Whenever I can, I like to explain where my stories come from. This one started with me experiencing a morning very much like Johanna’s. While there wasn’t nearly the amount of money involved, it was enough to wake me up without a single sip of caffeine. Tell me what you think and share if you think it’s worth reading. Thanks.
Image by Riki32 from Pixabay
Who To Kill?
Johanna hadn’t brewed her morning coffee yet when a text alerted her to trouble.
Big trouble.
Do you recognize this check? $10, 250 was the message from her bank.
The numbers seemed to flash red, but that was her limbic system kicking in. Danger! Danger! She immediately saw nine-year-old Will Robinson on a hostile planet, a toothy predator just around the boulder.
“No!” She screamed while, with a twitching finger, she texted the same two-letter word to alert her bank.
She’d just transferred that amount into her account for taxes and insurance, but according to the statement she was now staring at, her balance was a nice round $50.00. She wouldn’t be able to fill up her car with that, and it was running on fumes.
When life ticked along in its rutted routine, the hours zipped past. It was eight in the morning, and the next time she looked, it was five and the sun was slipping behind the trees. That didn’t happen while she waited to hear if her text had reached the bank in time to retrieve the money. Each minute was thirty, so to keep from going mad, she did what she dreaded most.
She called the contact number for her bank and suffered through the sweet voice of their AI phone tree.
Please listen to the following option as…
Presione dos para continuar en español.
One moment please while…
Finally, please stay on the line to speak to a representative. Quickly followed by, “We’re sorry, but all our representatives are busy with other customers…”
She didn’t listen to the last part of that statement. Disconnecting from the call to the blue nowhere, she grabbed her keys and driver’s license. The bank would open in half an hour, and she would be at the door, in a bank manager’s cubicle, and getting attention or else.
Pressing the start on her Lexus, Johanna talked herself down to calm. “I’ll fix this. I know I will.” She’d “fixed” so many things over the past few weeks since her parents died, leaving her to manage everything. This bank catastrophe was just one more thing.
The car sputtered to life for a few minutes, then went silent. She pressed start again. Nothing.
“Of course,” she whispered. “Why not?”
She tapped the Uber number, but before she could confirm the pickup, her phone buzzed. “Yes?”
This is the West Coast Bank Fraud Department. Is this Johanna McNear?”
They went through a security check, then the agent gave some good news. Her funds had been recovered. Johanna’s heart rate fell into a steadier rhythm, and for one moment she felt a sense of calm.
Then the agent—his voice carrying an undercurrent of alarm—said. “Did you recently access your safe deposit box…July 10 to be exact?”
Johanna closed her eyes, trying to conjure up the past few weeks. The funeral home. The lawyer. The CPA. But not the safe deposit box. She hadn’t gotten to that yet, but she knew it had several million in bonds, and she’d have to manage that soon. Her very fiscally conservative parents hadn’t trusted stocks, so outside of the house, her inheritance was in that box. “No. I haven’t been inside the bank at all. Why?”
There was a pause that stretched from one side of the Grand Canyon to the other before the agent said, “According to our records, a Johanna McNear accessed the box, surrendered the keys, and signed the closure form. After today’s attempt to cash an unauthorized check, we did some investigation and found that the ID used to access the safe deposit box had indications of being counterfeit.”
Johanna didn’t hear the rest as she leaned against the front door of a house she could no longer afford, stared at a car that didn’t run, but had to be sold, and let thoughts of murder scroll through her mind.
If only she knew who it was she should kill.
The End
The first part about the check fraud is autobiographical. The second part about the safe deposit box is pure fiction. Thank goodness.
If you like my writing, my books are available at all of the major distributors. One of the themes in a recent book is still in the headlines, unfortunately.
YIKES!!!!
Death and taxes. Life hits.
Hardly a day goes by. Stolen ID. Watch stops.
You just want to wind up and pitch fork someone aloft
into Hell's half acre.