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Imogen was vain. She was the vainest woman that one would ever have the misfortune to happen across.
She had married the wealthy Gregory ten years before and quite frankly; love didn't feature in the equation at all.
Gregory loved her but she rather intimidated him...ridiculed him and despised him really!
Oh, Imogen was the perfect hostess. She held on to her husband's arm and twittered and smiled as if he were her world...when people were about.
At other times she showed him nothing but contempt.
Imogen loved one thing about Gregory, his vast bank account.
He had inherited his father's business and when his parents had died, Gregory had received the lot...money cars and a huge mansion.
Imogen had been twenty-two years old in a dead end job and living in a small council flat. Her girlfriend had persuaded her to accompany a few friends to a local nightclub...there she had met Gregory.
He had thought her strong and feisty. Everything he was not really. He adored her from that very first meeting.
Gregory had wooed her and spent a fortune on designer outfits, meals in expensive restaurants and wonderful vacations abroad.
It had been of no surprise to anyone when Gregory had proposed marriage...definitely no surprise to Imogen.
She knew exactly how to wrap him around her little finger. A pout and a quick flutter of eyelashes got her anything she wanted.
Once married, poor Gregory led a dog's life although, to their acquaintances she acted the ideal wife...acted so well that she deserved an Oscar.
Her main passion was shoes. If a pair of shoes was expensive she loved them...the more variety of colours, the better.
One particular style of Italian leather shoes, she owned in thirteen different colours and she had heard that there was now a fourteenth colour on the market.
This particular Friday she awoke around midday. Imogen had a pretty hectic schedule today. She had a cab booked to take her to the beauticians and then she was going shopping to get the Italian shoes.
Gregory had been so ghastly to her last night.
He had actually insinuated that she might consider lessening her spending sprees.
What a cheek, surely it benefited him to have his wife looking so gorgeous.
Anyway, she had to have some pleasures in life. It was a real chore to try and be nice to him sometimes...and he quite often turned on the romantic charm, which meant indulging in 'that side of marriage'...ugh.
Imogen applied the final coat of Yves St Laurent lipstick and viewed herself appreciatively in the gilt-edge mirror.
Yes, though she said it herself...Imogen looked a million dollars.
She took a final look at her reflection and was off through the front door to the waiting cab.
The cab driver shouted a cheery hello to her, but Imogen wouldn't lower herself to exchange pleasantries with the likes of a commoner.
They arrived outside the hairdressers and she passed some cash to him, put her haughty nose in the air and gave him a dismissive wave with her bejewelled hand.
'Funny' thought the cab driver. When he was younger, there had been a young woman just like her living in the same council block as himself...it couldn't be though!
Ninety pounds later, Imogen emerged from the hairdresser's salon with a coiffeur that a tornado wouldn't have been able to move, it was that full of hairspray!
The Italian leather shoes were to be found in a designer shop frequented by the nouveau riche. Imogen just had to have them. The smell of new shoes turned her on so badly...she needed them like a drug addict needed his daily fix!
She glanced at herself in a shop window and smirked. She had it all...face-lifts, breast implants, collagen implants, a beautiful home ...Gregory also.
It was strange that Imogene perceived herself as so damned wonderful...in fact she had few friends and even fewer good qualities about her.
Gregory had recently become so riddled with depression. His business was starting to fold and the creditors were appearing at the door.
If Imogen had been any sort of wife at all, she would have realized all this. Instead she spent and spent...the more she frittered the money away, the deeper grew Gregory's acute depression.
Once inside the designer store, Imogen spied the wondrous shoes and pounced on them like a tiger to its kill.
An extremely waif like assistant came to serve her and asked how she would like to pay.
"Darling...is their any other way?" she purred at the stick like girl.
"Obviously I will use my platinum credit card!"
The girl pouted and turned away to run the card through the complicated machinery.
With obvious glee she spun around simultaneously and said
"Madam, they won't accept your card"
Imogen went a very bright shade of cherry-red and almost barked at the insolent girl
"What on earth do you mean you fool...I have been shopping in here for years, you must have done something wrong!"
The girl took great pleasure in enlightening the mad woman that the card had expired and due to late payments, another one would not be forthcoming.
Imogen looked as though she might explode or spontaneously combust.
"There is obviously an error in the bank's system" she retorted
"I will make sure someone loses their job over this"
She told the girl to charge the item to her husband's account at the store.
"I'm sorry," said the girl obviously loving every minute of the scenario
"Your husband has closed his account and we have a correspondence from him dated three days ago that he will not be responsible for any purchases made by yourself"
Imogen went white then puce and ran with great gusto out of the store...straight to the cash dispenser.
Once again she was thwarted. That husband of hers had left just thirteen pounds in the account and all other bank accounts had been frozen.
Little did Imogen know that whilst Gregory...poor defenceless Gregory had been suffering so much because of his wife's vicious behaviour, someone was there for him?
Miss Grouper his secretary had lately been looking after her boss very well...in all ways.
It was her that had finally persuaded Gregory that he was being taken for a mug by his wife.
She had told him that all he needed was she to look after him...and she would.
The previous month Imogen had spent a fortune on a pair of kid leather boots. Seizing the moment, he'd struck.
Knowing that his business was not fairing well, Gregory had asked Imogen to sign a couple of forms in blank.
One was to transfer the business and all it's losses into her name...the other was to transfer all the money in her sole bank account into an offshore account in his name.
At this moment Gregory and Miss Grouper were aboard a plane destined for Europe. He smiled a lot at the moment and it felt damned good. Miss Grouper was not as elegant as Imogen, but by God, she made up for it in other ways. He was at last a happy man and debt-free!
Imogen wasn't though. In her fury she had run in to the busy road and had been knocked down by a London bus.
It was Friday the thirteenth and wouldn't you know it...it was a number thirteen bus!
©2002 StoriesByEmail.com
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