The Newsmaker (Volume One Book 1)

by Tom Field

  “Ignore the question then,” Lawson said to himself, before adding a longer than required sigh at the end for effect.

  “I should have thought of this before,” Ward said, “Charlie was right. With people like that it is always about money.”

  “Thought of what?” Lawson asked.

  “That there had to be a mammoth gain to be made. I was thinking that increased sales and advertising was the motivation here. I remember asking in London what was on the second floor and they told me it was the advertising and marketing department, and when we were there, it was busier than the news rooms.”

  “That’s how they become obscenely rich; even more money than they ever need isn’t enough for people like that,” Lawson said.

  “It’s more than that,” Ward added, “This is about ego and empire building. These people genuinely believe that they are untouchable.”

  “They normally are,” Lawson replied.

  They arrived at the offices of USBC News and parked in the exact same spot that they had parked in twice before. A government registered black Sudan was not going to get towed away.

  “Maybe you need to keep your hands clean on this one?” Ward said.

  “Not this time. I doubt very much you are going to keep him alive to tell the tale anyway, so thanks for the offer, but I’m coming with you,” Lawson replied.

  They walked through the glass doors again and into the reception area. Once again the same girl was behind the desk, and this time, she completely ignored Ward and offered up the biggest, most flirtatious smile she had in her armoury in Lawson’s direction. She was so fixated on his good looks that she didn’t even ask where they were going as Ward walked up to the elevator and pushed the call button. Lawson leant with his back against the elevator wall, smiling towards the latest addition to his fan club. The elevator doors opened and they stepped in.

  “I might get her number on the way down,” he said.

  “Seriously, what is it with you?” Ward asked, “You do realise that if you spent less time thinking with your loins, you would probably be running MI6 by now.”

  “Was that a compliment?”

  “You are wasting what you have. You are exceptional at what you do and I trust you with my life. In a fight, you would be the first person I would want beside me, but seriously Mike, it’s time to grow up and utilise the superb skill set you have to full effect.”

  “Is that another compliment?”

  “Take it as you wish.”

  The elevator doors opened.

  They stepped out and started the walk along the glass-wall lined hallway to the boardroom door, and without knocking Ward turned the gold handle and walked in. Barnard was sitting in his usual seat, surrounded by papers and three big, red, thick legal books. No one else was in the room.

  Barnard’s nose was swollen and he had bruises starting to appear under both eyes. He looked up at Ward and completely ignored Lawson.

  Ward sat down.

  “Have you any idea of the trouble I am going to make for you?” he spat at Ward. “I will tear you apart and then your despicable house will come down on top of you.”

  “How so?”

  “I will haul you before the courts for assault, trespassing and illegal data collection, and then I will prove that the British security forces had prior knowledge to your actions, and I will humiliate them too.”

  “I’m not British dipshit,” Ward replied.

  “Nowhere is safe for you to hide from me. I will hunt you to the ends of the earth,” Barnard said, his voice relaying a dramatic tone that had no doubt served him very well in court over the years, but wasn’t helping him much now.

  “You don’t understand, do you?” Ward said.

  The response seemed to confuse Barnard.

  Barnard was used to always getting his own way. Members of the British parliament, senior police officers and even members of the clergy, all backed off when he made personal threats to them. The man sitting opposite him made no attempt to either pacify him or confront him.

  He just sat there.

  “Don’t understand what?” Barnard demanded, trying to maintain the assertive tone to his voice.

  “You don’t understand that the next five minutes will decide if I just kill you, or if I kill you and destroy your reputation. How you die is your choice,” Ward calmly said.

  “You think you can threaten me?” Barnard asked aggressively.

  “Let me explain something. You might look in the mirror and see a man who knows a legal system inside out, and can find a loophole in every situation, but I just see a man with no morals and someone, that in my world, doesn’t count for anything,” Ward said.

  “Your world?” Barnard asked.

  “In my world, I do what I see fit. Think of me as a bit of a Judge Dread. I am judge, jury and executioner, and right now I’m inclined to kill you just for the sake of it.”

  “You can’t do that, there are laws and rules that we have to live by. You have no choice. It is how everything works.”

  Ward took out his Glock and started to screw the silencer on very slowly and deliberately.

  “I have to be honest, I want to kill you and forget about you because to me, you are completely insignificant, but I will probably just have as much fun with the alternative that I can offer you. Providing you give me the information I want of course.”

  “Alternative?” Barnard asked.

  “The best computer graphic artists in the world are, right now, applying the finishing touches to videos and photos that show you engaged in sexual activity with a fourteen year old boy. They are good, very good. Their work is without equal, and there is not a graphics expert anywhere on earth who could analyse their work and not declare it to be authentic,” Ward said, before looking at Lawson who was leaning on the wall by the door.

  Lawson nodded his agreement and smiled.

  “You can’t do that; I will defend myself in court,” Barnard replied.

  “You still don’t get it.”

  “What don’t I get?” Barnard asked.

  “I’m going to kill you anyway. It’s just a question on whether you were the victim of a mugging and your obituary in The Times says great things about you; or I kill you and release the evidence and the police chase a fictitious boy that you abused. He doesn’t exist, but nonetheless, you and your family will be destroyed.”

  The colour drained out of Barnard’s cheeks.

  “That’s absurd,” Barnard said, “What sort of barbaric world do you think we are living in?”

  Ward ignored him and made an overly dramatic point of tightening the silencer on his Glock one more time.

  “There are people who saw you come in here, there are people who will be trying to contact me on an hourly basis. If you even hurt one hair on my head, there will be the full weight of the British justice system coming down on you,” Barnard declared. His voice had a quiver to it, he was frightened. Ward knew he was going to tell him all he knew.

  “You still don’t understand,” Ward said, “You have knowingly contributed to the deaths of nearly two hundred people in London and Paris, and judging by the size of the next bomb due to go off here, there will be at least another two hundred. Does that sit OK with you in terms of justice?” he asked.

  “You have no proof of anything” Barnard declared.

  “That’s the beauty of what I do,” Ward said, “I don’t need proof.”

  “You will never get away with it,” Barnard replied, visibly shaking now.

  “No one likes Lawyers in general, you know that right?” Ward asked.

  Barnard ignored the question

  “You think that the smallest written technicality, no matter how much evidence is against the people you defend, is justification for setting them free.”

  “Everyone has a right to a fair defence,” Barnard replied.

  “But it’s not fair, is it?” Ward said, “It’s all about who can afford to pay for people like you to swim into your
world of books, precedents and loopholes until you find a way.”

  “My crime is I’m good at my job?”

  “Look at you,” Ward said, “You are a physically weak man who is on the verge of bursting into tears. How is the fact you are good at your job helping you now?”

  Barnard looked down at the table. He knew Ward was right. No amount of legal wrangling was going to help this situation. He looked across the table and all he could see was this monster, this frightening man who looked about seven feet tall, sitting opposite him, holding a gun and giving off an air that said he had done this a hundred times. A different approach was required.

  “I was training to be a barrister once,” Ward said, “I was good at it. I’m smart, very smart actually. My IQ is probably way above yours, but do you want to know why I got out of it?” he asked.

  Barnard just sat there.

  “I couldn’t stand the dishonesty of it. I couldn’t stand to know that because I am smarter than the average man; that no matter how guilty someone might be, I had the ability to get them cleared of any crime they may have committed,” he continued, “It didn’t sit properly with me. Who defends the man in the street, the guy who gets up at 5am every morning to go to work in a factory?”

  “If you don’t harm me, I will tell you all I know and then you can go after the people who have all the information that you need,” Barnard said.

  His tone was that of someone who was bargaining from a position of strength; clearly refined over many years in courtrooms, and in dealing with plea bargains.

  “For someone who claims to be very good at their job, you are extremely dumb,” Ward replied, “You’ve just told me that you personally don’t have any information, but you can point me in the direction of someone who does,” Ward shook his head in dismay, “I almost feel disappointed in you. On my way over here I had visions of us standing toe to toe and having an intellectual battle.”

  Barnard was visibly starting to panic now. The pressure of his predicament had made him lose focus. He knew that he had just given away his whole game. He briefly thought of the witness’s he had destroyed in courtrooms using the same technique over the years, and for the first time since he left law school, he felt like a physically weak man who was on the verge of bursting into tears. He started to cry.

  Ward looked at Lawson,

  “Not so terrifying is he?” he asked.

  “He reminds me of that man we killed last week who soiled himself before we finished him off,” Lawson said, holding a serious expression on his face.

  “Now, I ask the questions, you answer them and depending on what you tell me, I’ll decide if you get destroyed in death, which will totally devastate your family, or if your obituary celebrates you,” Ward said.

  Barnard nodded slowly.

  “What is your role in this?”

  “I had to protect Lord Ashurst-Stevens legally. It was down to me to show that he acted under duress and he had no choice with his Godson’s life in danger.”

  “So you created the paper trail that would hold up in a court of law?”

  “Yes. That was all I did,” Barnard replied.

  “Did you know who had kidnapped Joseph Walker?”

  “No.”

  “Why didn’t you know?”

  “I didn’t want to know. It was arranged through his contact who knew the man who detonates the bombs.”

  “Who is this contact?” Ward asked.

  “I don’t know. I did ask that question and was simply told that it was a place that I didn’t want to go. Whoever it is, he is extremely powerful,” Barnard replied.

  “So someone is assisting Ashurst-Stevens?”

  “I don’t know. Initially in terms of making contact then yes. I did not ask the question again after my initial enquiry.”

  Ward thought back to the rescue of Joseph Walker. The four men they took out were all Middle Eastern and all likely to be related to the FFW.

  “Who is Ashurst-Stevens planning to kill with the bomb?” Ward asked.

  “I don’t know. I looked after the paper trail of the money involved because we knew that eventually it would be traced back,” Barnard said, “Lord Ashurst-Stevens told me very little.”

  “Where is the bomb going to go off?”

  “I don’t know.” Barnard replied.

  Ward raised his gun,

  “But I know when!” Barnard quickly said.

  “When?”

  “10am tomorrow morning.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because Lord Ashurst-Stevens rarely gives live interviews, but he has arranged one for tomorrow morning at 10am in the boardroom,” Barnard eagerly said.

  It made sense, Ward thought to himself. Ashurst-Stevens being broadcast to the world on live TV when the bomb went off, particularly if one of the people who died had a link to him. It was the perfect alibi.

  “OK. You’ve been very helpful,” Ward said.

  Barnard took this as an opening, a starting point for negotiation,

  “I can testify for you. If you want Lord Ashurst-Stevens, I can help you,” he said. Ward could almost hear the cogs in his brain ticking over, trying to find a new angle. Self-preservation, a typical lawyer he thought to himself.

  “No need for that,” he replied.

  “Think about it,” Barnard said, “With me as a witness there would be no way out for him.”

  “I have no need for that” he repeated.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m going to kill him too.”

  “You are going to kill Lord Ashurst-Stevens?” Barnard asked in disbelief. These people really did think they were untouchable.

  “Why do you still refer to him as Lord all the time?” he asked.

  “Because that is what he is.”

  Ward looked at Barnard across the table. He could see that he was starting to feel that he might have a way out of this. He was thinking he could negotiate somehow. He was so used to people holding everything he said in such high regard that he believed Ward was going to hang on every word he said.

  Ward stood up and looked down on him,

  “People don’t trust or respect the legal system anymore and it is all because people like you that have diminished its value,” he said, “No one stands up for the little man anymore because they are governed by your rules and the immoral and deceitful people who implement them. You are as bad as Asif Fulken, yet you convince yourself that you only deal in paper. I lost a friend of mine yesterday who was trying to stand up for the little man, to protect him and keep him safe, and you were one of the people who sent him to his execution. He had a wife and two boys who were his world. Do you think they would find comfort in the fact that you only filled in the paperwork?” Ward asked.

  “Please, don’t,” Barnard begged, and started crying again.

  “I’m going to kill you and then before I kill Ashurst-Stevens I am going to make sure that pictures of you in disgusting acts with a young boy are broadcast to the world.”

  Ward lifted his Glock and pulled the trigger. The bullet smashed into Barnard’s chest and the impact pushed him back against the chair and he rolled off of the right side onto the floor. Ward walked around the table. His eyes were open and he was still breathing. He pointed the gun again and fired one more shot into the same area where the blood was pumping out of him. Barnard stopped moving. Ward paused for a few seconds and then fired two more into the same place. Barnard’s body jerked and then went limp again.

  Ward stood over him, staring at his lifeless body.

  “I think he’s dead,” Lawson said.

  He didn’t say anything. He leant forward and went through Barnard’s pocket and pulled out his cell phone and put it in his own pocket.

  “Four bullets was probably overkill, which puts you into the psychotic category,” Lawson said casually, trying to lighten the mood.

  Ward still didn’t speak. He just stood there looking at the body.

  “Did you
really have those pictures and videos generated?” Lawson asked.

  “No.”

  “Seriously, four was a bit too much,” Lawson said.

  “It was the right amount.”

  “Why?”

  “One for Gilligan, one for Gilligan’s wife and one each for his two boys.”

  Lawson chose not to speak this time. He understood.

  Ward took out his phone and called Centrepoint.

  “What is happening?” he demanded.

  “I need a clean-up crew urgently to the offices of USBC News, sixteenth floor, the boardroom,” Ward replied.

  “Oh my God, tell me you haven’t killed Ashurst-Stevens?”

  “Not yet,” Ward replied and hung up the phone.

  He looked at his watch. It was now 5.45pm.

  “Stay here until the clean-up crew arrive and then meet me back at Nicole-Louise’s,” he said, and he walked out of the boardroom.

  He thought he would feel a sense of gratification in avenging Gilligan’s death but he didn’t. He felt nothing. He knew immediately that only by killing Ashurst-Stevens, would he achieve that feeling, as he started the short walk back to Park Avenue.

  He now knew three things; who, how and when. He only needed to find the where.

  As he walked, one thing kept nagging at him. There were higher powers at play Barnard had said, but who?

  THIRTY EIGHT

  Now things were pretty straightforward. He had two more people to take out: Fulken and Ashurst-Stevens. It was a task he was sure he would complete.

  He looked at his watch and it was now 6:05pm. Just under sixteen hours of his estimated finish time left. He felt he would not need all sixteen hours. His phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and Eloisa’s name flashed on the screen.

  “Hello you,” he answered.

  “How is it going, has my knight in shining armour made the streets safe yet?” she asked.

  Ward smiled to himself; just the sound of her voice always brought him to life,

  “Almost,” he replied, “How was your day?”

  “I’m still here, it will be a late one for me.”

  “How late?”

  “About eight thirty.”