather straps across her chest and fasten them together. The abdominal restraint is next and I pull the straps tight before buckling them together, again making her suck in her slender gut.