How We Caught a Cheater
I wasn’t trying to catch him. But once I started, I couldn’t stop
I wasn’t trying to catch a cheater, and I didn’t catch him cheating the way you’d expect. It involved a fake identity, a seedy motel, and a plan that went a little too far. But once I started, I couldn’t stop…
This is a piece of writing from a different time in my life and is intended for entertainment purposes only…
Part One
I met him during the summer of 2007. One of my very good friends, Susie, was getting married and I was in the wedding party. He was too. Susie thought Luke and I would be good together so she decided to play matchmaker.
We all had a lot of fun together during the summer and by the time the wedding came around in early fall, Luke and I weren’t just paired up in the wedding party, we were each other’s dates.
Susie and I met at work and had been friends for a few years at this point. Susie’s husband was good friends with Luke and they met while working together in the military.
The wedding was beautiful and the reception was full of energy and excitement. After the wedding festivities wound down, Luke and I continued to see each other. He lived on base which was a two hour drive from where I was living. The distance didn’t bother us, we saw each other every other weekend and we were also able to spend some weekdays together because of my work schedule at the time. Susie and her husband lived near the base, so I got to see her more as well.
Things between Luke and me were good. We enjoyed each other’s company, and we continued seeing each other for about a year.
And then things started to unravel very quickly.
Luke had just spent a couple of lovely days at my place. When he left it was like any other time and everything felt right between us. We talked on the phone that night after he arrived back at the base. Everything felt right with the world before I went to bed that night.
What I woke up to the next morning was something that shook me to my core, and it’s something that I will never forget.
Sometime in the middle of the night, Luke had sent me an email. There was nothing nice about it. It was filled with contempt and he was accusing me of cheating on him. To say I was shocked would be an understatement.
I could see he tried to recall this email, but not because he realized he had made a huge mistake. Oh no. Luke simply changed some of the wording, added a bit more colourful language (including calling me a whore), and hit send again.
I don’t think he realized that even though he recalled the first email, I could still see everything he had written. So before me on my screen, I had two emails, one more hateful than the first. Both were confusing, disturbing and completely out of nowhere.
Not only was he accusing me of cheating but he also said I was stupid to think he wouldn’t find out.
I immediately called Luke to ask what was going on. He was angry and shouting the same accusations he had written in his emails with no further explanation. I did not understand where any of this was coming from. We had just finished spending a couple of really nice days together. I was confused and extremely upset and told him to never contact me again.
But that was far from the last communication I would have with Luke.
He began calling obsessively and sending emails. After ignoring him for a few days, I answered. He said he had made a huge mistake and still wanted us to be together. He also said he didn’t know why he did what he did, as if that was supposed to be a good enough explanation.
I had zero interest in continuing a relationship with someone who made accusations without any basis and called me names. I made this very clear several times. He chose to ignore it and continued his pursuit to win me back.
I ignored most of his calls, but I did answer occasionally, just to remind him that my answer would never change. His behaviour disgusted me. We were done, and there was no going back.
During one phone call where he was begging me to forgive him, he told me he had to hide all his guns.
Since he was in the military, he had several guns and they were not locked away as they should have been. He had quite the collection that he kept in a closet. He told me they were all loaded because he wanted easy access in case he needed to shoot a zombie.
Yes. A zombie.
I know how ridiculous that sounds. But Luke talked about being terrified of zombies on several occasions. He even warned his friends to never try scaring him by pretending to be a zombie because he would shoot.
At first I thought he had to be joking, but it became very clear that Luke didn’t joke around when it came to zombies.
When I asked why he had to hide his guns, he wouldn’t answer. So I straight out asked if he was planning to hurt himself or someone else.
He still did not answer and the silence was eerie.
After that phone call, I felt very uneasy and immediately contacted the military police to let them know what had just happened. I would not be able to live with myself if something bad happened and I hadn’t tried to prevent it.
The police called me back a short time later to let me know they had gone to talk to him and had confined him to the base. He was not to leave that base for any reason.
I imagine he was not too happy about that. Poor Luke!
Luke remained persistent and relentless in his efforts to contact me. He called my home number, my cell, and sent emails.
One of those emails he sent included a link. Luke was not very computer savvy, which explains why he ended up with a virus within hours of owning his brand new computer.
Curiosity got the best of me, and I clicked on the link.
In no world was I prepared to see where that link would lead me. The website was called “Adult friend finders.com,” and it had absolutely nothing to do with finding friends. It was more about finding others who shared similar sexual perversions.
I felt sick, and being in shock from what I just saw, I did what any woman would have done in a situation like this. I called my friend Susie!
Susie was shocked as well but she also told me about some of the strange behaviour she had witnessed since Luke had sent that first accusatory, name calling email.
It seemed as though Luke was having some sort of melt down. He had been drinking heavily, showing up at their place and not leaving until he drank all the booze they had in the house. On one of these occasions Susie found Luke passed out in their driveway the following morning.
Susie also told me that Luke had mentioned he was buying a house in a nearby town for the two of us to live in. This was news to me. We had never discussed this and considering we were no longer together, it made even less sense.
Clearly something was terribly wrong in Luke’s world.
Susie has always been a good friend and she has some very interesting and creative ways of dealing with people who cross her and her friends.
She suggested that I make an account on this adult friend finder website to look for Luke. I told her I didn’t have the energy for that. About an hour later Susie called me back. She told me she had made an account and gave me the password. All I had to do was log in and look for him. So I thought, why not?
Once I logged on it only took a couple of minutes to find him. There was no photo of his face, but you see, Luke had a somewhat unique way of using British slang which made him easy to spot.
To my surprise he was not trying to hide either because his username was also “Luke.” I clicked on the profile. Shock and disgust doesn’t even begin to describe what I felt when I read that he was looking for group sex. It also said he had been a “gold member” on the site since July. It wasn’t until September that he accused me of cheating.
And just like that, I started to understand who the real cheater in this relationship had been.
I could not dial Susie’s number fast enough! I had to report my discovery. I wasn’t 100% sure it was Luke but the wording sounded exactly like him. So naturally, the next question was…what do we do now?
With Susie’s enthusiastic encouragement I sent him a message through the website. He replied almost instantly. This is when things started to get really interesting. And also deeply disturbing.
Part 2
When Luke replied to the message I sent, he asked if he could message me on MSN, which was a big way to communicate online at that time. I was still on the phone with Susie at this point and once again, with her enthusiastic encouragement, I quickly made a fake MSN account and sent the info to Luke.
I went from not really wanting to know, to feeling like I just had to know if it was him. I needed to know who Luke really was and I wanted an explanation for how he had been acting.
I received a message just a couple of minutes after I sent Luke “Donna’s” MSN account. Donna was the name I decided to use.
Another shocking discovery came as soon as I saw his MSN profile. He was using a picture of him and me together. And another photo of us with Susie and her husband. And he was using these photos to meet strangers online for group sex!
Needless to say I was not impressed. I shared this news with Susie as I was still on the phone with her. She was equally disgusted and also extremely unhappy with Luke’s choices. Again, with Susie’s encouragement, I chatted with Luke as “Donna” for a bit.
He had no idea that he was actually chatting with me.
Susie and I had a damn good laugh about this as we started plotting our next move. I’m not usually the revenge seeking type, but Luke’s behaviour was inexcusable. And using a photo with me in it for his twisted sexual games? Well, he needed to learn a lesson.
Luke and I chatted on MSN for a few days. He kept requesting a photo so, thanks to Google, he got a photo of his dream woman. He was very impressed with what he saw!
His messages were downright dirty, vulgar and completely disgusting. I could not believe this was the same caring person I had been in a relationship with. During the few days of chatting with Luke I wanted to tell him he was busted. But after talking it through with Susie, we decided to keep him on the hook a little longer.
I didn’t know where this would lead, but during one of our calls, we decided I would continue chatting with him as “Donna.” The plan was now officially in motion.
And somehow, it started to take on a life of its own.
We decided to move ahead quickly with our plan because the whole time Luke was chatting with “Donna”, he was also desperately trying to get back together with me.
I received numerous phone calls, which I stopped answering altogether, along with emails, roses and chocolates. He even mailed me a handwritten love letter. That would have been an incredibly romantic gesture if he hadn’t been trying to arrange group sex with strangers he met online at the same time.
I don’t think there are any words to accurately describe how I was feeling during this time in my life.
It didn’t take long before Luke was no longer content with just chatting. He wanted to talk to “Donna” on the phone. And he wanted to meet in person. Again, with Susie’s encouragement, we decided it was time to move forward and put an end to this nonsense once and for all.
Since Luke wanted to talk on the phone, I got my friend Tracy to step in and pretend she was “Donna.” I was there when she made the phone call, so I heard everything on her end.
She told him she couldn’t wait to meet him. They agreed they would meet at a hotel. She told him she would bring beer and a camera. Tracy told him to bring the condoms, which he happily agreed to.
The whole thing was so ridiculous it was hard to believe it was actually happening! Tracy told him she would message him the hotel details with instructions. When their phone call ended, Tracy told me Luke sounded super excited about their plans.
At this point, I was so disgusted I think I threw up in my mouth a little.
Next, I called Susie so we could figure out the location for the grand finale, and where this cheater would feel the sharp sting of humiliation.
We chose a local motel to make the plan easier. Each room had its own outside entrance which would make it perfect for what we had planned. “Donna” sent a message to Luke letting him know the location for their sexual adventure together. She told him the room number and gave strict instructions NOT to knock on the door. “Donna” said there would be a letter taped to the door of the room with further instructions.
I don’t think I need to tell you how excited Luke was with this plan!
Susie came into the city for the final phase of our plan. I could never have pulled something like this off without her. We arrived at the motel an hour before Luke was due to arrive. We found a discreet place to park so we could take in the action without being noticed by Luke.
I was shaking when I got out of the car and ran over to the motel room door. My legs felt like they might give out. My adrenaline was through the roof as I taped the letter to the door and hurried back to the car.
I had written the letter by hand in big bold letters, and it said:
Did you really think there would be a woman here waiting for you? You should probably be careful who you talk to online, you big loser!
We waited patiently for Luke’s arrival.
Finally we saw his blue Jeep drive slowly past the motel. We could see him straining his cheating neck to get a good look at the room. Satisfied with what he saw, he turned around and pulled into the parking lot of a drugstore across the street. We looked at each other and laughed, assuming he was there to get the condoms. A few minutes later, he walked out of the drugstore with a lot of pep in his step, got back into his Jeep and drove straight to the motel.
At this point Susie and I were running on pure adrenaline. We couldn’t believe this plan was working so well! We sank low down into the seats of her car so we wouldn’t be spotted. Susie held up her camera, ready to capture video of this dirty cheater in action.
Luke got out of his Jeep and began walking to the motel room door. I’m pretty sure he already had a hard on at this point. He stopped abruptly, turned around and went back to his Jeep.
Oh no! He’s not going through with it.
Then we realized he forgot the condoms in the Jeep. He grabbed them and strutted up to the motel room door with the confidence of a peacock showing off its feathers.
He pulled the letter off the door and opened it. The anticipation was killing us! He read it and then crumpled it up into a ball. He walked back to his Jeep, tossed the letter and condoms inside and very aggressively sped off into the night.
Susie and I sat there for a moment before we started laughing our asses off.
Part 3
At this point, Susie and I were thrilled that our plan worked and we caught the cheater in action. But we were also scared of what his reaction might be. The whole time we had been planning this, we never once thought about how Luke would react.
You see, not only did Luke seem to be a little unstable at the time, we suddenly remembered his position in the military. He was a Sniper.
As we drove away from the motel, the gravity of the situation started to bring us back to reality. We couldn’t help but wonder what Luke’s next move would be. I was afraid to go home. We were pretty sure he had probably figured out who “Donna” really was by now.
Oh my God. What were we thinking? We just pissed off a sniper who was becoming more unbalanced every day!
Susie drove me back to my car. We sat for a few minutes and laughed as we replayed the video she had captured. We planned that I would call her when I parked my car at home so we would be on the phone together while I walked into my apartment building. A wave of relief washed over me once I was safely inside and I said goodnight to Suzie.
That relief was short lived though, because what happened next that had me rattled for days.
When I checked the fake MSN account there were already several emails from Luke to “Donna.” They scared me a little because they did not make sense.
They were long, rambling messages with no paragraphs, no periods, and no punctuation at all. It was a long, continuous stream of words that made very little sense. And they kept coming.
Luke was becoming seriously unhinged.
The messages continued over the next couple of days. Then he started sending the exact same emails to me as well. He finally figured it out. Or at least, he thought he had.
He was furious and one of his emails said he claimed he had known from the beginning it was me. That he had been setting me up instead of what really went down. Setting me up for what remains unknown to this day.
Susie and I knew the truth.
Luke fully believed he was showing up to that motel room for dirty sex with a stranger that night. He believed they would drink beer together and photograph their nasty sexcapades.
The emails kept coming for a few more days and somehow they became even more ridiculous. They were disturbing and gave me a glimpse into Luke’s troubled mind. At the same time, I was getting seriously sick of it. I felt like he should have just accepted he was caught and left me alone. By that point he should have realized the damage he caused was not reparable.
So I decided to send one more email from “Donna” that I thought would end this once and for all.
In the email, I told Luke he had been set up. That Donna was not real, and that I had known every detail. I told him he had been talking dirty and having cyber sex with a man the whole time.
I knew that Luke was extremely homophobic and that this might push him over the edge, but at that point I didn’t care. I just wanted him to leave me alone and thought this might work.
I knew it wasn’t right but I laughed as I hit send.
I definitely wasn’t ready for his reaction. It was another long, chaotic email with no punctuation or structure. Just rage.
At this point I was no longer laughing. I was scared, and I lived in fear for a couple of weeks. But that was the last time I heard from Luke so I guess that final email did the trick.
I had been telling a few friends about this as it was unfolding in real time. They couldn’t believe this was real and thought it was hilarious. They joked that if they ever saw a red dot on my forehead, they would run.
Conclusion
Years later, I heard Luke got married. They had a zombie themed wedding. With his irrational fear of zombies who would have thought? Hopefully, for her sake, he got over his knack for cheating as easily as he got over his fear of zombies.
Susie and I still laugh about this every now and then. But in reality, it wasn’t funny then. This was my life and Luke was someone I trusted completely right up until the day the accusations started. This is one bad chapter from my life, and a lesson.
It taught me how easy lying and deception are for some people. And it showed me how many people are out there looking for sex with strangers online.
Looking back, it’s hard to believe any of this actually happened. But then again, there are times when the truth is stranger than fiction. Probably…
From time to time, I will be sharing short stories in this space.
Stories that are fiction. Probably…
Darcy, this story kept my interest. Ooh, what a creep! Praying that you didn’t have to go through this torment. Thank you🫶🏻