The case we’re discussing tonight is Candy Montgomery.
I didn’t find much about their early lives but Candy Wheeler was born in Dawsonville, Georgia in 1950. She was an Army brat, the daughter of a radar technician so she moved from base to base in her childhood. She seemed like she was born for the wandering life, though. She was outgoing, had an easy rapport with strangers and she realized at a early age about the power women could exert over men.
She was very headstrong as a child; she knew what she wanted and did whatever it took to get it. Not much changed when Candy grew up, always the independent spirit, Candy moved out on her own just after she graduated from high school. She had jobs and worked hard, like anyone else, but she dreamed of being a full-time Mom and wife—she just hadn’t found the right man.
Candy was described as petite and blond and a little impish, with a thin, pointed nose and a contagious high-pitched laugh. She dated around (that doesn’t mean alot), even had a few sexual encounters, but none of them were what she was looking for. She knew that the man she wanted to marry would be wealthy—that was her first and foremost rule.
In the early 70’s, Candy had been working as a secretary and she found a man meeting her qualifications in Pat Montgomery. I couldn’t find how long they dated, but Candy married Pat, one of the brightest young electrical engineer at Texas Instruments, in the early ’70s. Despite the fact that their family was wealthy and Candy enjoyed being a housewife, she found herself incredibly bored at home.
By 1977, Candy and Pat had had a son and a daughter. The made the move to the country life and their marriage had settled into a routine. Pat was providing everything Candy had expected from a husband. He brought home a $70,000 income from his job on sophisticated military radar systems at Texas Instruments. Imagine that’s how much he made in the 70’s! In today’s currency, he would have been a millionaire! Candy did not mind taking care of the house and the children and but like I said before, she was as she put it “bored crazy.”
On a late-summer day in 1978, while playing volleyball for her church, Candy and a guy named Allan Gore both tried to make a play on the same ball—and collided. It was a harmless bump and went unnoticed by everyone else on the court, but for Candy it brought on a realization – Allan Gore smelled sexy. Now Char, have you ever met anyone who smelled sexy?
For several weeks she had been kinda talking to friends about having an affair.
She wanted something to shake up her “very boring” life (and sex) with Pat.
Candy was very specific about the kind of affair she was she wanted: she wanted “explosive sex.” As she said, “I want fireworks.”
When she bumped into Allan (literally) she wondered to herself, “Could a man like that make (as she put it) the earth move?” At first glance he didn’t look like it. Allan had a receding hairline and the beginnings of a paunchy stomach, and he dressed blandly. So basically nothing that would make a woman go oooooohhhhh, but in other areas he was the kind of guy she might be able to have a good time with. She’d known Allan for only nine months, but to her, she said, it seemed so much longer. He acted a lot like her – he was active in the church, he was an outgoing person, he loved kids, the likeable part of a mismatched couple. Allan sang in the choir and helped organize the sports teams; he did all the things that Betty never seemed to want to get involved in. He also had a sense of humor; a known kryptonite for us women. Because they worked closely in the church, it was only natural that he and Candy would see a lot of each other. But a tiny, insistent voice in the back of Candy’s brain kept telling her that Allan was as anxious to go to bed with her as she was with him. Remember, though, I just said in HER head.
Let’s back up a bit and see what’s up with Allan Life:
Bethany Betty Pomeroy was born in 1951 and grew up in Norwich, Kansas. She was frequently the center of attention; not because that’s what she was looking for, but mainly because she wasn’t. She was pretty and had what people said was an innocence about her and a smile that made everyone else automatically smile. This made her one of the most popular girls in her tiny hometown. In college Betty fell in love with her math teacher, Allan Gore and married him. Her family and friends were surprised. They couldn’t understand what she saw in him. Like I said before, Allan was a small, plain man who wore horn-rim glasses. He had puffy cheeks and, even at a young age, signs of a receding hairline. He was also very shy, which made him come across as stern, aloof or even snobbish. I understand this as I’m a shy person. My mom said people thought the same about her as well when she was younger. Betty and Allan were married in January 1970 and they eventually settled in the suburbs of Dallas. Betty settled into married life and when their first child was born, Allan was working for Rockwell International as an electronics conglomerate and major defense contractor. In 1976 Betty took a job teaching at an elementary school in the small town where they lived, Wylie, which is about ten miles east of Plano, but she didn’t enjoy her work because she couldn’t control her unruly students, and at the same time she couldn’t bear to be left alone at home when Allan had to travel.So she was stressed all around.
Despite her unhappiness, Betty had decided, as a new school year began in the fall of 1978, that they should go ahead and have their next child, but this time she wanted the pregnancy planned down to the exact week so that the baby would be born in the middle of summer and she wouldn’t have to take any time off from teaching. This is something that really can’t be done, no matter how much someone plans. It may work for SOME people, but this is not the norm. This was especially hard, since their’ sex life had dwindled to almost nothing, and when they did have sex, it was completely mechanical. So, being that Betty wanted another kid when she said she wanted another kid, Allan was required to have clinical sex with her every night during her estimated fertility period. (Don’t get me wrong, I’m not giving him an excuse to cheat) Allan felt a little resentful towards his wife. The whole situation had him feeling like he was being used. That, along with Betty’s usual complaints about minor illnesses, ended up making Allan’s marital future look empty and like a hated job, when compared with the bright, happy-go-luckiness of Candy Montgomery. This didn’t mean he didn’t love Betty or that he would ever do anything to hurt her. It just pleased Allan that a woman like Candy would feel those emotions for a man like him.
Now that we’re caught up:
Allan seemed to joke with Candy more than he joked with the other women at church. He teased her about her volleyball skills, and every once in a while he’d give her a sly wink, as though they shared some little secret. After choir practice the two of them would sometimes talk a bit longer than it needed to be or wait around in the parking lot when the others were busy getting into their cars. The flirting was subtle, not in your face kind of flirting.
Sometimes it was so much like Allan’s natural friendliness with everyone else that Candy couldn’t really tell if it was real flirting or all in her head, but then Allan would do something that she couldn’t mistake that was done to get her attention, and she would end up wondering all over again. Back and forth – up and down – over and over. As time passed, Candy started fantasizing about what sex would be like with the guy who smelled so good. At this point in time, Candy was close to 29 years old and sexually frustrated. Can you imagine how that feels? She took stock of herself and was totally honest with herself about her life. She wondered how many more years did she have left to find out what she was missing in bed? So she decided that she was going to do something about it.
She got her chance one night after choir practice. Allan was already getting into his car when Candy spotted him. She walked up to the passenger side and opened the door.
“Allan,” she said, leaning into the car, “I want to talk to you sometime, about something that has been bothering me.”
Now for some context:
The Montgomerys and the Gores had been friends for a while; the kind of friends who met at church and who babysat each other’s kids. Candy met Betty at church, where the two formed a close friendship. When Betty became pregnant with her second child, Candy even threw her a surprise baby shower.
After a church volleyball game, both Candy and Allan stayed to clean up the gym, and after that they walked out to the parking lot together. When they got to Candy’s car, Allan asked her, “Now what was it you had in mind?”
“Get in,” said Candy.
Allan got into the passenger seat.
“Would you be interested in having an affair?” Candy asked.
Even though he’d thought about this before, Allan was ready for Candy being so direct with her request. “I don’t know what to say,” he said.
“It’s just something I’ve been thinking about and I wanted to say it so I don’t have to think about it anymore.”
“I don’t think I could, Candy. I don’t think it would be a wise thing to do, because I love Betty. Once when we were living in New Mexico she had an affair that hurt me a lot, and I wouldn’t want to do that to her.”
Candy was surprised at his answer. “That’s fine, Allan. I love Pat, too. I wouldn’t want to hurt him, either.”
“Betty just got pregnant again, too, and it would be unfair to her, especially since I don’t feel the same way about you that I do about her. So I probably couldn’t do something like that.”
“Okay, Allan, I was just putting the option out there because of how I felt and it’s up to you to decide. I don’t want to hurt your marriage. All I wanted to do was go to bed. I won’t mention it again.”
After that, Allan leaned over and softly planted a kiss on Candy’s lips, then he quickly got out of the car.
Insert from Texas Monthly
After Candy turned 29, she received the phone call that she had been waiting for, but was still surprised to get.
The book, Evidence of Love, spends a lot of time on the affair, and how careful Allan and Candy were. They would speak in hypotheticals for weeks before starting what the authors, Bloom and Atkinson, called “the most meticulously planned love affair in the history of romance.” Would you really describe this as romance? To me it’s more lust. Anyway, they dreamed up some worst-case scenarios of getting caught by their spouses, or if someone from their church spotted them sneaking around together.
From the start, they established ground rules, agreeing that either could end it at any time. They agreed to only meet up only on weekdays, they agreed that Candy would make them lunch on those days, they agreed that all of the expenses – like gas and motel rooms -would be split half/half. They also agreed that there would be no emotional attachment involved. They would meet once every two weeks, starting December 12, 1978 at the Continental Inn and ending in seven months. Their lives still remained the same between the couples – heavily intertwined. Candy continued to play the perfect housewife and held playdates between her children and the Gore kids. Like I said, Candy threw a baby shower for Betty – what I didn’t say was that it was while she was having an affair with Betty’s husband. They acted as if nothing was wrong.
In July, Betty gave birth to their second child. According to some, it seemed like Betty might have been growing suspicious of Allan. Betty demanded that Allan be home as much as possible, especially once he took a new job that required a lot of travel which triggered her fears of abandonment.
Over the next several months, Candy and Allan continued their affair, sneaking off whenever possible. However, their meetings became less and less frequent once Betty gave birth. Feeling guilty about lying to Betty and Pat, Candy suggested ending the affair and they decided to think it over without making a final decision. In the meantime, Betty had begun to notice changes in her Allan and felt very depressed by his lack of desire to have sex with her. She complained of aches and pains and began to take prescription painkillers to soothe over her anxieties.
After seven months of the affair, at Betty’s request, and Allan’s guilt, Allan and Betty attended Marriage Encounter which was a church-led weekend program to help people struggling in their marriages. It ended up being a revealing weekend for both of them. They talked about their hopes for the future and exchanged notes on their thoughts and feelings about their relationship. Allan wrote about how he felt distant from her and wanted them to understand each other better. Betty wrote that she didn’t do well on her own, but was grateful for a week alone with just her husband. Candy and Allan called off their affair after this.
On the night of Friday, June 13, 1980, while Allan was away for a business trip he called his wife as he normally would. She didn’t answer, which was strange because, as we know, she hated being left home alone. He kept calling and she kept not answering. Slightly worried, he asked his neighbor Richard Parker, to knock on the front door and see if Betty was home. When he knocked, Betty didn’t answer, so Allan called Candy to see if she had heard from Betty that day. Candy insisted Betty seemed fine when she saw her earlier that day while picking up her daughter’s swimsuit and gave Allan assurance that nothing was wrong.
After a few more phone calls, Allan beame more worried and insisted on staying on the phone with his friends to get updates as they tried to find out why Betty wasn’t answering. Both of the cars were still in the garage and the lights were on in the house. Many hours after Allan had first thought that something was wrong, the neighbors were able to get into his house, where they found his baby daughter, Bethany, in her crib. But before they could breathe a sigh of relief, they also found Betty’s dead body in the utility room…..
…TO BE CONTINUED
