I woke early and could feel my heart racing. This was it, the day my carefully made plans were put into action. Trying to stay calm, I did a few sun salutations before heading to the bathroom for a shower. When I’d moved into the spare room months ago, Simon hadn’t objected and we hadn’t had sex in over a year. I guess he didn’t need to have sex with me when he was shagging his mistress at every opportunity.
Crossing the landing, the sound of the shower in the en-suite told me that Simon was up and getting ready to leave.
“Breathe, take deep breaths and you’ll get through the next few hours.” I reassured myself.
When Simon emerged, freshly showered and dressed in one of his Saville Row suits I handed him a freshly brewed cup of coffee, cooled to the right temperature. Past mistakes had taught me not to hand him scalding hot coffee. He’d given up the toast and marmalade a while back “got to look after my heart” he’d said at the time, patting his developing paunch. More like his mistress had told him to lose weight, I’d thought.
“I’ve got your case packed as you asked. Your best suits, shirts and casual wear. I know you want to make a good impression with the guys in Singapore.” My voice shook a little, praying he wouldn’t find fault and lash out one last time before he left.
“Have a good trip, I hope your flight is on time. The car will be here in a minute to take you to the airport.”
“Yes, yes, I’ll see you when I get back.” He no longer bothered with a perfunctory kiss on the cheek, for which small mercy I was grateful. I’d been madly in love with him at one time, but his selfishness, quick temper and refusal to start a family had killed it. The final death knell on our marriage had been when he’d left his phone unlocked and I saw the messages he’d been sending his mistress. “It won’t be long now, I’ll get it all sorted while we’re in Singapore. She’ll be glad to get the house and we’ll be moving into our new home when we get back.”
That had been a couple of months ago. For a clever man, he was surprising naïve about internet security. I’d had a feeling that he’d been smuggling, exactly what, I wasn’t sure, but there on his computer in his browsing history was all the information I’d needed to bring him down.
He’d been totally dismissive when I’d started my web design company, even though I’d made a great job of building a website for his company.
Perhaps I’d known then that the end was in sight, as I’d reverted to using my maiden name. Portia Parkinson was a bit of a mouthful, so PP Web Design had seemed a good name. Our solicitor had recommended his bank where I set up an account for my business. I’d also created a PP Client Account for holding client’s deposit money, which was going to be key to the success of my plans.
As soon as the limousine had disappeared I raced up the stairs to his office and fired up his computer. Hands shaking, I logged into his personal email account and checked for the hundredth time the emails from our solicitor, Peter Parker.
15th March.
“Thank you for the deposit money received today, I shall proceed with the purchase and aim for completion on 3rd April. I confirm that I have registered the title to your current property in your wife’s name. I have the title deed from HMLR which I will send to her on 3rd April with your accompanying letter, as instructed.”
Of course, I already knew that the house had been transferred to my name, £3 spent with HMLR had been a good investment.
Now all I had to do was wait for Peter Parker to request completion funds from Simon and then I could send my own email. It had been deliciously easy to register a web address PeterParkerSolicitors.co and create an email address almost exactly the same as his, Peter@PeterParker.co Simon would never notice that one tiny detail, the missing .uk.
An hour crawled by reviewing the correspondence between Simon and Peter Parker. They were so damned arrogant, convinced that I was the dumb little wife who played at making pretty websites.
After a couple of hours I was thirsty and desperate for a pee. A quick bathroom visit and armed with a coffee, I returned to the computer and checked incoming emails. Nothing yet. Simon would be in the air, they should have just taken off. It was a 12 hour flight to Singapore, unlikely that he’d be monitoring his email account mid-flight, but I couldn’t take any chances.
After what seemed an interminable amount of time an email dropped into his inbox from Peter Parker.
“Hi Simon, all ready for completion on 3rd. Just need you to transfer the remaining £800,000 purchase price. Have a great time in Singapore and remember to bring back those diamonds I asked you to get. Best Peter”
It was easy to copy the whole email together with the company logo and delete the original. Heart racing, I opened up my email server and using my spoof email account, I pasted the contents of Peter’s email with one small addition.
“Hi Simon, all ready for completion on 3rd. Just need you to transfer the remaining £800,000 purchase price. Have a great time in Singapore and remember to bring back those diamonds I asked you to get.
Nearly forgot, send funds to my PP Client Account. Same sort code, account number 13496875.
Best Peter”
Hitting send, I breathed a sigh of relief. So, Parker was in on the smuggling too, although I didn’t care. All I wanted was for Simon to land in Singapore, check into his hotel and transfer the funds to the PP Client Account, which was, of course, mine.
To pass time, I retrieved the stash of black bin bags I’d bought and gleefully bagged up the rest of Simon’s clothes, ready to take them to a charity shop. They could have his Saville Row suits and tailor-made shirts. Cases were dragged out of the loft and packed with my own clothes and personal items.
A locksmith was called out to change the locks and finally I phoned my new solicitor. The charity I’d sold the house to was delighted to buy it fully furnished so they could use it as a women’s refuge from day one. Completion was set for tomorrow, along with the purchase of my new home in Yorkshire. It seemed like a good time to phone Daniel, my yoga teacher.
“Hi sweetheart, are you up for a one to one yoga session this afternoon?” I smiled, thinking about the usual ending to our one to one sessions. Daniel. He was kind, loving, and oh so flexible and strong. We’d made love in positions I hadn’t thought would be possible. And the orgasms. I felt a dampness begin as I thought about making love to him later.
Daniel had been all too willing to help when I’d said I needed to shelter some company profits for a few days, until after the end of the tax year. He’d given me his bank details, ready for me to make a transfer when I was ready. I’d also opened a new company PP Properties, and a bank account, ready for moving the money when it came in.
All I had to do now was trust that Simon wouldn’t query the bank account he’d been asked to send the money to. That he’d make the deposit p.d.q. after he checked into his hotel in Singapore. Knowing that it could be another 12 hours at least before the money was transferred, it seemed safe to leave the house and enjoy a therapeutic yoga session with Daniel. Several mind-blowing orgasms later I murmured against his ear, “it could be as much as £40,000 that I need to shelter. I may be moving the money later. Is that still okay with you?”
“For you Portia, anything” he’d declared, readying himself for more action. To be honest, I wasn’t sure if I could keep this up long-term, but he was a means to an end. A beautiful sperm donor.
With a satisfied smile on my face I let myself back into the house later and checked my watch. “Give them a couple of hours to de-plane, get to the hotel and settle in. Time for some food, after all that exercise I’m starving.” I thought.
My eyes began to get heavy as I browsed the net, checking for emails, checking the bank account. I know I dozed a while until around 1 in the morning I checked the bank account again. There it was in my PP Client account! £800,000. I hastily transferred £40,000 to Daniel’s account and the rest to my PP Properties account. At last I could sleep for a while.
I was up early, eager for the day. Even the text from Daniel telling me he was keeping the money to start his own yoga studio didn’t bother me. I’d half expected it. He’d earned the money and fulfilled his purpose, the pee stick showed I was pregnant. I hugged myself, at last I was going to be a mother.
My solicitor emailed me at 12. “All complete on sale and purchase. Please drop off keys for handover. Arrange to collect keys for new house from agents.”
Logging in to Simon’s email account for the last time left me laughing as I saw the string of emails between him and Peter Parker.
“Where’s the money?”
“I’ve sent it to your client account as you asked.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You asked me to send to your client account. I’ve forwarded the email to you.”
“You total dickhead, the email wasn’t from me! We’ve been spammed.”
I couldn’t resist it and typed a two word email to both of them.
“April Fool”.