Life Deluxe

by Jens Lapidus

Natalie said that if she didn’t understand, they didn’t have a deal.

  He folded, explained his business—it took over an hour.

  He was pedagogical, thorough. Almost seemed like he took pleasure in explaining. Showing how smart, multifaceted, advanced he was. Above all: how much money he was handling.

  First: the key to success was transfers. Everything was ruled by transferal.

  Transfers from one economic system to another. Transfers from dirty to clean areas. Transferal in a cycle. Transferal in three vital steps: placement, concealment, reintroduction. Without them, there was no closed circuit.

  Again, the foundations: placement, stratification, and reintegration into the legal economy.

  The first step: placement. The funds were almost always in cash. The cash had to be moved into the financial system somehow. Cash was lethal—nothing raised suspicions as quickly as a bunch of bills.

  Step two: concealment. Stratification to distance the money from the source. They used several systems, several transactions. Companies, private persons, trusts, geographical areas with high levels of bank secrecy. Transfers between accounts in different banks around the world.

  The final step: reintegration into the legal economy. Reintroducing the illicit capital so that it could be consumed or invested without risk. So that everything appeared clean and legal.

  JW and his people were in control, creating plans, being consulted at every turn, every step of the way. “We don’t just give advice, we implement the entire chain,” he said. “We execute everything that I just told you about.”

  But now regulators within the EU and the OECD were applying pressure. Countries were implementing anti-terror laws to prevent shady transactions across borders. Many countries’d gotten rid of their bank secrecy laws. Switzerland had thrown in the towel years ago. Several Channel Islands gave up last year. Liechtenstein was on its way. Even most of the Swedish banks were much more careful now. No one wanted to become known as the dirty bank. Someone who wanted to make a deposit often had to answer questions and show valid ID if the bankers thought the transaction seemed unusual. Or if the bankers didn’t understand the transaction’s background, they began sniffing around. What was its purpose, where did the money come from, and what was it going to be used for? They wanted to see contracts, receipts, invoices, or other stuff that backed up your explanation. They wanted to know precisely who wanted to deposit what.

  It was also increasingly difficult to use front men. The banks wanted proof that you owned more than 25 percent of the company, that you were the one who had the controlling interest. They wanted to know that you were the actual principal. Which was precisely what a criminal wanted to hide.

  But JW had a good entry point—that’s what he called it. The men in the currency-exchange group that he collaborated with made sure that the little birds behind the counters in the currency-exchange offices never asked questions.

  Anyway, the main principle was to do only things that looked normal. Nothing that attracted attention. That created good relationships with bankers at other banks too. Created routines, trust. Once all that was in place, the deposit sums could be increased.

  Bladman controlled three companies that did reasonably important business, in electronics, financial consulting, and catering. The important part: the companies actually had real customers, they had real income, they dealt with the real world. Front men were listed as the owners, but they could produce bank accounts, fake share books, and edited statements.

  The electronics company had a Web site, a girl who manned a call center, even a small warehouse in Haninge. It sold laptops for fifteen million kronor a year. The thing: 80 percent of the sales were fake. Deposits were made into accounts without a sale taking place. The smart part: it all looked normal enough on the books. It wasn’t so easy for the bank to see that eight out of ten deposits were made by the same twenty people.

  The consulting company operated on the same principle. It had a real office space, a dude who was employed to help small business owners with their bookkeeping, real phone, and Internet plans. Companies all over Sweden paid for capital consulting. The company had a turnover of twenty million kronor per year. The thing, again: 80 percent of the time that the dude wrote invoices, no business’d been done. But the clients were real—that was a point of strength.

  The catering firm rented space in a kitchen in a basement venue on Ringvägen. It employed a chef. It delivered lunches, dinners, and business buffets for thirteen million a year. Maaaaany employees, who were paid a salary. The thing: the chef was a gambling addict, and 80 percent of the grub was fictive. The employees were figments of the controller’s imagination.

  They had other companies too, where the business was fake all the way through. Antique furniture, tanning booths, and export companies—a lot was just on paper. It didn’t matter—the companies looked like they had millions in turnaround every year. Cash-intensive industries—perfect. The banks thought everything appeared normal when the companies dumped ten grand a day into the service boxes. But the export company was best of all. All the payments came from abroad: its inflated invoices were matched by zero deliveries.

  JW ran a tight ship, kept everything in check: you had to be careful about increasing the sums—they had to correspond with what the made-up companies might be expected to earn per day, and the deposits had to be made in old, wrinkly bills.

  All together JW and Bladman had a large number of placement tools. Many ways to introduce illegal cash into the system.

  But they didn’t do everything via the companies. They deposited a lot straight off via errand boys—bums, alcoholics, and small-time criminals. Not junkies or gambling addicts—they couldn’t be trusted. Cash deposits made directly with Western Union, Moneybooker, Forex, and, above all, the currency-exchange offices controlled by JW’s business partner. They avoided the hawala joints and the Africa people—the terror hysteria was too rampant there. The errand boys made small deposits, under ten thousand kronor at a time, straight into the Swedish companies’ accounts or to companies abroad. It ended up being a lot anyway: one dude could wander around town and make fifteen deposits in one day.

  And last but not least: they often used mules directly. Loaded suitcases with one thousand tightly packed five-hundred-kronor bills, filled hidden compartments in cars with euros, let some down-and-out person travel with their stomach stuffed with diamonds. It was dangerous, of course—the mule could rip you off or be found out. That was why JW needed dangerous friends. He needed the support of the right organization. The mules had to be scared off from trying something stupid.

  Summa summarum: JW claimed that he invested more than one hundred million per year in safe locations.

  The second step was more refined. The actual stratification.

  There were companies in Liechtenstein, the Cayman Islands, the Isle of Man, Dubai, and Panama. They’d even bought their own shell bank in Antigua where they were in control of the whole show. Northern White Bank Ltd.—JW loved the name. If suspicious eyes were ever turned on them, they could personally decide to shutter the entire bank and destroy the bookkeeping. Oops, we just had a fire—what terrible luck.

  They opened bank accounts for the companies in the same countries or in other countries with better secrecy policies. They had walking accounts in more than ten countries through which they diverted deposits. The idea: the bank had clear instructions that all incoming money was automatically to be transferred to the next bank in the next country. But not too quickly. If a deposit was diverted directly, the honest bank could grow suspicious and its warning system would be set off. The instructions to the banks were to empty the accounts over ninety-day periods. Bit by bit. What was more: each bank got even clearer instructions that if some regulatory authority was in touch and asked about some transaction, it had to inform the bank in the other country, which then had to divert the money immediately. This method created tricky paths for Big Brother to follow. Even better: it create
d an early-warning system if something were to go to hell.

  The setup and the structure varied depending on the client and the sum.

  A significant portion was located in European countries or in the Caribbean. But according to JW, things were changing now. Actually, the best countries were Panama and certain emirate states.

  Best of all: JW’d enrolled the perfect banker. He didn’t want to mention him by name, but the guy’d apparently been CEO and head of a branch office in Danske Bank. An upstanding gentleman. A man from the real business world. “My man at the front,” as JW called him.

  The guy lived down in Liechtenstein but mostly traveled around the world. Ran the actual management company, Northern White Asset Management, and the shell bank, which took care of everything. The guy had connections with the offshore institutions and the law firms that helped get fake invoices, trust setups, certificates, and other documentation needed to create the impression that legitimate transactions were taking place.

  He made sure the invoices were sent, that the banks issued credit cards. To put it simply: the guy held all the strings. And he created trust, both with the people down there and with the clients here at home.

  Last but not least: integration. The reintegration of the money back into the legal economy. The final step. The most important step. Everyone wanted to be able to use their assets freely, without arousing suspicions.

  JW’d been the brain behind the main setup. Many clients demanded special solutions. Sometimes a foreign company lent money to a client. The loan explained why the client suddenly could have so much money, from nowhere. Sometimes a foreign company bought property from a client at a crazy inflated price. The gains were totally legal, after all, even if it was taxable. Sometimes a trust was set up that made real investments on the stock exchange: the gains were white as snow even though the money that’d originally been invested was bloody. Sometimes a company in Panama simply paid for a client’s health insurance, home, or new seventy-foot motorboat. How would the authorities in Sweden ever find out that the client had a Sunseeker yacht docked in a marina in Cannes?

  But JW’s favorite setup was entirely different. It was magically elegant. At the same time, awfully simple.

  The money arrived at the client’s company in some appropriate country. The company signed a contract through JW’s Northern White Asset Management and opened a bank account in a bigger, better-known bank. That bank issued credit cards to Northern White Asset Management on behalf of the client’s company. The credit cards were sent to the client in Sweden.

  In other words: suddenly the client had access to a card connected to all the money he’d collected through bank robberies, blackmail, drugs, sex trafficking, or regular old tax evasion. And there was never an actual person’s name on the card. No one could connect the client to all the money being spent. Everything went through the Northern White company instead.

  It was so simple. It was so elegant.

  JW grinned. “Personally, I have a MasterCard Gold. Issued by a bank in the Bahamas, Arner Bank and Trust. Big Brother will never know that I consume like an oligarch.”

  Natalie listened.

  “We have more than two hundred clients in Sweden,” JW said. “Everything from your father’s people to the financial elite in Djursholm. Everyone wants to get away with it. And everyone does get away with it thanks to help from me, Bladman, and my deluxe guy down there.”

  Honestly, Natalie was impressed. By the size of the operation, the number of clients, and the complexity of it all. Most of all, she was impressed that he’d managed to run it all from prison.

  “How’d you manage to do it from the inside?”

  He laughed. “Let me put it this way: I had help.”

  He got up and got dressed.

  Natalie sat on the edge of the bed. Put her panties on and fastened her bra.

  “So you want the war to end,” she said. “You want me to work with you. But you had another proposition. Something more you want from me. What?”

  “Like I said: to begin with, I want you to hire only me in the future.”

  Natalie pulled her pants on. “That’s not a problem.”

  “Second of all, I want your organization’s full protection when shit hits the AC, so to speak.”

  She looked questioningly at him. Did he have in mind Melissa Cherkasova? The politician Bengt Svelander? The Russian’s building project through Östersjön, the Nordic Pipe?

  “You’ve already said that,” Natalie said. “What more do you want?”

  JW looked deeply into her eyes. “I want you to kill Stefanovic.”

  For a second or two, Natalie didn’t know what to say. It was so direct, so unexpected, and so brutal to be coming from JW. But she recovered quickly—this was her reality.

  “I’d want nothing more myself. But let me tell you, it’s not so easy, ending that fucker.”

  “I’ve understood as much. But I can help you. He trusts me. I can give you what you need. In exchange, I will give you what you want.”

  JW rose, opened the door, and walked out.

  Adam was still sitting on the couch, looked as if he hadn’t moved a muscle.

  Natalie gazed out through the window. Down onto the street.

  She saw JW exit the hotel lobby. A white Audi pulled up next to him. She saw a man in the driver’s seat.

  He had light brown hair. Something about him felt strange—Natalie couldn’t put her finger on what. He reminded her of Thomas.

  She stared at the Audi.

  She saw a sticker on the car’s back window: HERTZ.

  The car rolled off. The sticker was still visible through the back window.

  It was a rental car. Probably because JW wanted to own as little as possible that could show up in some record.

  Then she thought again. A rental car.

  Anyone could rent a car. Of course.

  What an idiot she’d been.

  She grabbed her phone.

  52

  Jorge’s head was filled with images.

  How he’d run up the stairs. Heard screams from down below. Cops, the cabbie. Maybe neighbors.

  Doors with names over the mail slot. Four on every landing.

  No real plan, this wasn’t his home turf, but he wasn’t gonna fucking give up when he’d gotten this far. Shawshank—that’s exactly who he was gonna be tonight.

  The five-oh oughta be forced to stop for a few minutes: the cabbie down there with the toy gun pointing straight at his mug was like a stop block.

  J-boy panted. His heart was beating faster than he was running.

  How many stories did this building have, anyway?

  The answer came immediately. He was standing in front of a door that seemed to be made out of plywood. It was locked. The end of the stairwell. Didn’t look like there were any apartments up here. But there were boxes on the floor, some kind of generator, and a bunch of cables. He picked up the generator. It probably weighed over a hundred pounds. It felt like his back was breaking.

  He staggered. Almost fell. Then straightened up. Held the generator bulk in front of him in a cramped grip. Thundered straight into the closed door.

  The sound: like the building was crashing down around him. Lots of dust. A rattling noise. He’d slam-dunked the generator straight through the door. Two-zero to Jorge.

  He looked around. The sheet of plywood behind him was hanging on one hinge. He understood why there were boxes and a generator outside the door—someone was in the process of turning this attic into a massive apartment.

  High ceilings. Beams up there. Three large holes in three different spots in the ceiling covered with hard plastic. Irregular pillars everywhere. Paintbrushes, cables, and worker’s gloves in large crates standing on the filthy gray protective paper that was covering the floor. Building machines, ladders, and wooden boards were leaning up against the white-painted walls.

  Jorge didn’t have time to loiter and look around—as he grabbed a ladder, he just had
time to think: the Svens loved their renovated attic apartments the way his homies loved their tricked-out Benzes. Everyone wanted something to pimp. Everyone wanted something to brag about. The elevator didn’t go all the way up, and there were five flights of stairs to walk, maybe with a stroller—who gave? You couldn’t stand upright in half the square footage because the ceilings were so slanted—who gave? Who gave that the windows were set so deep, they had to live in semidarkness year round? The Svens: just as horny for status as everyone else—they were just into weirder shit.

  He propped up the ladder. Climbed toward one of the holes in the ceiling. Struck the hard plastic with a screwdriver he’d found in one of the crates. They were obviously building skylights here.

  He slipped the screwdriver in under the edge of the plastic. The ladder swayed. He bent the plastic back. Pulled on it. Tore off small nails and tape.

  He heard voices yelling down in the stairwell. They were on their way up.

  He got a good grip with his fingers. The hard plastic cut into his skin. He didn’t give a shit. He used both hands and put his whole weight into it. It was bulging inward now. He climbed one more step up the ladder.

  Felt the cold night air hit his face. He slipped his backpack off.

  The ladder swayed.

  He almost lost his grip.

  He managed to press aside enough of the plastic to haul himself up. Pushed the backpack out.

  Both elbows on the roof now. He was standing on tiptoes on the ladder. He pulled his torso up. He tore himself on some nails that were still stuck in the material.

  The hard plastic scraped his back. He kicked the ladder to the side.

  Pulled the rest of his body up and out. It’d started to rain again.

  The roof was probably slippery as hell.

  He hunched down. Slipped forward a few feet. Tried to get a look down at the street. He didn’t need to: the cop cars were projecting a light show that colored the building facades blue all the way up here.

  The culos down there could mobilize as much as they wanted—Shawshank was on the go.