Welcome to Hell by Colin Martin Read Free Book Online Page B

O’Connor to sit down. Once he was sitting he seemed to recover himself slightly.
    ‘What the hell is going on?’ he barked. ‘I am a businessman. I did not come to this office to be attacked!’
    My police friends told O’Connor that I had made a complaint against him, and then explained what I’d told them. O’Connor said that he didn’t know me and had never seen me before in his life.
    This was all bullshit and everybody knew it. So the police laid it out very simply. He could either admit that he stole the money, or he could go to prison.
    O’Connor thought about this for a minute.
    ‘Wait! Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘Maybe I do remember doing some business with Mr Martin. I didn’t steal any money, but Mr Martin might have lost out on the deal. I’m sure we can come to some agreement. Perhaps we could talk in private,’ he added, looking at me.
    I still remember the look on his face. It struck me for the first time that O’Connor looked on fraud and deception just like any other business. Everything was a matter of negotiation.
    ‘No chance, O’Connor,’ I said. ‘If you want to say something, you can say it here, in front of the police.’
    I asked the police to take him away. The police stepped in and started to cuff him – at which point my wife appeared, with four of her brothers. She had been worried that something had gone wrong, or that O’Connor’s bodyguard had come to the meeting armed.
    In fact, for a bodyguard, Holdsworth had been very well behaved. He’d sat quietly against the wall and hadn’t interfered.
    Nevertheless, Nanglung’s arrival with her four brothers made me feel a bit more relaxed. You can never trust a Thai cop 100 per cent, especially if there’s money involved.
    I told O’Connor there was no deal. He could either return the money or go to prison. To be honest, I would have preferred if he had opted to go to prison.
    For the first time, O’Connor looked worried. He said he’d give me three million baht. He’d stolen about 20 million. I told him to fuck off and not to insult me.
    He then offered to pay me 11 million baht, saying this was every penny he had. Allowing for what he would have had to spend on the con itself and paying off his partners, I figured he was telling the truth.
    Not wanting to sound desperate, I told him that I’d consider dropping the charges but only after he’d returned the money. Of course, I had no intention of dropping the charges, but I knew that if O’Connor ended up in any police station with pockets full of cash, he would bribe his way to freedom.
    Acting all friendly, he said that I’d have to take him to his bank in Bangkok if I wanted to collect the money myself. No local bank would hand out 11 million baht.
    That left me with a problem. I knew the police couldn’t take O’Connor to Bangkok unless they arrested him. As a warrant was supposed to have been issued in Bangkok for O’Connor’s arrest, their superiors would have to notify the tourist police, and O’Connor would to end up in their hands.
    That was the last thing I needed. After three years of lies and bullshit I knew I couldn’t trust the tourist police – and if O’Connor had paid them once he would do it again. I’d have to bring O’Connor to Bangkok myself.
    * * *
    The plan ran into difficulties from the beginning. The bodyguard, Holdsworth, was the biggest problem. I should have refused to allow him to attend the meeting in the first place.
    Now he was putting me in a difficult position. If I let Holdsworth go, he might phone Bangkok and arrange some unpleasant surprises for me. Or he might call the police.
    I’d have to bring him along. But I reckoned that with my wife’s four brothers accompanying me, I would see no trouble out of him.
    This was my biggest mistake.
    I paid the policemen for their time and they left, saying that if there was any trouble I could call them.
    O’Connor had arrived to the meeting in an old American-style car with a