The Houston Art Chronicles

This is the fourth novel in the Martin Taylor art crime series and begins when Martin returns to New York to give evidence in a murder trial related to the case he had worked on in 2020. Whilst in New York, the senior editor of the Houston Chronicle newspaper requests a meeting to discuss an assignment to assist in the purchase of some paintings which will be auctioned shortly in Houston. The paintings had belonged to a Mexican drug baron who had moved to Houston and was subsequently assassinated after falling out with his partner in the drug trade. The newspaper also wants to write a serialized article about Martin and his adventures for their weekend magazine which he agreed would be a fantastic way to promote his private investigation company. Following the auction at which Martin successfully bid for a number of paintings that will be hung in the boardroom and some of the senior personnel's offices, Martin travelled to Mexico City to meet with the art forger who had produced many of the paintings sold at the auction. He suspected that the drug baron might have secreted drugs in some of the paintings when he moved to Houston and this proved to be the case. He was kidnapped whilst in Mexico and thanks to a friendship he had with a senior officer in the L.A.P.D. he was rescued by a team of his men in Mexico City tracking the movement of drugs from that city to the USA. The colleagues of the arrested Mexican drug baron arranged for an outlaw motorcycle gang to harass Martin after he returned to Houston and this harassment followed him to Melbourne and later to Bilbao where his fiancee lived. The action continues in Bilbao right to the end.