Heavy Duty People: The Brethren MC Trilogy book 1 (15 page)

A couple of weeks later the banks
’ welcoming crap started to arrive at the flat so now I knew that I had some accounts opened.

‘
OK, we’re up and running,’ I reported to Dazza in early July.

‘
Great.’

‘
So what do we do now?’

‘
Now? Now we take a trip.’

He ca
ught me in mid drink with, ‘Have you got any golf clubs?’ and I laughed so hard I choked and I had the stinging sensation as the beer came back out through my nose. Fuck I was still laughing and gasping for breath as with an unsteady hand I plonked my bottle down on the table and wiping my eyes and my mouth with the back of my sleeve I tried to get my breath back.

‘
You cunt!’ I gasped, ‘Of course I haven’t got any fucking golf clubs.’

‘
Here’s some cash,’ he said getting out a roll and peeling off some notes, ‘go into town this weekend and get yourself a set.’ My laughter died away. He was serious. ‘Get some golfing type gear as well if you haven’t got any.’

‘
Golfing type gear?’ I wondered out loud.

‘
Yeah, casual stuff, polo shirts, that sort of crap,’ he said offhandedly, ‘Passport up to date?’

I nodded
, taking the proffered cash.

‘
Good. Get some more accounts opened over the next week or so and I’ll make the arrangements.’

‘
What arrangements?’

‘
We’re off on a little holiday, in a fortnight’s time I guess. We’ll be gone for about a week.’

‘
Gone for a week? A week where?’

‘
Algarve I think. Should be nice there this time of year.’

And that was all he would say. I knew he didn
’t do things without a reason, but what the fuck was he up to now I wondered? And where the fuck did you go to buy ‘golf type gear’?

He wasn
’t going to expect me to play for fuck’s sake, was he?

*

I repeated the operation twice the following week and soon the bank details were flooding in.

So now I could get
Dazza’s contacts to deposit money into a whole range of different accounts, in different names. It was all done by telephone in the early days once Dazza told me who to ask for what, but later I switched to doing it all through anonymous hotmail accounts, just by sending them an e-mail with the details. All I had to do was check the balances in the accounts to see if the cash had come in when and where it was expected. Once it was in I could let Dazza know so he could get organised whatever it was he needed to and I could even confirm receipt back to the same number or to the same e-mail account.

The second problem
, once the money was in the banking system, was fucking it about, arranging to hide it so that it couldn’t be traced.

That actually wasn
’t so very difficult.

The key here was to
simply move it around a lot which again came down to accounts. Moving cash from one account to another was a relatively quick operation, even in those days, and even overseas and back again. So with the cash in the bank I might split it up and transfer it to a whole range of other accounts in different banks, in different amounts, perhaps in different currencies, perhaps even in different countries by the time I got sophisticated about it. So now if the plod wanted to try and trace it they had to get access to the first account, which would take them time and court orders, only to find that they then needed to get access to the whole range of other accounts, which again would take them yet more time and yet more money and court orders, here and overseas or wherever; if they could get them overseas, knowing that by the time they got these the cash would be long gone, the electronic trails of criss-crossing payments and money orders spreading far and wide around the world in ever increasing numbers of jumps ahead of them.

Of course it could all be traced eventually if the plod had enough time
, effort and resources to throw at it, but ‘if’ was the key. If you had enough accounts and places to put it you could leave such a confusing and difficult to follow trail that it would take them years to unravel. And the plod were never going to have the time for that.

So
I always used some accounts only for money coming in and I kept others only for where Dazza wanted to have money coming out. The others were the money stream, just used for transferring funds in and out and around to hide the trail, cash being split up, sent in different directions, rejoining, jumping from account to account, country to country. A dividing winding silver stream of electronic cash, flowing in all directions, impossible to track.

But having cash and making it untraceable was one thing. Then you had to do something with it.

And as I got more into it, I became more successful in finding places to hide it. Everybody’s heard of numbered Swiss bank accounts, and they’re OK, but Liechtenstein’s are better. But then I found that I could register a trust in Jersey which was completely confidential, much more secret than any Swiss bank account. I could deposit stuff in there and no one was ever going to be able to find out about it. And what’s more, they were completely reversible so I could wind them up anytime I wanted, and just pull the stuff back out whenever I wanted to send the cash back on its way in its merry dance.

Then there were
the safe-deposit boxes filled with cash or stones.

Then I would use the same ID
documentation to open investment accounts, some funds were noticeably less fussy than others in wanting to check details and asking where the money was coming from. Pretty soon I had built up quite a network of accounts with investment firms who took cash on a very few questions asked basis. There was so much of it coming in that I didn’t have time to manage it all so why not trust the professionals, I thought? After all, it’s their job.

Pretty soon layering
had started to become an increasingly full-time job.

We were building something fantastic here.

But there was still the third problem.

How do you get it back out again?

Well as far as possible I guess the answer is that you don’t. The last thing you want to do is draw the plod’s attention to you by having a whole load of cash that you can’t explain, and Dazza was far too fly to make that sort of mistake.

Of course not all of the
money that went in was pure profit. Dazza also had his costs to meet to his suppliers which was where some of the money danced away overseas. But even so there was a lot sticking to the sides right from the start as we got going. He was also quite happy to have the money working for him within the system or as investments. Dazza was a bit of an aesthete in some ways. He lived in a modest house a bit out of town and spent most of his time when he wasn’t out on a run or at a party in his office at the pub, so it wasn’t as though he had a particularly flash lifestyle that he wanted to fund. To a large degree he was happy to leave the cash in the system until I could find ways to diversify it out into investments in legitimate businesses or property. He was particularly keen to get some in South Africa for some reason, I arranged to buy a ranch for him out there through one of our dummy companies. I think he was planning on that as his retirement home.

Anyway the who
le arrangement suited me.

I regarded it as good insurance. I was the money man. I knew where it all was and how to access it. Without me much of it would be lost so
Dazza couldn’t afford to lose me I reckoned. Not that I thought he would want to you understand, but it’s always best to have some kind of back up.

And of course if he didn
’t know where it was, then there was no way he could keep tabs on whether it was all there or not, which was always handy if you were a bit careful.

*

Dazza called about the trip a fortnight later.

‘
Hi, how ya doing?’ he asked.

‘
OK.’

‘
Good.’

‘
Where are you off to?’ asked Sharon as I put the phone down. Cautious as ever Dazza hadn’t really said much on the line. Just that it was on and the date.

‘
Somewhere called the Algarve apparently,’ I told her.

‘
That’s in Spain isn’t it?’

‘
No, Portugal I think.’

‘
Can I come?’

‘
No, this is a Dazza thing. He just wants me along.’

‘
Why?

‘
Fucked if I know,’ I said shrugging my shoulders, ‘I just hope it’s not to play fucking golf.’

‘
Not with Dazza it won’t be,’ said Sharon, ‘it’ll be business. That’s all he ever does.’

‘
That’s true.’

Even so I did have to wonder as we got off the plane
and swanned through customs. Why were we here? Dressed like a couple of plonkers.

We checked into our business class hotel and met back downstairs in the bar for a beer.

‘So what d’ya think,’ asked Dazza as we wandered to a table on the outside terrace, ‘eat here this evening or wander into town?’

I shrugged,
‘Not fussed, whatever you want to do. I’m more interested in knowing what we’re doing here and what this is all about?’

‘
Hey relax bro, all in good time.’ He took a long satisfied drag on his cold beer and lounged back into his chair. ‘You need to cool it OK? Just think for a moment what we’ve got here and how it looks. Here we are, just two ordinary guys as everyone can see, smart casuals, nothing unusual, we’ve obviously just slipped off the leash from the old dears at home for a week of sun and sangria or whatever the shit is. We’ve even brought a set of fucking golf clubs each, we’re probably going to get a few rounds in. What could be more normal?’

‘
So this is what? Fucking cover? We’re into spy shit now?’

‘
No, just good business. And sometimes for business you have to dress the part.’ He finished his beer, ‘Be patient, you’ll see. Now, where do you fancy eating tonight. I’m told there’s an English pub in town that does good fish and chips. Fancy it?’

We had a leisurely breakfast and sat around the next morning. I think
Dazza was waiting for something but he didn’t say what. I found that the hotel had access to a clay pigeon range just outside of town so we spent the afternoon with some shotguns blasting away. It was good practise, you never knew when it might come in handy.

We ate out again that night and had some beers. But mindful this was business we kept our heads, nothing too wild.

The next morning Dazza was in conversation at reception as I came down for breakfast.

‘
What’s up?’ I asked joining him.

‘
We’re on,’ he said, ‘I’m just booking a room.’

‘
OK.’

I still didn
’t have a clue what we were doing here.

Dazza
’s contact arrived at about three in the afternoon. Burly guy, smartly dressed, Dazza met him at reception and they shook hands before heading off across the lobby to one of the hotel’s little meeting rooms which Dazza had booked that morning.

As the door shut, I stayed sat in reception, a coffee on the table in front of me as I settled down to read the English language paper while I kept an eye on the door for interruptions.

Dazza was in there for about an hour or so while I wondered why he had wanted me along? If it was just to have a bodyguard why not bring Butcher or one of his crew instead of leaving him in charge back home the way he had.

Then the door opened and
Dazza reappeared, waving me over to join them.

Stepping into the room I could see that
Dazza had been using the whiteboard. There was some stuff on it that the other guy was in the process of wiping off.

Dazza
made the introductions as the big man turned to face us, ‘Damage, this is Sergei; Sergei, Damage.’

‘
Hi, please to meet you,’ he said in a heavy, almost comic book Russian accent.

‘
Hi.’

So it was business, hence the whiteboard.
Dazza was obviously being extra careful. He’d only booked the room that morning and we didn’t think anyone would know we were here so the chances of our or any local plod having bugged the room were remote, they just wouldn’t have had time. But even so Dazza wasn’t taking any chances. Plod couldn’t bug a whiteboard for sound so it made for a safe way to ‘talk’ business.

Sergei turned back to the whiteboard and picked up a pen
. ‘OK,’ he said starting to write, ‘please excuse my English.’

I shrugged as I watched what he was writing.
‘Don’t worry about it mate, beats my Russian any day.’

Dazza
looked pissed at that and held his finger to his lips. Now who needed to cool it I wondered, turning back to the board.