(No) Money No Problem

I should have known better.

When a mysterious and exotic woman comes to you, whispering of riches and intrigue, you know it's never going to be that easy or go as expected.

Never.

And yet when receiving an email from one 'Nabilah Al-Saud' (not her real name) asking about surveillance on her husband who is currently living and working in Bad City - all I heard was "money is not a problem"...

But it always is.

We exchanged a number of emails to clarify exactly what Mrs Al-Saud wanted us to do, what she suspected her husband of getting up to, and some other details.

Even with her statement that cost was not an issue, we offered a reasonable fee to cover a range of options. Mrs Al-Saud wanted none of that but instead asked how much it would cost for intensive coverage over 5 days with a small team. Essentially some 240 man-hours of surveillance, to be precise.

So I calculated the cost, slashed it by 30% (I believe in offering a better rate for prolonged cases), and submitted it to Mrs Al-Saud post haste. After all, it appeared that she was eager to commence with the surveillance as soon as practical, even stating that she would wire the full funds prior to commencement.

This would be my single biggest case, ever, and a bunch of problems would go away overnight.

I just needed that confirmation from Mrs Al-Saud, send the invoice, and all was good to go...

And, of course, I never heard anything from her again.

Actually, I suppose somewhere deep down I had already known this was too good to be true. Previously I would have already spent that money, even if only in my head, and would have been extremely (if not bitterly) disappointed when the job failed to come through.

This time there was only a small pang of regret.

I must be getting used to this.