Within two days, Dr. Andy had fixed another appointment with Debbie, this time at Hotel Intercontinental thereby sustaining the impression that he had good quid. Debbie was keen on bagging this “Big fish” so she prioritized his appointments and did everything to create her part of the “Big impression”. In her last tele-contact, she gave the Doctor a break-down of her quotation for insurance cover as per their last discussion and the Doc responded, not just by accepting the offer but by proposing that she come along with a contract they could sign so that they could seal the deal immediately since he had very limited time. The deal amounted to an annual cover of Ksh 150.000, an amount that would be adjusted depending on the number of workers who would be employed at the Clinic.
The Doctor told Debbie that once he was through with the paper work, he would make a down payment of 75% of the total amount “to nail down the deal for good” and Debbie could not hold back her elation. Next, the Doc revealed that the Clinic cars would all be insured through Debbie’s firm while workers who had assets would be encouraged to consider changing their schemes to enable Debbie take over the insurance packages. Doctor Andy would also try to convince his friends, colleagues and business contacts to link up with Debbie for possible covers in different areas. Some Dutch friends who were contemplating opening businesses in Kenya would all be encouraged to hook up with Debbie while a 750 acre piece of land the Doctor owned in Rift Valley would be under Debbie’s supervision “on a long term”. The opportunities were endless and they were dropped at reasonable intervals.
In the process of their physical and telephone connections, Dr. Andy managed to drop some big names in his list of contacts including three Cabinet Ministers, Western Ambassadors, high flying patients he had allegedly treated in Holland, a Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other Tumbo kubwas. He had learnt the art of name-dropping to increase his sense of importance and to create the impression that he was well connected as a way of trapping his prey. To enhance his profile, he organized to receive strategic but fake phone calls from crooked accomplices and during the conversations, he would talk big as the prey listened with admiration.
“I will be meeting the Minister’s Personal Assistant before I leave but I cannot promise that he will intervene or raise the matter in Parliament”, he said during a fake phone conversation as Debbie sampled the nature of “Big fish” that had just come her way accidentally. There was nothing to suggest that all this was arranged and for her, the future looked bright especially from the point of view of business. She hadn’t been so close to a guy who had good contacts in high office and she decided to take advantage of every opportunity to further her agenda. For her, this was the most natural thing to do.
Dr. Andy had planted a bait in her brain by revealing that he was divorced and as the Doctor talked about business opportunities, Debbie began to play with the idea of using her “personal goods” to tie up things even though the Doctor had not shown any personal or romantic interest in her. As a matter of principle, she was strictly not in the habit of playing this kind of game because she was not cheap but the more Dr. Andy opened up possibilities, the more she began to think that she needed to use her feminine appeal to increase her chances. She considered the contact one of the biggest opportunities she ever bumped into and she wasn’t sure when she would meet another client of the same caliber.
After all, she was single (her current BF was just for screws) and besides, she had nothing to lose in trying her luck on a single, wealthy Doctor who resided abroad and who appeared to have been in possession of vital keys that could begin to open real doors of personal wealth, opulence and prestige she has always dreamed of. At this point, she had no idea that she was beginning to fall into Doctor Andy’s elaborate trap from where she would be entangled to be screwed repeatedly, conned and dumped before she could understand the chain of events.
Holiday at Nyali Beach Hotel
Little did she know that one day, she would look back and blame herself for having been too naïve after someone brought her dreams too close to reality. Simply put, Dr. Andy had perfected the game. He seemed so natural, real, relaxed, wealthy and at peace with himself, traits Debbie admired greatly.
For the Doc, the fundamental question was whether Debbie’s pants would be down in two, three or more weeks. His experience had taught him that it is very easy to cone a woman he had already screwed after pumping her head with lots of fanciful expectations (enhanced with fake displays of wealth) and he ensured that the conning phase of the “Project” always came after his fingers had explored every curve of the subject.
Dr Andy would be travelling back to Holland in a week but before then, he would be going to Mombasa to relax for two days. A day into the holiday at the Nyali Beach Hotel, the Doctor called her to find out if she could do her a favor.
He had bumped into an old friend who was selling his sea-side resort at a “cheap price” of Ksh 5.6 million and he urgently needed someone to value the property and draw up an insurance cover. The property was being sold “under a certificate of urgency” because the owner had gone bankrupt and needed money urgently to deal with a financial crisis. The Doctor explained that if the property was worth Ksh 7.8 million as his friend had claimed, Dr. Andy would buy the property and re-sell it after a short while thereby making a cool profit of Ksh 2.2 million within a very short time.
The favor the Doctor needed from Debbie was very small – whether he could buy her a round air ticket to Mombasa as soon as possible to look at the property and give him an assessment from the point of view of insurance cover. In her business, valuation is part of the business and although she was not a professional in the field of valuation, her education allowed her to make an estimate of a property as long as technical details were available. It was an “all expenses paid” kind of request and Debbie would return to Nairobi as soon as the engagement was over. This was an innocent request from a new client and with all expenses paid (for a week-end trip), there was nothing to lose.
What did surprise Debbie was the amount of cash that was at the Doctor’s immediate disposal because all along, she hadn’t figured him out as a millionaire who could buy property worth more than Ksh 5 million in the twinkle of an eye. Now, everything began to fall into place including the big names Dr. Andy had been talking about in the middle of their conversations. There is just no way she could miss such an opportunity and when she called the Doctor back after an hour, it was a big “Yes I have decided to be there for you Doc”. Andy could not resist a smile especially at the thought that she was “coming slowly” his way. The bait had worked perfectly well.
In reality, Dr. Andy was not on holiday. He was working on “Project Debbie” and every move he made was well calculated. There is no one who was selling him anything. The thing is… before he left Nairobi, Dr. Andy had identified (through Newspaper adverts) a property in Mombasa that would fit into his plan and eventually posed as a buyer of a bungalow that was going for Ksh 5.2 million. He arranged with an agent to view the property at a time when Debbie shall have landed and “ready to help”. The plan was that after viewing the property, there would be no further contact with the agent although Debbie shall have been convinced that the transaction was real and that she was doing the Doctor a favor in a multi-million bizz deal.
Debbie’s Arrival in Mombasa
He would introduce Debbie to the agent as her “business associate” while Debbie would be informed (away from the agent) that the agent was working for the property owner who was Dr. Andy’s old class-mate at a US Medical school. According to the scheme, his tycoon pal who was in crisis had traveled to Dubai on a Bizz trip but was expected back the following day. Once Debbie’s work was over, the Doctor would resume negotiations with the property owner and seal a deal which would be presented to Debbie as a way of helping an old friend who was in shit.
Debbie would be told that the Dr. had extended his stay in Mombasa with another two days to enable him examine the deal and make a decision. The strategy of Dr. Andy was to pose as though he was partly relying on Debbie’s assessment of the property to make a decision on whether or not to purchase it at the quoted price. He wanted to make Debbie feel that he had developed a lot of confidence in her as a way of pulling her closer.
Debbie would be picked at the airport by Taxi on Saturday morning at around 10 am with Dr. Andy at hand to welcome her to Mombasa. She would be driven to the Hotel where Dr. Andy was putting up and exposed to “any treat” as they awaited for time to pass for the appointment with the property agent at 2 pm. A key plunk was that Debbie was booked for lunch with Dr. Andy at around 12.30 after which they would go through the process of what was required as per Debbie’s specifications. At 2pm, they were scheduled to join the agent to view the property after which they would pass time sight-seeing, awaiting for Debbie’s flight. Once Debbie’s work was over, she would fly back to Nairobi the same evening as Dr. Andy took a decision on what he needed to do next. Everything was planned form A-Z and the scheme looked fairly innocent and business-like.
When she arrived at the airport in Mombasa, she was immaculately dressed and as per Dr. Andy’s program, everything flowed smoothly. She was playing her part of the game and when she boarded the plane at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, she had left “all options open”. Although she had a BF, she was nobody’s wife and Dr. Andy was nobody’s hubby so her position was that she would use her instincts without being too aggressive. Her plan was not to make any “first moves” but would keep her eyes open for any signals from the Doc.
The Taxi halted at the Hotel lobby and the two disembarked and tip-toed into the hotel. Since she was scheduled to travel back to Nairobi on the same day in the evening, she had carried a minimum of clothes and other “Lady’s stuff” in her small suitcase while Dr. Andy had booked her in a separate room for a few hours as she conducted business and awaited for her flight back to Nairobi. For the Doc, booking her in a separate room was a deliberate ploy meant to eliminate any thoughts of possible romantic activity although for him, hanyaring Debbie was the main Project. He had learnt to go round this agenda as long as necessary, choosing to make a move when things were really ripe and when he thought he had a 95% chance of “getting right into the honey-comb”.
Once in her room, Debbie utilized the time she had to “fix her looks” and other stuff before Dr. Andy picked her for lunch as per the program. The lunch-break was mainly spent on bizz talk and within two and a half hours of contact, they were chatting as if they had known each other for a long time. Slowly, Dr. Andy began to take control of the conversation as he continued to construct “reliable castles in the air” especially in the area of business. He had already rubbed (indirectly) his fake “millionaire status” in Debbie’s mind and he assumed the airs of a real tycoon.
Dr Andy’s Estimates
By Kenyan standards, Debbie belonged to the “monied class” but her bank balance did not place her in the “millionaire class”. This was a rare opportunity to mix with “a real millionaire” and she took things quite easy. Anyone would be interested in understanding how millionaires make their money and here she was, taking lunch with one of them after flying all the way from Nairobi in an all expenses paid trip at Nyali Beach!
If she played her cards well, she thought, may be, she would become a major beneficiary on a long term. Little did she know that she was dealing with a professional con artist who was not only dying to lay his hands on her precious goods but was also bent on coning her money through crooked deals.
Through conversations, Dr. Andy had made his own estimations and he believed that at her level, he would walk away with not less than Ksh 150,000 and so he was ready to spend Ksh 50,000 to catch her, enjoy himself and walk away with Ksh 100,000 “in profits”. He had played this game over and over again and the cash he was spending on Debbie was earned in another “deal” that is currently off topic.
For the Doctor, Debbie “was responding well” and it was just a few days before he could strike. In the final installment next Tuesday, discover how Debbie found herself willingly on the arms of Dr. Andy in his hotel room after missing her flight and how she was made to withdraw a huge amount of cash from her Bank account before Dr. Andy melted into thin air, never to return again.
Okoth Osewe
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