Speaker 1: Hi, it's Andrea Gunning. Thanks for tuning into our first
Speaker 1: three seasons of Betrayal. These stories have inspired so many
Speaker 1: of you to share your own experiences with us. We
Speaker 1: knew we had to find a way to bring more
Speaker 1: of your stories to the podcast speed and now we are.
Speaker 1: Every Thursday, we'll be releasing new extraordinary episodes. These are
Speaker 1: first hand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust, and the
Speaker 1: trayal of destruction left behind. And these are stories you've
Speaker 1: never heard before.
Speaker 2: What, No, this isn't real.
Speaker 1: What's going on?
Speaker 2: Who are you really? I said, I can't believe what
Speaker 2: I'm listening to.
Speaker 3: I was like, where is the baby? What's happening?
Speaker 4: From unbelievable romantic betrayals?
Speaker 3: The love that was so real for me was always
Speaker 3: just a game for him.
Speaker 4: To betrayals in your own family.
Speaker 3: When I think about my dad, Oh well, he is
Speaker 3: a sociopath.
Speaker 4: He is a criminal financial betrayals. So this is like
Speaker 4: the beginning of it. This is not even the part
Speaker 4: where he steals millions of dollars, right, even life or
Speaker 4: death deceptions.
Speaker 2: She's practicing how she's going to cry when the police
Speaker 2: calls her after they kill me.
Speaker 4: The people we trust the most.
Speaker 2: He was caring and loving and genuine with his wife
Speaker 2: and his child and his patients.
Speaker 4: The people we least expect.
Speaker 3: And he was a psychopath.
Speaker 1: These are cautionary tales, stories of romance, family and business
Speaker 1: gone horribly wrong. But they're also survival stories, stories of
Speaker 1: resilience after losing the thing we all depend on.
Speaker 4: Trust.
Speaker 3: My story was true, even if his wasn't. Mine was.
Speaker 1: Now here's a sneak peak of our first episode. This
Speaker 1: Stefy's story. Her marriage came crashing down in an instant
Speaker 1: when she discovered the sinister truth about her husband, a
Speaker 1: dark secret he had hidden for twenty two years.
Speaker 2: We got married in nineteen ninety eight. It was a
Speaker 2: second marriage for both of us. I came with four boys.
Speaker 2: He had a boy and a girl. Our kids were
Speaker 2: already friends and were thrilled about us being together.
Speaker 1: Stephanie and her husband I'm gonna call him Greg, lived
Speaker 1: together in a tiny Midwestern town. It's the kind of
Speaker 1: town where everybody knows everybody.
Speaker 2: It's like a small town that you would see on
Speaker 2: a movie or a sitcom. I didn't want my husband
Speaker 2: to go to the grocery store with me. It just
Speaker 2: would take so long if he went with because we
Speaker 2: knew every person at the store and everyone would have
Speaker 2: to stop and visit with him.
Speaker 1: Their big, blended family was well known in town. Picture
Speaker 1: a modern day Brady Bunch. At least that's the feeling
Speaker 1: I got from a photo she shared with me. It's Stephanie,
Speaker 1: her sons, and Greg's kids, all six of them standing
Speaker 1: side by side on the beach, smiling. Their family takes
Speaker 1: up the whole three by five photo across their arm
Speaker 1: and arm having the best beach vacation.
Speaker 4: It's really sweet.
Speaker 3: He was the absolute ideal husband. He was my best friend.
Speaker 2: He did housework, he cooked, he played with the kids,
Speaker 2: and when the kids who were little, we would go
Speaker 2: in and volunteer at their elementary school and help with
Speaker 2: their reading groups, which was super fun and like what
Speaker 2: their dad does that? I mean, back in those days,
Speaker 2: he was the only dad who volunteered, and the kids
Speaker 2: all loved him.
Speaker 1: There's another photo of Stephanie and her husband in front
Speaker 1: of a waterfall in a forest with his arms wrapped
Speaker 1: around her.
Speaker 4: The sun lights her face and she looks relaxed and blissful.
Speaker 2: He was very kind, very generous, very interested in hearing
Speaker 2: what I had to say. He very much lifted me up.
Speaker 2: He made me feel seen, and he made me feel
Speaker 2: like I was smart and competent.
Speaker 4: They had great chemistry.
Speaker 1: They made great partners, not just in marriage, but in business.
Speaker 2: I just ended up working at my husband's optometry practice,
Speaker 2: because you know, it's a small practice, just him. He
Speaker 2: always had three employees and one quit and I was
Speaker 2: kind of in between jobs, so it's like, oh, could
Speaker 2: you just fill in.
Speaker 1: Stephanie did a lot more than just fill in. She
Speaker 1: started managing her husband's optometry practice, pushing insurance claims through
Speaker 1: and making the business more profitable than ever. They had
Speaker 1: a clear vision for their future.
Speaker 2: We certainly were not rich, but we were very comfortable.
Speaker 2: We had our own resort in our backyard. We had
Speaker 2: a large and ground.
Speaker 3: Pool, hot tub, basketball court.
Speaker 2: Have this great photo of Greg on his giant pool
Speaker 2: lounger watching the Master's golf tournament on our outdoor big
Speaker 2: screen TV. We had just begun a plan of getting
Speaker 2: the house absolutely perfect and maintenance free for when we retired.
Speaker 1: Of course, there were hard moments bumps along the way
Speaker 1: in a twenty two year marriage.
Speaker 4: That's par for the course.
Speaker 2: At one point, he admitted that he hadn't been paying
Speaker 2: the taxes at his business, and there was a possibility
Speaker 2: we could lose the business, our house, he could go
Speaker 2: to jail. That's a pretty big bump. It's like I've
Speaker 2: invested everything. I've put my life and my kids' lives
Speaker 2: in this man's hands.
Speaker 3: So that was tough, but we worked through it.
Speaker 1: They agreed to a payment plan with the irs and
Speaker 1: move forward as a team, back on track for a
Speaker 1: happy retirement. As the kids got older, Stephanie and her
Speaker 1: husband adjusted well to the empty nest.
Speaker 2: When the kids were grown, things were almost even better.
Speaker 2: We would leave the office and walk hand in hand
Speaker 2: down the street to the local cafe and go to
Speaker 2: lunch together and sit and talk and laugh through the
Speaker 2: whole lunch, not and scroll on our phones like other couples.
Speaker 3: And then we would go back and work for the afternoon.
Speaker 2: And then we would go home together and make dinner,
Speaker 2: watch our favorite game shows, and play a board game.
Speaker 1: Even during the twenty twenty pandemic, Stephanie and her husband
Speaker 1: got along.
Speaker 3: So you know, during COVID, I'd hop on a.
Speaker 2: Zoom call with like six or seven girlfriends and we're
Speaker 2: pretty much all empty nesters, so we're all just stuck
Speaker 2: in the house alone with our husbands.
Speaker 3: And my friends have good marriages, and still there was
Speaker 3: a lot of like, I don't know how much longer
Speaker 3: I can take this. I'm really bored, and I'm.
Speaker 2: Going, oh gosh, you guys, I feel bad because, you
Speaker 2: know what, We're having a blast over here.
Speaker 3: We're trying new recipes, We've.
Speaker 2: Got this whole game thing going on. We're doing all
Speaker 2: these puzzles. We're having so much fun.
Speaker 1: When COVID restrictions lifted, the couple took the opportunity to
Speaker 1: spend even more time together and enjoy a warmer climate.
Speaker 2: Kind of on a whim, we were like, hey, things
Speaker 2: are opening up. We didn't get to go on our
Speaker 2: winter vacation to our time sharing cancuon let's go down there.
Speaker 2: So we had gone down the first week of April
Speaker 2: and had a fabulous time as we always do.
Speaker 4: But on this.
Speaker 1: Little COVID getaway, she could tell that something was off
Speaker 1: with Greg.
Speaker 4: She first noticed it when they were lounging by the pool.
Speaker 2: One of the things that really struck me as weird
Speaker 2: on that trip was that we had kind of sat
Speaker 2: in this same spot a couple days and there was
Speaker 2: someone else sitting a couple chairs down from us, another
Speaker 2: husband and wife.
Speaker 3: And the guy made me really uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: You know how some guys just look at you weird,
Speaker 2: you know, when you're hanging out in your bathing suit whatever.
Speaker 3: And I the guy just kind of made me uncomfortable.
Speaker 3: And I told Greg that. I said, you know, that
Speaker 3: guy is just kind of creeping me out. Can we
Speaker 3: sit somewhere else? And he said no. That was totally
Speaker 3: out of character for him.
Speaker 2: He was always so accommodating to me and never wanted
Speaker 2: me to feel uncomfortable. I mean, does it matter if
Speaker 2: we sit over on the other side of the gorgeous
Speaker 2: infinity pool looking out at the ocean?
Speaker 3: So yeah, it just struck me as a little weird.
Speaker 1: It was weird, but Stephanie didn't think much of it.
Speaker 1: That night, the couple indulged in a long, romantic dinner.
Speaker 1: This was always part of their vacation, a few dinners
Speaker 1: where they could really treat.
Speaker 2: Themselves, many many courses and lots of different drinks and
Speaker 2: wine and all of that.
Speaker 4: The next morning, Stephanie was in a fog.
Speaker 3: I was very out of it like it was really
Speaker 3: hard to wake up. I had this feeling.
Speaker 2: It was almost like I was at the bottom of
Speaker 2: the lake and I could just see light way up ahead,
Speaker 2: but it was so hard to try to get there,
Speaker 2: and then I would just feel so awful, like very
Speaker 2: cotton mull, very dehydrated, headache, miserable waking up.
Speaker 3: Shouldn't feel like that.
Speaker 4: But Greg was there to help take care of her.
Speaker 2: Last night. You had a lot to drink, and we
Speaker 2: were out in the sun a lot. I'm sure you're dehydrated.
Speaker 2: Let's get you some water, Let's get you some coffee.
Speaker 2: Let's try to stay out of the sun a little
Speaker 2: bit today. You know, very comforting, very kind.
Speaker 4: But Greg wasn't the man who was pretending to be.
Speaker 2: I had that feeling. I was like, I got to
Speaker 2: check all his stuff while he's gone. I saw his
Speaker 2: laptop was sitting there by his recliner. I picked it
Speaker 2: up and I took it over to the kitchen counter
Speaker 2: and that was where I was sitting, and I literally
Speaker 2: just lifted it up up and it was there. The
Speaker 2: pages were open. He readily confessed to all of it.
Speaker 2: No tears, no remorse, no regret, no care whatsoever. He
Speaker 2: talked to me like he was telling me I went
Speaker 2: to the store and got a gallon of milk. He said,
Speaker 2: I have those pictures of those other women because I
Speaker 2: trade like kids trade Pokemon cards. I would trade your image.
Speaker 1: Be sure to listen in on July twenty fifth to
Speaker 1: hear all of Stephanie's story, and subscribe to the Betrayal Feed,
Speaker 1: where you'll hear news stories every Thursday.