Life Deluxe (46 page)

“Those Russian
putos
.”

“Law of nature. At home too. We eat the Svens like gingersnaps. The Somalis and Iraqis eat us who came in the eighties like mini-baklavas. And the Russians eat us all like we’re tiny pierogi with seeds on top. Russians.”

Still: in the afternoon, Jorge met Martin Hägerström one on one. The next morning they were gonna have a meeting with a Thai guy who wanted to sell his sports bar. Jorge wanted to talk through the setup beforehand.

They were sitting in the hotel restaurant again. The Hägerström dude didn’t look like the regular Europeans around here. A button-down shirt instead of a T-shirt. Real shoes instead of Crocs or flip-flops. Above all: pants instead of shorts. It made a good impression: Hägerström was more like the gooks than the tourists.

The ex-cop’d been here for nearly a week already, but he hadn’t done much so far. Only talked briefly to Jorge about how he’d gotten hold of a list of real estate brokers and asked around among the Thai guys to see if anything was for sale—but so far that one guy was all there was. And Jorge needed to get something going soon.

But another thing: Hägerström’d brought an envelope for Jorge from Sweden. He said it was from JW. Jorge’d opened it—some folded documents. He unfolded them. The first was handwritten:

Hombre! I got hold of some information that might interest you. Check out the docs I included. And I understand times are tough. I’m sending some money in case you need it
.

At the bottom: a code number for Western Union. One thousand euros. JW—
un compadre de verdad
.

And the documents were real special. Actually: top secret, classified shit. It was a copy from some cop registry. JW must have some sweet connect who’d gotten the material from the belly of the beast. Cops often leaked real bad—which proved: they were all hypocrites.

The five-oh were seriously onto them. The star of the show: him. First one page with lots of photos of him. Different aliases: J-boy, Jorge Bernadotte, Shawshank. His personal identification number, addresses to different apartments he’d lived in, what cars he’d owned, the last time he’d been fingerprinted. And more stuff: suspicions. Jorge Salinas Barrio: one of Stockholm’s key players when it came to smuggling and dealing cocaine. Excerpts from the general reconnaissance register, paperwork from the customs police, the criminal records registry. “At present, Jorge Salinas Barrio can most likely be found in Thailand, according to the international unit and Interpol. No other information is available.”

And then shit got a helluva less pleasant. They outlined his network, his acquaintances, his friends. Shit from the past: people he’d dealt to, people he’d bought from, dudes he’d done time with, dudes he’d threatened ’cause they tried to encroach on his territory. They listed everyone who’d visited him in the pen, bitches he’d banged,
hermanos
he’d lived with.

Then there was a special section: suspicions about the Tomteboda heist. He was connected to Babak, who was connected to the Range Rover. But other than that, they didn’t have much. Jorge knew: there was also a preliminary investigation somewhere with a lot more info—but the worst of it oughta have made it into this compilation.

He breathed out.

Still: he almost got vertigo—the five-oh was sitting on so much info. It’s like they almost knew more about him than he knew himself. He exhaled again: such a relief to be in Thailand.

The worst was saved for last: they listed his family. Mom’s, Paola’s, and his cousin Sergio’s personal identification numbers, places of work, income situations, what kind of relationship Jorge had with them. Positive,
neutral, negative. They even fucking listed Jorge Jr.’s day-care teachers. Four years old—what the fuck did he have to do with this?

Nasty. He hated the five-oh. Hated Sweden. Hated the kind of society that would drag an innocent child into this.

Hägerström was talking negotiation tactics. In Asia: always be polite, rock the
kapun khap
crap, don’t look anyone in the eyes. Never get worked up. Don’t say no, no, no and act all hard-line. Instead, say yes, yes, yes but then change your mind. Smile and pretend like you agree even though you are miles apart.

The ex-screw: “It doesn’t matter if you’re right. If they try to clean you out. Because if you get worked up, you show you’ve lost control. And then you’re the one who’s lost. If you do that, you’ll have zero respect with the Thai guys. You always have to keep your cool.”

Jorge listened, tried to take in Hägerström’s advice. He was just gonna buy a café, then this Sven player could turn right back around and go home.

“They’re never going to be able to show you anything in writing about their turnaround,” Hägerström said. “So you or I have to get the right to check the place out from a distance for a few days. See how many people visit the place, calculate how much beer they sell, if they pay a protection fee to some Seedang family, check their daily takings.”

Jorge laughed. “Who you think I am? That’s how it is at home too. Everyone’s tricking everyone. The only thing that matters is keeping your eye on the cash.”

Still: he appreciated Sven Hägerström’s thoughts. It was good to have him along.

The next day they negotiated with the Thai guy. They met at the sports bar. Jorge and Hägerström were sitting on one side of the table. The man and his two sons were sitting on the other.

All the talk was in Thai. Hägerström babbled on. Jorge followed his instructions: bowed and groveled like a twelve-year-old meeting the king. As soon as the Thai guy looked up, Jorge smeared a fat smile across his face.

The meeting took an hour and a half. Throughout, Hägerström explained what was happening.

There was a major problem—the guy wanted the money in cash, up front. No transfers, no installments. Hägerström was trying to get the guy to agree to a three-month plan, allow Jorge to get the place going.

The guy wouldn’t budge—everything at once or nothing at all.

Fuck
.

Fuck, fuck, fuck
.

Jorge’d never be able to afford it.

Not even if he borrowed money from Javier, Jimmy, and Tom. He’d have to go back home and dig up the rest of the cash.

He could forget about that.

There was a knock on his door. One of the girls who usually worked the welcome desk looked in. Jorge was on the bed watching TV.

“Mister, there is a man wants to talk to you. Phone.”

Jorge got up. Walked down to the reception area. There were no phones in the rooms in this place.

“Yo, what’s up?”

It was Tom. He sounded stressed out. Jorge wondered what’d happened.

“It’s crazy, man.”

“What happened?”

“The Thai cops’ve arrested Babak.”

“When? Why?”

Tom sounded like he was gonna cry.

“They took him away at night. Me and Jimmy were out partying. Apparently they just stepped right into his room. It’s about the thing in Sweden.”

“How do you know?”

“We got a message about where they’d taken him. A police station nearby. Do you know what Thai cop stations look like? Their arrest cells have bars that are totally open to the station’s main entrance. You can go up and talk to the guys in there if you just pay the guards a little, like a thousand baht or something. So I just did that.”

“Oh, fuck. Good thinking. What happened?”

“I talked to him for fifteen minutes. Babak’s been informed that there’s an international arrest warrant out against him. That they’re gonna negotiate about extraditing him to Sweden. He’s met a Thai lawyer too. It’ll take at least two weeks before they’re gonna be allowed to
send him home. Thailand and Sweden apparently don’t have extradition agreements, so everything’s gotta go through embassies and shit. You follow?”

“Yeah, yeah. Fuck, man. What else he say?”

“He’s not happy, Jorge. He’s really fucking pissed off, you already know that. And now he’s seen documents from Sweden that show the suspicions against him. You fucked him, man.”

Jorge didn’t understand what Tom was talking about. He’d ripped the Finn off, the other guys including Tom himself too. But he hadn’t fucking ripped Babak off.

“They’ve got information about his car,” Tom said. “The Range Rover. He found out it was chased by the cops a few weeks before the heist. With you and Mahmud in it. And with his hoodie in it. Now they’ve tied him to the fucking car even tighter. ’Cause the hoodie’s been caught on film. And no one told Babak.”

Jorge clocked the situation. Him: an idiot.

Him: AN IDIOT.

J-boy’d booked it from Babak’s car when he and Mahmud’d had the gat with them. The thing: neither he nor his bro’d told Babak. And now it was boomeranging with full force.

“But fuck, man, nothing happened that time,” he said. “That shit doesn’t matter. Boy’s gotta chill out.”

“It doesn’t matter what you think. Babak said if you don’t help him at home in Sweden, he’s gonna sing about you like a real canary.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“You slow or what? He’s gonna wrap you if you don’t make sure he walks.”

Brain freeze.

Thoughts short-circuited.

Hard-drive crash.

Jorge didn’t know what to think.

What he was gonna do.

What he should say.

He thought he’d hit rock bottom.

And now this.

Hägerström had been here for about two weeks now. The food was giving him rushes of nostalgia. He liked the weather, the way the streets smelled, and how polite the Thai people were. But he missed Bangkok. Phuket was a particularly dank tourist trap. And the hotel might be the nastiest he had ever stayed at.

He met Jorge briefly on the first day. The guy told him why he had been called down here—it didn’t exactly sound like his intentions were supercriminal. But Hägerström hoped he would find out more. At least one thing was certain: Jorge Salinas Barrio wasn’t just anybody. JW had asked Hägerström to bring an envelope for the guy. He had opened it in secret and checked out the contents—a printout about Jorge from the police databases. JW must have some insider within the force who had leaked the document. That alone was unpleasant.

Over the next few days, Hägerström kept to himself. Mostly walked around the city and took trips out to the beach communities on the island. There were dozens of restaurants, bars, and cafés around every resort. Patong Beach, Karon Beach, Kata Beach. The Mai Khao and Nai Yang beaches alone made up over ten miles of waterfront property with more than five hundred prospective bars. He checked out places that might be interesting for Jorge. At night he tried the beer in the same places. Eyed the guests, the number of employees, tried to calculate the turnover in his head. He was waiting for Jorge to call on him again.

A week or so later, Hägerström was sitting at the restaurant next to the hotel.

He was thinking about Pravat. It was so strange: the tiny tot, Daddy’s ragamuffin, his little boy was going to start school.

He thought about the nights when they had seen each other last.
Pravat had wanted to sleep in his bed. And Hägerström couldn’t think of anything more peaceful than lying beside his sleeping son. It was as though Pravat’s calm rocked his shaky soul to rest. The boy’s snuffling sounds wrapped his demons in a haze of relaxation. Hägerström didn’t worry about the investigation or even about the challenges he was facing personally. He was just calm. It was one of the best weekends of his life.

He looked up. Let the thoughts go. A voice nearby said something to him that might have been in Swedish:
“Sho bre.”

It was Jorge’s friend, Javier, who was standing beside the table. The guy pulled out a chair.

Hägerström looked at him.

“Bro, don’t you get what I’m saying?”

“No.”

“But you know the talk—you’ve been a screw.”

The guy sat down. Hägerström kept glaring at him. Didn’t know if Javier was messing with him or not.

“That’s cool. But I speak Swedish too. Do you?”

Javier let roll a slow laugh. “I know three languages.”

“Spanish, Swedish, and whatever that shit was?”

“No, that shit
was
Swedish, but I don’t talk that ghetto lingo anymore. It’s mostly baby Gs who say
sho bre
this and
yo brotha
that. I mean the third language, the international language.”

Hägerström raised his eyebrows.

“The language of sex.”

Hägerström raised his bottle of Singha. “Cheers to that.”

Javier toasted in return.

“So, what’re you doing here, really?”

Again—Hägerström didn’t know what to say. He had no idea where he had this guy. He tried to gauge the mood, read Javier’s slow drawl. He was different somehow.

“What? You know what a screw makes?”

“Better than we make here, that’s for sure.”

“Maybe, but it’s all a bunch of crap. The Swedish government is pulling a fast one on us. We work like dogs, and what do we get for it?”

“At least you know you get
something
.”

“I’ve worked hard. Know what I did before I became a screw?”