Rrrrrringgg!
Rrrrrringgg!
Rrrrrringgg!
Rrrr-
Who the fuck - I blearily thumbed off 'reject' without looking, and fell back into my sweat-soaked bed. It was stifling hot in the trailer, and though I had pulled all the curtains shut and closed the windows, the little chinks of sunlight coming through the cracks drilled into my pounding head like white lasers. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to ignore the heat, the smell, the constant roar of traffic outside punctuated by the hoarse barking of the dog my 'neighbours, insisted on keeping, mixed with yet another screaming match they were having. Already I knew it was too late - no chance I could go back to sleep.
But I tried.
More than anything else, it was the smell. Dirty clothes, drying fast-food wrappers, dogshit, stale cigarette ash, sweat, faint traces of beer and puke, rubber and engine oil, and... well, dead-end desperation and failure, really. I could ignore it most of the time, but once in a while, it just jumped up and kicked you in the guts.
Rrrrrringgg!
Rrrrrringgg!
I stared down at the phone again. Unknown number. The pounding in my head intensified. Enough people - people who I owed money, favors, or time, had this number. They were not very nice people. Soon they would become even less nice, and not bother calling at all, and say what they wanted face-to-fist. The personal touch, you see. Maybe it was time to pick up and move again...
The knock on the door wasn't loud, but insistent. I waited, frozen, and it came again.
I came back to my senses. I could handle this. The dangerous people don't knock, which meant - I grabbed a bat and moved swiftly to the door - I was the dangerous one here, and some idiot was about to have a really bad morning.
It was a suit. Grey, black shoes, sort of thin and scrawny, thick glasses, sweaty pale face under a bald head. He had a piece of paper in one hand and a phone in the other. Behind him stood a much bigger guy, bulky, little fat, 'security' written on his head in flashing neon. Well, not literally, you know what I mean.
That stopped me from giving the suit a good-morning broken jaw, and gave him enough time to look up and say, "Mr. Richard Anderson...?"
"Ricky," I said, eyeing him. "Was that you calling just now?"
"My apologies," says Grey Suit. "I wasn't sure if I had the right address, and you were a little difficult to locate. May we speak for a moment?" He looked past me into the trailer. "There's a coffee shop down the road, and I do have some important news that it would be very beneficial for you to hear."
I eyed him again. "Well, I guess coffee sounds good. You're buying."
"Of course," he said. "Please do get dressed, and we can go now."
A wash and large scalding black coffee, and half a pancake plate later, I was seated across Grey Suit, who had covered his half of the table with papers and photos pulled from a plain file. He sipped his coffee and asked, "You are the last living relative of George Anderson, who was your father?"
"Well, yeah, I guess," I said. "The bastard ran out on us ten years ago. We tried to make it work but he owed too many people too much money, and they couldn't find him so decided to collect from us. The usual - threats, beating, finally they burned the house. Ron - that's my brother - was sixteen then. He took it hard. OD'd a year or two later, and that pretty much finished my mom off as well. I've been on my own since. Never heard from dear old George, but I hope he died a painful death a long time ago."
"I'm sorry to hear that... Ricky," said Grey Suit. "And yes, Mr. George Anderson did indeed die - but only this last March, six months ago."
"Shit - he was
alive
until now? What was he doing?"
Grey Suit looked at his papers. "Apparently a lot of things, some of them even legal. The circumstances of his death are... consider them sub-judice for now, meaning, I can't talk about them yet. The bulk of his estate, businesses, and assets have been seized by the authorities as evidence, or frozen in ongoing investigations, but there is some amount of liquid cash, and... another asset... that appears legitimately acquired and hence can be inherited by the next of kin. As there was no will, some considerable time had to be invested in identifying and locating his family, which - given his situation - proved troublesome. In this case, you."
"Mister," I said, "You already made my day when you told me the fucker was dead. You bought me coffee and a banana-and-cream pancake. And now you tell me you're giving me cash? I could kiss you right now."
Grey Suit looked alarmed. "Please do not, Mr. Anderson."
I grinned, feeling hungry for the first time in a while, and stuffed my face with the remaining pancake. "'Ow mush cash?"
"Not very much in liquid terms - about five thousand dollars, I believe," Grey Suit answered. "However, the other asset may prove to be a more reliable and beneficial passive income source over time."
Only five thou? Pity. I had been hoping for a million-buck payday, but hey, I'll take it.
"What's this other thing you keep talking about?"
Grey Suit pulled up a second file and opened it, then slid it across to me. "This. It's a twenty-storey residential apartment complex in Phuket, Thailand, beachfront property, affluent neighborhood, cosmopolitan society with a lot of expatriate tenants, five years old and in excellent condition."
I stared at the photo of a nice-looking building under blue sky, palm trees, typical holiday-postcard scene from exotic countries. "I don't get it. He had a house in this place?"
Grey Suit sighed. "No, Mr. Anderson."
"Yeah, what was I thinking... a timeshare then? Maybe if I didn't need the 5K for other stuff I might even have gone to check it out. Can I sell it, or return it, or something?"
"Mr. Anderson. I am sorry to be so blunt, but the concerned cases have been successfully prosecuted and closed, so are in public domain, therefore I can freely share the findings therein - which you would have discovered eventually in any case. Your father was involved in multiple illegal businesses involving trafficking of drugs, immigration scams, smuggling, and money laundering. The trail of shell companies and front businesses was complex, but covered a transaction volume at a level I cannot disclose at this point, because it is still to large to be known. This was the only asset that had been kept isolated from the rest, possibly as a 'clean' safe haven to escape to. So, no, Mr. Anderson, your father did not own a timeshare, or an apartment here. He owned the property -
the building itself.
"
I gaped at him. He reached out and flipped the photo, revealing a title deed encased in clear plastic behind it.
"And now, you do."
One month later, I was stepping on a plane in pouring chilly rain. The 5K had been just about enough to get my passport, plane tickets, a bunch of other documents and legal stuff Grey Suit had coordinated with some local equivalent of himself (
White Suit, maybe, haha
) and finally dropped me off at the airport armed with a file folder of all the paperwork I needed, some info about my building (
MY building!
) and a legal services bill that made my eyes bleed when I saw it.
"My services do not come cheap, Mr. Anderson, but rest assured that you will face no difficulties in making financial restitution over the course of the next twelve months, once you take control of the asset, and its' cash flows."
I suppose that was his way of saying "Goodbye and have fun," - it's hard to tell with lawyers.
As the plane flew through the night over the dark Pacific, I settled into my seat and began to read through the folder.
Penthouse:
entire top floor, used by owner as personal residence
13A:
Archana D, Indian, 50, self-employed. Owns an unnamed consulting business in the city, travels often. Appears well connected politically & socially. Status: rent paid regularly
13B:
Vacant. For some reason, never sustainably rented for any long duration. High incidence of lease breaks and sudden exits.
12A:
