Number Seven^Sex on the Beach by Colin Cotterill

Author:Colin Cotterill [Cotterill, Colin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9786164560055
Publisher: Proglen
Published: 2018-10-26T04:00:00+00:00

*

We stopped by the police station on our way back and the evening shift sergeant at reception was every bit as insistent they’d never had a Burmese there on a murder charge. Captain Grit was still on leave and, as far as they knew, nobody had reported a tourist missing.

We went back to the Happy House, got cleaned up, ate at the restaurant and went to sit at the bar. Arny had a tonic water. I had Sex on the Beach from a stainless steel ice bucket. Our barman from the previous evening hadn’t turned up for work and the new guy knew ‘nothing about nothing’. I called Manager Doom in Pak Nam and told her we’d apparently lost her boyfriend. I kept quiet about his relationship with the Italian.

“Doom,” I said. “You got a call from someone claiming to be a lawyer?”

“Yes.”

“Did he say he’d spoken to Te Win?”

“Yes, that’s how he found out about me.”

“Te Win told me nobody had talked to him except police. How do you know the caller was a lawyer?”

“Well, he told me.”

“In Thai?”

“No, he spoke English.”

“Did he mention money?”

The pause was long enough to answer my question.

“How much?” I asked.

“He… he said we could offer an incentive to let him go,” said Doom. “He said they had a lot of experience with negotiation with the Thai police.”

“How much?” I tried again.

“500,000 baht.”

“Quite reasonable I’d say. And you happened to have half a million baht lying around?”

“I have savings. My family isn’t short of money.”

“And you take the word of an English speaking stranger and send him your savings?”

“Look, yes. When you say it like that I know it sounds like madness.”

“I can’t think of a way to say it to make it sound like anything else.”

“I knew something was wrong,” she said. “I hadn’t heard from Te Win for two days. Before that we’d talk on the phone two or three times a day. The lawyer told me things only Te Win could have known.”

“Like what?”

“Like… like about his family in Burma. About our relationship. How else could he get my number? The lawyer told me about the International NGO he was working with. His name and picture were on the site. They had a Paypal account. I sent the money there. They acknowledged receipt right away by email. It was all quite legitimate. I waited for news. Nothing came. Te Win still didn’t call. I couldn’t get through to the lawyer. That’s when I brought you on board.”

I laughed.

“Doom,” I said.

“Yes?”

“You’re pretty stupid for a bank manager.”

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