Wicked Leaks

by Matt Bendoris

  The journalist excused himself and returned to the broom cupboard, where he crumpled McGill’s card and threw it in the bin.

  ‘What was that?’ April asked.

  ‘Some twat’s business card.’

  ‘Don’t you need it?’

  ‘I’ve got a funny feeling I’ll be hearing from him before he hears from me,’ he said while retrieving his man-bag with the hard drive and slinging it over his shoulder. ‘Gotta go. If anyone asks, just say I wasn’t feeling well or something.’

  ‘Take care,’ April said, lightly touching her younger colleague’s hand.

  ‘Yes, Mum.’

  Connor headed for a side entrance – just to make sure – and called his computer expert contact whilst walking to his car.

  ‘Stevie, I need you to tell me what is on that hard drive. It’s vitally important.’

  ‘I told you I want fuck-all to do with this, Elvis. It’s dangerous and I’m way out of my depth.’

  ‘You’re never out of your depth when it comes to IT stuff, Stevie. Come on, help me out,’ Connor protested.

  ‘Flattery will get you nowhere this time. The answer is no.’

  ‘Look, I just need a copy so I can return the hard drive and get the authorities off my case.’

  ‘They’ll never be off your case with this.’

  ‘Stevie, it’s just a copy. For fuck’s sake, I need this.’

  There was silence down the line before he finally replied. ‘Okay, I’ll make you a copy and we’ll store it in the data storage centre, where no one can get hold of it. After that, we’re through, understand? I never want to hear from you again.’

  ‘A bit extreme, Stevie, but have it your way.’

  Connor was greeted with an ironic laugh down the line. ‘You still don’t have a fucking clue, do you, Elvis? Ignorance is bliss, huh? See if that defence helps when they kick down your door.’

  ‘I’ll pick you up in twenty-five minutes. Look out for me,’ Connor said before hanging up and starting the car.

  73: Home

  Kelly walked past her mum’s house, which sat just off a bend on the road. The drive was empty and there were no signs of life from within. She turned on her heels and gave a small wave to Monahan walking around fifty feet behind her. He was stooped like an old man crippled with pain. She needed to get him a doctor and a shot of morphine – fast.

  Kelly walked up to the keysafe attached to the brick stonework at the front door and entered the five digit code, which was 1950 – the year her mum was born – followed by seven. Her mum had thoughtfully had it installed for William in case he cycled to her house only to find she was out.

  A twist of the lever later and the contraption gave up its contents. Kelly opened the door then conducted a quick search of the rooms to confirm the place was empty, before Monahan stumbled into the hallway. He now barely had the energy to stand as she helped slip off his backpack. It weighed a ton and contained goodness knows what tools of death.

  He gave her a weak smile of gratitude then collapsed on the floor, going down in stages as he clung to her before passing out.

  • • •

  Monahan woke with a start as a stranger leaned over his bed. He grabbed the man’s wrist as he had done to Doctor Shabazi, but this time he didn’t have the strength to bring it anywhere near breaking point.

  ‘Whoa, it’s okay. I’m Doctor Finlay.’

  ‘As in Doctor Finlay’s Casebook?’ Monahan asked.

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Who do you work for?’ Monahan demanded.

  ‘The NHS.’

  ‘Then I’ve got to get out of here,’ he said, throwing the covers back. But his legs wouldn’t move.

  ‘No need, Mr Monahan. This is off the books. A favour to Kelly. She used to work at the practice many moons ago. We were sad to lose her.’

  Monahan wasn’t interested in the doctor’s sentimentality. ‘How long have I got?’

  ‘Ah, the age-old question. I’d say, staying bed-bound with complete rest, ten days maximum. But I don’t reckon you’re the type to follow doctor’s orders. So half of that. If you’re lucky.’

  Monahan eyes focused on the ceiling as he calculated if he’d have enough time left.

  74: Looking for Lucan

  The data storage centre in the north of Glasgow looked like it should be housing furniture rather than digital archives. Its giant shipping-container metallic structure would never win any architectural awards, meaning it was right at home with the other faceless buildings on this anonymous industrial park. Stevie Brett was twitchy as hell in the passenger seat of Connor’s car. Irritatingly, he tapped his right foot constantly, emphasising his painfully thin legs through his jeans.

  ‘You’ll snap those pins of yours if you keep tapping them,’ Connor said, half in jest and half in hope it would make him stop.

  Stevie halted his annoying habit as he turned his head vaguely in Connor’s direction, only to resume the leg-tapping a moment later.

  Connor tried a different technique. ‘How long have you had an account at this place, then?’

  ‘Around the same time as my court case. This was where I stored things of interest.’

  ‘Hid the evidence, in other words,’ Connor chuckled, desperately trying to lighten the mood. ‘What about court orders? Can’t they just seize what you keep in there?’

  ‘They’ve got to know you have an account, first,’ Stevie said as his leg thump-thump-thumped away at the footwell of the car.

  ‘So it’s pretty secure, then?’

  ‘You could say that. Normally you need twenty-four-hour notice to enter, but you can get access in the case of emergencies. Today is an emergency.’

  They pulled up outside the main entrance and, as Stevie had phoned ahead, the electronic gates opened automatically due to vehicle registration number recognition. There were cameras everywhere pointing at every square inch of the car park and entrance. Stevie pressed an intercom button and stared straight down the lens of the entry systems camera as he gave both his and Connor’s name. They were let inside to a small area, which was more like a holding pen – the outside door automatically locked behind them. At another intercom they were asked to display photographic ID. Stevie showed his passport, whilst Connor opted for his driving licence instead of his press pass as he didn’t want to attract attention to himself.

  They were then buzzed through to a sparse reception area, where a member of staff asked them to sign a visitors’ book and state the reason for their visit. Stevie penned, Emergency upload. The receptionist asked if Stevie could remember his seven-digit access code. He confirmed two random numbers from it and was given a key fob that would only open the doors leading to his specified rack. The final security measure was a wall-mounted keypad, where Stevie typed in his memorised PIN number. Immediately a KVM keyboard flipped down in front of him, while the clunk and whirr of various mechanisms filled the confined space as Stevie’s personal hard drive was retrieved from the 7ft-tall storage racks.

  ‘It looks like a pizza box,’ Connor remarked.

  ‘Well observed,’ Stevie replied. ‘That’s what we geek-types call them.’ He plugged Connor’s portable hard drive into his own laptop before plugging it into the storage system.

  ‘And there’s no way anyone from outside can access what we leave in here?’ Connor asked.

  ‘Correct. It’s a ring-fenced network. There is no public-facing access. What data we leave in here, stays in here.’

  Stevie accessed the contents of Connor’s hard drive. Feeling safe and secure this time, he took his time to browse, with Connor looking over his shoulder. There was a massive number of folders on the desktop. He opened one at random to see various scanned police reports, along with a series of black and white photos showing men at some orgy, having sex with young boys. The abusers were all old, with saggy bodies,
but were in high spirits, clearly enjoying themselves. Their victims were mostly submissive, dead-eyed, while others were in obvious distress. Connor thought two of the men looked familiar.

  ‘I always suspected politics was full of kiddie fiddlers,’ Stevie said. ‘That bastard there,’ he said, pointing at the screen, ‘was always banging on about how single mothers were ruining the country, or some shit. Don’t remember him championing the buggering of underage boys, mind you.’

  ‘It’s the fucking Westminster paedophile ring.’

  ‘It sure is,’ Stevie replied before clicking on another file. ‘And look at this cunt. A minor royal. With a minor. How fucking ironic.’ He turned to Connor. ‘You do realise this is the list. I mean, the cops have something like 1,500 cases of historic sex abuse crimes that they’ve been investigating. Well, this looks like the lot. There’s hundreds of them. Oh, here’s our friend Cyril Smith. And I thought he looked disgusting enough with his clothes on.’

  ‘Who’s compiled all this?’ Connor asked.

  Stevie shrugged. ‘Who’s to know? A disgruntled civil servant, perhaps. Or, more likely, the security services. They’ve probably seen the way the wind is blowing and knew the Government would eventually launch an inquiry, so they could have bunged all of their most incriminating files onto this and taken the rest off the system. And no wonder – if all this came out, it would rock the very fabric of the nation. Folk wouldn’t know what to believe. I mean, look at this guy. Recognise him?’

  The black and white picture was of yet another naked man in the throes of passion with a poor child. He was good-looking and vaguely familiar. Connor was convinced he knew his face before the penny finally dropped. ‘Fuck me.’

  ‘Fuck me, indeed. One of Britain’s best-loved actors. A married, devoted dad. Recently got the OBE, I believe. Everyone loves him. Yet he’s a fucking nonce. Sickening.’

  They both sat in silence, apart from the noise of the computer’s cooling fans, as Stevie flicked through the seemingly endless files full of depraved pictures and various police reports that had obviously been filed then shelved.

  ‘It’ll take about five minutes to upload all this stuff,’ Stevie explained.

  ‘So child abuse really is everywhere, in every walk of life. This will bring them all down. It’s right here on this hard drive. It’s irrefutable proof. No one will be able to doubt it,’ Connor said, almost in awe of the magnitude of what he was looking at.

  ‘And if your paper doesn’t have the balls to print it then that’s the beauty of the Internet. We can get this stuff out there. Pictures, police reports, the lot.’

  ‘Click that one there,’ Connor said excitedly, pointing to a file titled ‘Lord Lucan’.

  ‘What did he do again?’ Stevie asked.

  ‘Murdered the nanny then did a bunk. Was supposed to have fled to Africa, finally declared dead recently… but according to this, he’d been hiding in plain sight.’

  They both stared at what appeared to be a fairly recent photograph of an old man posing beside a well-known landmark.

  ‘Remind me, where’s that?’ Stevie asked.

  ‘The Commando Memorial at Lochaber. So he wasn’t hiding in a damp council house.’

  ‘Council house?’ Stevie asked, bewildered.

  ‘Sorry, it’s an in-joke with April.’

  ‘What the hell was he doing at Lochaber?’

  ‘He was an old soldier. Every military man I’ve known always makes a pilgrimage at some point to that memorial. I went there once with a troop of Gurkhas.’

  ‘But what the fuck was he doing in Scotland?’

  ‘Makes perfect sense. He was a toff, with toff friends who have Highland estates. Many even have their own private airfields.’

  ‘So a murdering old bastard like him could evade justice and live out his life in the Highlands and no one was any the wiser?’ Stevie said, shaking his head.

  ‘Not quite. Someone clearly knew where he was,’ Connor said as he read on through the file. ‘This even has his pseudonym: “Avery Manford”. Here’s Avery’s National Insurance number too. Probably so he could draw his pension.’

  ‘So the establishment protected one of their own. Quelle surprise.’

  ‘Yes, but this file was obviously their insurance policy. To make sure Lucky Lord Lucan toed the line.’

  ‘Lucky, indeed.’

  ‘Look, it appears he saw out his last days in some nursing home for ex-servicemen. What a cunt. He only served for a couple of years and that was in peacetime.’

  ‘Wonder if he regaled the old troopers with his war stories?’ Stevie said.

  ‘Yeah, like how he bludgeoned an innocent woman to death with a lead pipe. I’m sure the real war vets loved that. That’s a point, though: if he lost his marbles, he’d have started telling everyone he was Lord Lucan.’

  ‘Bet he wasn’t the first resident to claim that,’ Stevie joked.

  ‘True. Amazing, though. How do you hide one of the country’s most notorious fugitives? Plonk him in a care home with all the other forgotten members of society.’

  ‘Oh shit, wait a minute,’ Stevie said as he studied another file intently, before he began to chuckle.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Diana’s the joke. I was looking for the failsafe – the bit of security someone would have installed in case this fell into the wrong hands – and I’ve found it,’ Stevie said, tapping the screen for Connor to look. The picture of Diana in the Parisian tunnel was not one that the reporter had ever seen before. There was sheer terror on the illuminated face of the Princess, taken in what must have been milliseconds before the fatal crash.

  Stevie laughed again. ‘This is what fucks everything up. This will all be dismissed as yet another Diana story. She is the modern equivalent of JFK to conspiracists.’

  ‘Shit, this really does suggest that she was murdered. Just as Kelly told me. That picture could only have been taken by someone riding right beside her car.’

  ‘Oh, Elvis, and therein lies your problem. The establishment will say it was taken by the paparazzi and proves that the good ol’ Queen of Hearts really was hounded to death by the scumbag press. Either way, it means Diana will be the main story here yet again and cast doubt on the authenticity of everything else. You’ll just be another Diana nutter trying to sell yet another wacky theory.’ Stevie stopped and scratched his head. ‘That’s strange. The rest of the Diana file is encrypted.’

  ‘Why’s that strange? It’s a Government file.’

  ‘Yeah, but why just that one, Elvis? Why can we read all about Lord Lucan and not Diana.’

  ‘Because someone forgot to encrypt it?’ Connor said, more in hope than with confidence.

  ‘The other way around, I’d say. All the encryptions on the other files were deactivated except the Diana one. These people don’t do oversights, Elvis.’

  ‘It’s weird, alright.’

  ‘Actually it’s worrying. I have a feeling that these files aren’t what we think they are.’

  ‘You mean they’re fake?’ Connor asked.

  ‘No, they’re bait,’ Stevie said, frowning.

  ‘I wonder what fishy they’re trying to catch?’ Connor pondered.

  ‘Maybe it’s not a fish but a mole. These files are juicy enough to encourage even the deepest sleeper agent to break cover. They’ll never let this get out,’ Stevie said, the anxiety returning to his voice. ‘Elvis, we better leave this building.’

  75: Phone home

  ‘Kelly Carter’s been trying to get you,’ April said with her usual lack of telephone manner.

  ‘I haven’t got any missed calls,’ Connor said, checking his iPhone while driving.

  ‘No, she’s been calling your office phone. She hasn’t got your mobile. She lost hers or something.’

  ‘Where the hell is she?’

  ‘At
her mum’s home in Kilsyth. She wants you to interview someone.’

  ‘Shit. I can’t right now. You’ll have to do it.’

  ‘But it’s your story.’

  ‘It’s our story.’

  ‘Should I tell her lawyer?’

  ‘Probably. But wait till after you’ve seen her. Call the lawyer after you’ve left. We don’t want Miss McDade telling her client not to speak to the press.’

  ‘She wouldn’t do that after all we’ve done for her. Would she?’

  ‘She might. You never know with lawyers. They are not the journalist’s friend.’

  ‘Okay. I’m heading out now. Shall call you afterwards.’

  ‘Take care. There’s a lot of strange shit surrounding this whole scenario and I still don’t know what it is.’

  ‘I will,’ April assured him. She would need to trust her own intuition. It had always served her well in the past when it came to stories – though not so well when it came to choosing men.

  76: Targeted

  Connor drove Stevie back to his flat in virtual silence. The stolen hard drive was in the journalist’s man-bag on the rear seat, out of sight but not out of mind.

  As soon as they pulled up outside the flat, Stevie knew there was a problem. ‘My bathroom light’s on. I’ve been broken into.’

  ‘Don’t get twitchy,’ Connor said, trying to calm him. ‘You could have just left it on.’

  ‘What, with my obsessive-compulsive behaviour? Not a fucking chance. I switched that light on and off again exactly ten times before leaving.’

  The two men sat in the car glaring at the dim glow from Stevie’s bathroom as if they expected to see something.

  ‘We may as well get this over with and walk towards the light,’ Connor said, getting out of the car.

  ‘Yeah, like moths to the flame,’ Stevie said.

  The pair tiptoed as quietly as possible up the concrete stairs, but they were surprised just how much noise they made – from their footfall to the rustling of their jackets. When they reached the second-floor landing they could see that Stevie’s door looked intact, with no sign of a break-in. Stevie unbolted the various locks and they entered the flat’s hall, with Connor jamming the door with a foot in case they had to make a quick exit. Stevie did a quick scan of his small flat, which didn’t take long. ‘No one’s here.’