Bitch Better Have My Money

Today's prompt is this. Let's see what I'll make of it.

 

The ringing telephone woke her up with a start. It was so loud and insistent; she was used to the soft tones of Westlife on her cell phone. Who kept these old fashioned clonkers around anymore anyway? The phone wasn't even a touch phone, it was one of those old ones which had to be at least thirty years old. The telephone was fitted with a Dial, Automatic, 21FA.  This had a number ring with black figures on an antique silver background and a transparent finger-plate.  The dial cord had spade-tags at one end for connection to the dial terminals and ring-tags at the other for connection to the telephone terminals.

 Diana hadn't seen its type since she'd been no more than a tween. But now here she was; in Back Water Australia; on a sheep farm, unable to sleep for fear of some king cobra curling itself around her confronted with the shrilly ringing contraption that used to be a communication device back when the earth was cooling. She reached out hesitantly and picked it up.

“’lo”, she said sleepily, her voice rough and cracked with disuse. There was no one else to talk to for miles.

“Di! You’re still alive. That’s great. How’s it going?” Andrew’s cheerful voice danced down the line, sharp and clear as if he was in the room with her.

“Fuck you Andrew, and the wagon you rode in on”, she replied, her voice lowering even further and hardening.

“Aww, don’t be like that Di darlin’. Hey, it coulda been worse. You could be here right now, facing the lynch mob known as your creditors.”

“Or I could be in the Bahamas, spending those millions you promised me”, she bit out, poison in every syllable.

“You could I guess; except…”

“Except you're a goddamned motherfucking liar is except!”, she shouted at him.

“Di, Di, Di…come on; I told you the risks when you decided to invest your client’s money with me didn’t I? I was upfront and honest about all of it. Not my fault you got greedy”, he said voice dripping syrup and toxins in equal measure.

Diana sighed rolling her eyes even though he couldn't see, “That’s what I get for sleeping with the enemy I guess. What do you want?”

She heard Andrew sigh on the other end of the line, “I just wanted to check up on you babe, see how you were; if you're doing okay. How’s my brother treating you?”

“Like poison ivy. He dropped me here in the middle of fucking nowhere and took off!”

“He’s a busy man Di, you have to cut him some slack.”

“Sure thing babe. I'll do that. Just as soon as I see him again. I’ll definitely cut him something.”

“Hey, I won't call you again if you're gonna be like that.”

“Like what? Pissed as all get out?”

“Yeah. Like that.”

“Well fuck you Andrew. Fuck your brother and your mother who birthed you both.”

“Tsk tsk. Language my dear. You still want me to get you out of this jam you got yourself into don’t you?”

“Jam I got myself into!! You fucking bastard”, Diana’s voice was so high, possibly only the bats could hear her.

“I'm hanging up now”, Andrew said and matched his actions to his words. Di was practically foaming at the mouth she was so mad. Upside though, she wasn't currently thinking about snakes or snake bites.

“Did you get the location?” Andrew asked the CID officer standing beside him.

“Yes. Good work, that was long enough”, the cop replied with a curt nod. He turned to his fellow officer and said something soto voce to him. Then he turned back to Andrew.

“Once we have her in custody, you're free to go”, he said.

“Thank you sir. I was just an innocent bystander. She’s the one who was the master mind. You’ll see once you bring her in, she can tell you where all the money from the pyramid scheme went.”

The officer just nodded non  committally and left him in the room to marinate. Andrew could see them outside, discussing things in low tones. Probably planning to get in touch with authorities in Australia to see if Diana Lucifera could be brought in; and extradited to Kenya for prosecution. Andrew didn’t know how strong the relationship was between Kenyan police and Australian police was. It was the furthest point in the globe they could think to evacuate Di when they found out that the police were closing in on her.  Andrew had kept completely out of the limelight; he couldn’t imagine how the police had got his name. But he was a con artist first, ex-lover second. He wasn’t about to go down for something when he could pin it on someone else. Di had no proof he was even involved in the pyramid scheme, let alone the master mind. Good sex could do that to a person; it made them sloppy and careless. Andrew had learned that lesson long ago.

A cop came to return him to his cell. A little greasing of palms had made sure that he was alone in there, and a cleaning lady came by twice a day to keep it spotless. Also those pizza deliveries from pizza inn were like clockwork. It was good to be flush with cash. Especially outchea in these hard Kenyan streets.

Di lay back on her bed thinking hard. Why the fuck would Andrew call her? And for seemingly no reason other than to raise her blood pressure. There was more going on here than met the eye and Di’s spidey senses were tingling. She didn’t like it one bit. The last time she’d ignored her spidey senses, she’d ended up on the run with a target on her back. She sat up fast, looking around the room for her bag. She had not unpacked it so it was the job of seconds to swing it up on her back and exit the ramshackle she was in. She had a hundred thousand dollars cash. Time to disappear where no-one knew where she was.

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