A Matter of Honour: Harry Nichols: Investigative Journalist, #2

By D M Macdonald

WHEN HARRY NICHOLS IS FORCED TO FACE THE TRAGEDY IN HIS PAST, HE KNOWS THERE CAN BE NO FALSE STEPS BECAUSE WHEN YOU STRIKE AT THE MOST POWERFUL IN THE LAND, IT'S KILL OR BE KILLED.

Many years ago Harry's brother-in-law, Evan was brutally murdered as he stood outside the courtroom where he was to present evidence of a massive corruption scheme.

The rumours were that organised crime, politicians and the police were involved.

Immediately afterwards Evan's wife, Harry's oldest sister and her children were spirited away into witness protection. Before she left Maggie begged Harry to leave the case alone and stay safe. Harry lived up to his promise and has not seen or heard from her for thirteen years.

Since then he has gained an international reputation as an investigative journalist. As a result of this he is pulled unwillingly into re-examining the case that tore his family apart so long ago.

Suddenly the dormant case erupts around him creating a maelstrom spewing death once more. Using every resource he has, an older and wiser Harry prepares to face their enemies and fight to save his loved ones from the powerful forces who will stop at nothing to destroy them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: D M Macdonald
• Release date: May 23, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201733643

Book preview

1

It had been a miserable evening. Apart from anything else I'd failed at the one thing I'd come for. My face ached from constant smiling. My neck ached from constant nodding. I had bruised shoulders because they'd been slapped so often by people I didn't know. My ears rang and my feet hurt. And all for nothing I told the young waitress as I slid off my stool.

Sometime later I woke up. Or rather, became aware. More or less. It was pitch dark, it stank and I was being shaken apart. Through the fog in my brain I recognised those smells. Farm smells. Dog, horse, oil, diesel. Ah, I thought, Anna's taking me home. I smiled. Trust her to make it as uncomfortable as possible. That would teach me to talk to pretty young girls the moment I was away from her. I drifted off happily.

When I woke again the shaking was far worse. I diagnosed major road corrugations. It was even worse than the goat tracks up the mountains in Kashmir. The fog in my brain lifted a little but the confusion didn’t. There were no corrugated roads between the city and home. Anyway, Anna knew I was staying at our hole in the wall city pad, so she had no reason to come and get me. Then who had?

And in what? A moving vehicle. Yeah right, dummy. Maybe the fog hadn't cleared. I shook my head. Bad idea. I was instantly swamped by nausea. I waited while my stomach descended back down my gullet which took a while because the bumps in the road kept bringing it back up again. When it was reasonably stable I took stock and started concentrating on the outside of my body.

The pitch blackness was because I was blindfolded. The discomfort was because my hands were tied behind my back. I twisted to relieve the pressure and struck a cramp across my shoulders and back. Gasping in pain I tensed and immediately cramped my legs as well. I screamed with pain and curled up into a ball. Then I remembered from past experience that if I rocked I could unclench my teeth and breathe in short gasps. Enough at least to start stretching out the cramped muscles.

When the cramps finally faded I tested how much freedom of movement I had. I'd been tied up like this once before, by Anna's malevolent cousin Luka Mladenovic, and got out of it. This time, maybe not. As well as my hands and feet being tied together I seemed to be tethered to the walls of the van or truck or whatever it was, as well.

The vehicle wasn't new or in good nick either. The bloody thing had no springs and everything rattled. It had holes in it too. I could hear the wind whistling through…what? A partly open window? A poorly sealed door? That might account for the rattling which was enough to wake the goddamned dead.

My mind continued to clear but my last memories were still hazy. I remembered talking to Greg, my boss, and the team. We all sneered at the food, the wine and the executives who took off as soon as they could. But the others had gathered up their partners and friends and gone home. Only I was alone. Anna always avoided functions like this. Too much like her mother's unbending social compliance, she said.

`Mother despised the people at those things too. She always said they were like trash beneath her feet. Even though she needed to be there as much as they did. But I don't, so unless you win an award I'm not going.'

So rather than go back to the hole in the wall alone I'd stayed at the bar.

And now I was here, wherever here was. Why? Who? What next? I reached into my memory. The celebration was my film launch. The one I made in Kashmir. Finally about to hit the airwaves. Cheap champagne and soggy savouries. Then when you turned around the people who nodded, smiled with their mouths and patted you on the back in the first ten minutes were nowhere to be seen.

They'd gone off to glamorous after parties leaving you, the poor sods who made the bloody thing, half drunk, tired, hungry and figuring out how to get home without getting cold, wet, mugged, or arrested.

Normally I avoided these functions like the plague but not that one. I'd planned a series of filmed exposés on the corruption of multinational companies. The ones whose experiments in remote places literally sacrificed the locals for profits. But the money people had pulled the purse strings tight after this first one.

So I abased myself in front of them. To beg. They were kind and congratulatory and suggested that maybe, sometime in the future they might consider, possibly, thinking about the next step. If Mr Nichols could write an outline…

Except Mr Nichols already had. He had in fact already written the complete script for the second one and detailed outlines for the other two, completing the series of four. One for each continent. The corporations didn't discriminate. The poor and ignorant were all fair game.

But taking it up to the huge conglomerates that funded them and their corporate mates was against their religion. I suspected the only reason they let me do this documentary was because the company involved, RS Holdings, was already on the ropes and wouldn't give them anything anyway.

That was only thanks to me and my beloved, Anna Felby. My boss, Greg, said I should be grateful that we got to expose even one of these rapacious, amoral bastards. Great. Anna and I nearly died getting RS to face the law. Did we have to do it again to get the others?

`What about the poor bloody victims?' I'd told the young and friendly waitress. `Brain damaged kids in Kashmir, dead farmers in Guatemala. My own sister.'

If she was bored she hid it well and seemed to anticipate my alcoholic needs with the aplomb of a much older person. I suppose that should have alerted me but it didn't. After far too many drinks and far too little food my eyelids began sticking together. I told the little waitress that she should go and look after some of the other customers.

I reached out to tap her arm and fell forwards. My head fetched up against her chest. I rebounded and almost toppled backwards off my stool. Obviously I was far drunker than I thought. Drunker, in fact, than I should have been. I tried to apologise but couldn't manage the words. Someone steadied me as my legs turned to jelly and folded under me. I didn't see who.

I remembered thinking vaguely that maybe I'd been drugged and that I really shouldn't have shit-canned my superiors. Had I exposed a nerve? Maybe this time I'd lucked out. Then even that thought slid away and I knew no more.

Now I saw that the girl must have been a decoy. My paranoia notched up to full alert. But was it paranoia? I really did have enemies. The main players in RS Holding's collapse were in the caboose but there must have been plenty of others who stood to lose a lot of money. People I didn't even know about. People with revenge on their minds. It was just a year since they were indicted and the court case was only now in full bloom.

Then there was the Serbian Mafia. Anna and I had been instrumental in the demise of the scions of one of its most powerful leaders, her previously unknown cousin, Vlado Mladenovic. But considering the lads were plotting to overthrow him, I didn't think he'd come calling.

My contemplations were interrupted when the vehicle lurched suddenly, throwing me across the floor. And though I was lying on what felt, and smelt like, old feed bags and horse blankets, there were gaps and the floor was metal. I rolled around uncontrollably, cracking my hips, elbows and shoulders on it.

The rocking increased and I could have sworn we'd left any kind of road and were now driving over open paddocks. Then as I was thinking about what to do when my captors finally came for me, there was a grinding sound and something rolled across the metal floor. There was a sharp pain as it slammed into my head.

My next thought was, If it hurts like this, I don't want to wake up. Too late. I was awake and there was no rattling or lurching or shaking. Slowly my mind began to form proper thoughts. I wasn't in a vehicle anymore and there was light through my closed eyes. So no blindfold. That was a start. I stretched my legs and arms. Nope, I was still tied up but I wasn't lying on a hard floor or smelly bags. It was a bed.

I heard a slight movement. My captors were in the room. I opened my eyes. The sun speared through a high window straight into my face and I instantly shut my eyes as tears flooded them. But not before I saw two figures sitting on the far side of what looked like an old barn. They were dressed in black from head to foot including ski masks.

I opened my eyes again, slowly, and turned away from the direct sun’s rays. The barn was large and tumbledown. The sole other window, directly below the high one, was filthy, covered in cobwebs and cracked across both its panes. The walls were rusting corrugated iron with entire panels missing and many gaps between the ones that remained. Weeds grew through the spaces where the cracked concrete floor and the rusted edges of the iron failed to meet.

The high roof, where there was one, was sagging and some panels of corrugated iron hung down like curtains and waved in the breeze. If there was a doorway, I couldn't see it. The place was a wreck. Apart from a screeching flock of cockatoos in the distance and the creaking of the swaying iron, there was silence. That included the two black clad figures who sat perfectly still, staring at me.

`Well, now what?' I asked. I waited.

Hopefully that would get them going, I thought. They kidnapped me so they must have a reason. Let them tell me what it was. But they didn't. After a while one of them got up and left. The other sat and stared. I started to get angry. I figured that if they had evil intent they could have despatched me any time in the last—certainly many hours, maybe days. And they hadn't. But if I showed any aggression they might, so I kept quiet.

The first one came back in with a bottle of water and a chocolate bar. I took a close look at the figure's hands. They were small, female and young. It was a woman, maybe both of them were. That was good. Women were more compassionate than men. Then I remembered Anna's mother. Not always.

The girl stuck a straw in the bottle and held it up to my mouth. I hadn't realised until that moment that I was desperately thirsty. I dragged at the water like there was no tomorrow. I hoped that wasn't an omen as I bolted down the chocolate bar pieces she fed me as well.

The woman sat down again as I swallowed the last of the chocolate. The two of them looked at me, then at each other. I got the impression they didn't know what to do next. That all their plans involved just getting me here and now they'd run out of ideas.

`Can tell me why I'm here?' I asked. They stared on. `Or…who you are? I don't mean names or anything but…your organisation, maybe?'

One of them snorted. I couldn't tell if it was a disgusted snort or a laughing one. The one who had brought to water and chocolate stood up again and came over to the side of the bed.

`You're Harry Nichols, right?'

Her voice was very young. I said nothing. I needed her to speak again because I thought I recognised it.

`Answer me. You are Harry Nichols?'

`You know I am.'

`And you have a sister called Margot.'

2

Fear sent cold sweat down the back of my neck. I knew where I'd heard the voice. It was the young woman from the launch. But that wasn't what terrified me. The years fell away. The pain, the loss and the fear from long ago rose up, sending a mist across my eyes. I swallowed hard. How did these women know that? Were they sent to find her? To kill her and her family even after all this time?

`No, I don't.' I sent a silent apology to my lovely sister. That I had to deny even knowing her tore my heart in two.

`You also have a sister named Eve.’ The high, light voice continued. `Don't lie. We know you do. And you have two nieces called Kayla and Zoe too. Don't you, Harry Nichols?'

I swallowed again and my voice came out as a croak. `I don't know what you're talking about. I don't know these people. Now if you just let me go I promise I won't say anything about—' I nodded at the broken barn.

`You're not going anywhere and neither are we until you admit it. All of it.' The two of them looked at each other and nodded.

`Why? I'm in pain and I need to pee so if I knew these people don't you think I'd say so? But I don't.'

`Why can't you say you know them? Is it because they're in witness protection?'

I must have twitched or jerked or something. Of course she was right. So she must think I knew where Maggie and the girls were. That's why they were holding me. It was time to call it.

`You’re right. I do have a sister called Maggie and two little nieces called Kayla and Zoe, and yes, they are all in witness protection but hear me, and hear me well. I don't know where they are. That's because they're in witness protection. So you can hold me here as long as you like, you won't get to them no matter what you do to me. That's why it's called witness protection.'

`Even from a brother.'

`Even from a brother. I don't know how you found out all of that but you can stick it up your arse and take it back to whoever hired you.'

These two little crooks didn't deserve any quarter at all. They were clearly far older than they sounded.

They stood as one and walked out leaving me with a full bladder and a cold sweat that failed to dissipate as I contemplated the past that had come roaring back because of them.

I was nineteen when my brother-in-law Evan was killed outside the court where he was about to give evidence in a high-profile corruption trial. Because of threats to his family in the lead up to the case, the whole family had been put under police guard. He was surrounded by his legal team and police officers when a hit man walked up behind him, shot him in the head and melted away into the crowd.

As a result my sister Maggie and her two little girls were immediately placed into witness protection. I was away playing football in Western Australia so I didn't see Maggie and the girls, who were then six and four, before they were whisked away.

I was told not to attend Evan's funeral but I did and that was the last time I saw my family. I told Maggie then that I would avenge Evan's death but she begged me to leave it alone. One death in the family was one too many. So, swallowing my rage I vowed to her that I would leave the case alone. And I had. But the pain and rage over Evan's death, and my impotence in the face of the destruction of my family, fuelled my need to expose injustice wherever I found it.

The evidence that Evan was supposed to have had against a raft of career criminals, businesspeople, politicians and senior police, was never found and was thought to have died with him. That these two had come looking for Maggie meant that not everyone believed that.

The women returned about quarter of an hour later. They stood at the end of the bed and the bigger one said, `Who do you think we are?'

`I don't know who you are,' I snapped, `but I can guess who you represent.'

`Oh yes, who?'

`People who fear my sister and her family. A crooked politician called Curtis Tennent, perhaps? Or a bent copper or two. How's that for starters?'

`What do you know about these people? Have you been investigating them?' The high voice sounded quite querulous. Had I got this wrong? No.

`Not yet,' I snarled.

`Well, would you? If we asked you to?'

I stared at them. `What do you mean?'

`Could you expose the people who caused your sister and her kids to be hidden away? Like you do with other bad people?'

I stared some more. `I told you, I don't know where she is. You cannot use me to find her.'

`What if I tell you we don't need you to find her? We know where she is.'

The girl took off her balaclava and shook out a mane of wavy brown hair. She turned to her companion who did the same.

`What we want is for her to be free. I think you are our uncle and we want you to work for us.'

My jaw flopped onto my chest. Eventually I managed to say, `You're Kayla and Zoe? But why did you—' I waved at the barn.

`We sent letters to your office and when we found out that you lived on your girlfriend's farm we sent letters there too. But you never replied.'

`So you kidnapped me.'

`We had no other options.'

`You drugged me, tied me up and are holding me prisoner. A bit extreme, don't you think?'

`We couldn't contact you any other way.'

`You didn't do a bad job at the launch. Why didn't you just ask then?'

`We didn't want anyone to know we were interested in you. I told you. What if the wrong people were listening? We don't know if these people are watching you. We know they know about you.'

`How do—look I don't want to wet myself and I will unless you untie me long enough for me to have a pee.'

One of the girls pointed at the other who untied my feet from the bed but left my hands tied behind me.

`Come on. I can't do it with my hands tied behind my back.' The last thing I wanted was to have my young niece undo my zipper.

I fast tracked after her to a sagging barn door as she ran ahead of me. She ran to the ancient van parked outside and pulled out a rifle. My eyes bugged.

`Just in case you get any ideas,' she snapped. `Zoe, untie his hands and let him pee then tie him up again.'

While I emptied my very full bladder I took a look at my surroundings. Open countryside, almost bare sweeping paddocks with dark cattle in the far distance, high tree-covered mountains looming behind them. Far higher than the ones behind Anna's Marysville farm. Those were the foothills, this was the main act. The true high country.

A quick glance behind me confirmed that the building I'd been in may once have been a working barn, but it was now a ruin. It wasn't much of a prison either. Except for the rifle it would be easy for me to escape my juvenile captors. Even then, I doubted she'd shoot me except by accident.

I was wrong. The first step I took after I zipped up was answered by a bullet hitting the ground where my next step would have been.

I threw up my hands. `Hey, hey. Don't shoot me. I didn't do anything.'

`And you’d better not. I'm a very good shot and we need to talk some more. Zoe.'

I stood compliantly while Zoe tied my hands again. Together we walked back into the barn. I sat on the side of the bed while she again tethered my hands and feet to the bed frame.

`You really don't have to do this. But since you have I think I deserve some more information. Why do you think these…er…bad people…will be watching me?'

`We've looked up all the information about our dad’s case on the web and we worked out that they knew who you were and the only reason you weren't attacked was because you were so young.'

`The same age you are now, right?'

`How do you know that?'

`Simple maths. If you're Kayla Treloar, I'm thirteen years older than you and I'm thirty-two. And Zoe's seventeen.'

`Yeah, well…But if Mum's still scared to come out of protection it must mean the bad guys are still out there. So it makes sense they'll watch you. Especially now you're a famous investigator.'

`Journalist,' I murmured.

`What?'

`I'm a journalist, not an investigator.'

`But you investigate things and you and your girlfriend got that really corrupt company shut down. That means that the ones who killed our dad would have good reason to be afraid of you if they thought you were going after them. So if they, or someone they knew, overheard us asking you to do that they'd know you'd be investigating before you really were. And that would be very dangerous. They'd have known we knew where Mum was and they'd follow us.'

`So what you're asking me to do is find out—'

`Investigate.'

`Right, investigate the events of thirteen years ago that led to your dad being killed.'

`Yes,' they chorused.

`And if I say no. It's too dangerous, too hard, too long ago. Then what?'

`We'll tell the police that you sexually attacked us.'

`So now you're adding blackmail to kidnap, drugging, assault and false imprisonment. My word, you're proper little crooks yourselves.'

`We're desperate and that calls for desperate measures,' said Kayla. `Then of course we could just shoot you. It would be ages before anyone found you out here. And no one would ever believe two young country girls could do such a thing.'

I laughed. She looked so fierce and I think for a moment she actually believed she'd do that. But I knew she was Maggie's daughter and while she might have learned passion at the same feet I'd learned it, she hadn't learned violence there.

My mother died when I was five and Maggie was fifteen. It had taken two years for her to die and during that time my big sister took up the reigns of running the family. So the only mother I remembered was Maggie. When I was eleven my dad dropped dead in the street outside his office and for the next two years Maggie took up all the slack of raising me and my sister Eve.

When she was twenty-two Maggie married Evan Treloar, the younger son of a wealthy family in the newspaper business. Evan quickly became big brother and substitute dad, and warmed my soul. By then Eve had begun her international search for meaning and left the country, so it was just us until first Kayla, then Zoe, arrived.

Add Evan's brother Robert and for the first time in my life I had a real family.

3

Maggie nurtured passion in both Eve and me and I could hear her voice echoing now in her daughter and smiled.

`If you care about something, don't ever give up on it. And always follow your dream, no matter how hard the road gets.'

These girls might not kill or punish me but they might well try to go it alone and that way disaster lay.

Kayla stared at me. `It's not funny. We're not a joke.'

`I told you Kayla, didn't I? I told you he'd laugh at us,' whispered Zoe.

`Oh, do be quiet Zoe. He'll laugh on the other side of his face when—'

`Now you be quiet, Kayla. I'm not laughing at you wanting the investigation. I'm laughing because I remembered you as a little girl getting so cross when you didn't get your way