Stripped of his investigator's license, Cliff Hardy faces an uncertain future when something personal happens that provokes him into his best role: a confrontational investigator with a taste for violence and no regard for his lost credentials. Taking and dealing out punishment, mostly in Sydney's exclusive suburbs, Hardy encounters degenerate cops, bereft wives, and computer challenges.
Cliff Hardy is a Private investigator hired by Claudia Fleischman, beautiful, intelligent and rich. Claudia has just been charged with the murder of her husband. Cliff is soon deep in trouble with her, she drinks too much, smokes too much, is very lonely and soon business mixes with pleasure taking the relationship to the next level. Cliff's car is blown up and then one of his closest friends who was coming to meet cliff about the case is shot and killed.
With his PEA licence restored and strapped for cash, Cliff Hardy is reluctantly drawn into a scheme to claim the reward on a 17-year-old abduction case. Hardy is distracted by a hot new lover, but when one of the schemers ends up dead, the case gets his full attention. Who paid the cops to suppress the ransom note and how come they're always one step ahead of Hardy?
Corruption, murder and a missing girl: routine for Cliff Hardy - except this time it's personal. Cliff Hardy is stunned to get a phone call from his ex-wife Cynthia. It's been over 20 years since she last shouted she never wanted to see him again... and she was never a woman to change her mind. But that surprise is nothing to the bombshell Cynthia is about to drop. Dying of cancer, she's desperate to get in contact with the daughter she gave up for adoption - and the daughter in question, she confesses, is Cliff's! A shocked but sceptical Cliff agrees to search for their missing daughter. But this is never going to be a straightforward investigation..
They called him the Black Prince. Southwestern Uni's top athlete, Clinton seemed to have it all: he was destined for sporting stardom and lucky in love - then it all went terribly wrong. Now Clinton won't rest until he's avenged his girlfriend's death. He's after the dealer who sold Angie bad steroids and nothing's going to get in his way. Can Cliff Hardy find him before he ends up on a murder charge - or dead? The trail leads the Sydney PI all the way to an Aboriginal community in Far North Queensland and back to the shadowy world of illegal boxing.
