Gross Domestic Product: 7

Chapter Seven.

Morag looked down at the thin scrawl on the betting slip and gulped. Again, she checked the previous day’s results against it. A five horse accumulator, all winners. eleven to one, eight to one, six to one, fifteen to one, nine to one, on a fifteen quid stake. She checked the calculator again. The horrifyingly large figure came out the same, over 1.8 million. She looked out across the counter at the pale, sickly girl who stared at her, unblinking. The young girl’s eyes regarded her with such an icy, dispassionate intensity that her gaze chilled Morag to the bone. Morag gulped again. “I… uuh… this looks fine but gimme a minute, doll. I jist need tae get this confirmed wae the manager, haud oan.”

The girl didn’t move or respond she just kept staring. Her eyes following Morag as she got off her chair and pushed open the door into the back where her boss Jimmy Callen was sitting at a table reading the morning paper. Callen, a tired looking chubby in an ill-fitting black waist-coat and white shirt looked up at Morag. “Whit noo?”

Morag let the door close behind her. “Jimmy, we’ve goat a problem.”

Callen scowled. “There’s always a fuckin’ problem, in’t there?”

Morag slapped down the ticket on the table. “Five race accumulator, lassie oot there did it yesterday. She’s won nearly two million quid. I’d call that a problem, wid you no’?”

Callen’s face went from pink to white in an instant. “Yer kiddin’?”

“I’m no fuckin’ kiddin’ check it yersel’,” Morag insisted tapping the betting slip with her index finger.

Callen did just that, twice. “Aw Jesus,” he sighed. “Aw, Jesus fuckin’ Christ.”

“So noo whit?” Morag said tucking her hands on her hips in exasperation.

“I’ll need tae call the boss.” Callen answered with a groan.

He picked up the phone, rolled his blood shot eyes, lit a cigarette and dialled, waiting for connection. “Hullo… Mr P-Prince?” he stuttered

Patrick Prince was -as anyone who had ever met him, including his mother, his ex-wife and his two daughters would have would have told you- a right arsehole. He was one of those people who just rubbed everyone up the wrong way, he had an air of arrogance which he thought was confidence, had fooled himself into thinking he was a capable businessman and tough negotiator, respected by his peers. The truth of the matter was different. He owed his entire empire of three bookmakers and a crap Italian restaurant to the notoriously unstable gangster Tommy Bryce who’d hired Prince to run a few legitimate businesses on his behalf. Bryce thought Prince was an arsehole too but Prince had kept the money rolling in so Bryce had left him to it. Prince was standing inside that grubby Italian restaurant, the Bella Genoa haranguing the staff about the shoddy state of the red and white checked tablecloths when the phone ran. He pulled out the big grey rectangular block from his dark blue lambswool overcoat and said “Speak...”

He listened to Callen’s stammering. “What is it, James?”

At the other end of the phone Callen explained, wiping sweat from his brow. “We’ve got a problem, some customer came in with a 5 horse accumulator and-and… well, they’ve won 1.8 million quid.”

Patrick Prince scowled. “How much?” he gasped.

“1.8 million,” Callen repeated.

“Jesus, James, you fucked up big time. How the hell am I meant to pay that sort of money out?” Prince hissed, trying to keep it quiet, so the staff in the restaurant couldn’t hear.

“Surely you have insurance to protect you from this sort of thing?” James asked.

“Oh should I, smart arse? Is that what I should have?” Prince replied, his voice rising in pitch and volume as he got angrier. “Thanks for telling me how to run my businesses. How many businesses do you own James? Oh that’s right, none, you can’t even take care of the one I allowed you to manage without bankrupting it. Any other suggestions as to how I’m supposed to pay out that money, magic beans perhaps, should I check down the side of my sofa?”

Callen had had enough. He’s worked for Prince for less than two years and in that time Prince had been nothing but a snotty obnoxious arsehole of a boss. Now the prick was blaming him? “You dae whit ye like you fucking prick. Sell yer arse, that might make you a tenner, if you can get ten punters willin’ tae fuck a slimy weasel like you. Go fuck yourself, I quit, I hope you end up in jail.” Callen shouted before slamming the phone down.

“James?” Prince said. “James I’m not finished!” he shouted into the receiver before staring at it. He looked up from it at the staff of the restaurant who were all standing there smirking at him. “Back to work!” he barked before rushing out of the place and into his BMW. He was going to read Callen the riot act for that.

It was mere minutes before Prince turned up at the back door of the bookies. He banged on it angrily. It took a few moments before it was opened. Morag answered, her mascara had ran, reminding Prince of the singer -or was it group?- Alice Cooper. “Where’s Callen?” He demanded.

“He walked, Patrick. Right after he phoned you, said you could sort out this mess.” Morag replied.

“Oh I’ll sort it out alright. Let me see this winning ticket,” Patrick said, striding past her into the back office. The place was filled with a stinking blue fog of cigarette smoke.

Morag closed the door behind her and dashed over to the table, picking up the slip and handing it to Prince. He snatched it from her and peered at it like an angry pigeon. “Is that your signature?”

“Don’t put this on me,” Morag threatened. “Don’t you fucking dare.”

Prince was annoyed by that, precisely because that was exactly what he was about to do. He ran his hand back through his expensive haircut, sculpted to hide his widening bald-spot and sighed. “I think it best we see our winner, yes?”

Morag shrugged picked up a cigarette from the ashtray and inhaled. “Do what you like,” she answered blowing out the smoke.

Prince stood there, waiting. “well, go and get him.”

“Her.” Morag said.

“What?” Prince said, he was too busy looking at the astronomical number on the calculator.

“It’s a wee lassie, looks a bit like a smackheid,” Morag explained.

“Great, just what I need. Bring her in, would you?” Prince said, sitting down on one of the cheap plastic chairs.

Morag dashed off into the front while Prince sat down and tallied it up using his own calculator. The total came to one million eight hundred and fourteen thousand four hundred. He wondered what the chances of all those horses coming in were. He didn’t get a chance to ponder it before Morag pushed the young woman through the door.

The girl was small, very pale, bloodless even. She’d dyed her hair black but her brown roots were showing. He clothing was all black, which had the effect of making her look even more pale and sickly, but by god, her eyes. They were a grey blue, but had a stare harder than granite. The way she looked at Prince was unsettling, like she’d stepped on shit. “Ah,” he began, trying to force one of his charming smiles. Morag thought it made him look like a sex pest. “You are one very lucky girl. What’s your name?”

“Olivia.” The girl answered in a voice that seemed to come from the pit of her stomach, a deep, rasping voice that did not seem to fit at all with the wan waif that stood in front of him.

“Well, Olivia. First of all let me congratulate you on your win.” Prince said.

The girl said nothing, her face remained expressionless, she just stared at him. Prince really couldn’t read her at all, she was menacing, that was the only word for it, reminding him of no-one but his own boss, Bryce, only more so, there was something creepy about her.

“So your winnings...”

“One million, eight hundred and fourteen thousand, four hundred pounds.”

“Yes. Now as you can imagine, we don’t keep that amount of money here on the premises.” Prince said.

To this the girl again said nothing. “Well,” Prince said. “So what I’ll have to do is clear this with our upper management and then if everything is above board, we’ll write you a cheque.”

“Cash.” The girl said.

“Excuse me?” Prince said, sounding almost offended.

“You will collect the money you need to collect. You will give it to me in cash.” she ordered.

“Well… I’m not sure that is the best...”

“Do not argue. I will give you one day,” Olivia said.

Prince scoffed. “I’m afraid it is going to take quite a bit longer than that.”

“Cockroaches.” The girl Olivia said, her voice a strange rumble.

Prince was about to say “I beg your pardon?” but there was a swelling wriggling agony in his stomach. Before he could even endure it his stomach revolted. A large stream of projectile vomit burst from his mouth which spilled all over the table in a black/brown crawling mass of inch long skittering disks. The insects scuttled through his bile, slid in the yellowing viscous liquid, a chaos of clicking and twitching antennae. They tumbled from the table along with the spattering vomit, rapidly vanishing onto the floor and into the shadows, dozens of them. Morag screamed, Prince had no idea how to react.

The girl walked closer, sniffing Prince, like a hungry bear might with a lump of meat. She grabbed his sick covered chin with a thumb and forefinger, each burned him like the lit cigarette ends his brother used to put out on him. “One day, all of the money, in cash, or the next time it will be rats. Do you understand?”

He nodded. He couldn’t do anything else. The girl flung his head from her grasp. The force was so strong he felt something twist and send a shooting pain right up his neck and skull, a shooting nerve that almost blinded him with pain.

Dazed, he sat there as he watched the girl leave. She walked out the door in a fluid, silent movement that was wholly unnatural. Morag was in tears. “You alright, Patrick?” she asked.

It took him a second or two to regain his senses. “I need to phone my boss,” he croaked from his painful, bile scarred vocal cords.