Robert B. Parker's Wonderland by Ace Atkins

Author:Ace Atkins
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Mystery, Robert B. Parker, Spenser
ISBN: 9780399161575
Publisher: Putnam Adult
Published: 2013-05-07T08:00:00+00:00

35

IF HARVEY ROSE was trying to make shareholders feel money wasn’t being wasted on office space, he had succeeded. The following morning, I found his Boston headquarters were housed in a run-down three-story in Newton that hadn’t seen a renovation since the Nixon administration. It was built of brick-and-beige panels with rusted air conditioners jutting from aluminum windows. From where I parked in a back lot, there was a great view of the Mass Pike and a U-Haul dealer. I walked to a back door and found an intercom and security camera. I punched the speaker button and waved to the camera. The deadbolt slipped open.

Inside were a bunch of office types trapped in no-frills cubicles. Phones buzzed, keyboards clicked, and worker bees did whatever they did for Harvey Rose. I walked down a narrow hallway until I was greeted by the bald guy I had met at Rose’s house. Today he wore a blue pin-striped suit and a lot of cologne.

I sniffed. “Wood smoke?”

Rose’s guard did not respond. He just motioned with his bald head to a stairwell we followed to the second floor and a large open room with drafting boards and blueprints tacked on corkboards. On a long table that sat twenty, there were open laptop computers, countless boxes of files, and legal notepads. The beefy guy I had also met in Lexington followed us, glanced at me, and joined his pal at a folding table. He leaned back in his chair, suit jacket open and holster purposefully exposed, and eyed me with a slow indifference.

The bald guy picked up a hand of cards and tossed some chips into the pot.

“I could order a couple pizzas, pick up some beer,” I said.

They did not answer. The fat guy tossed down some cards. Somewhere in a back room, a toilet flushed and out walked Harvey Rose. He was several inches below six feet, chunky, and wore black dress pants with a wrinkled white dress shirt with French cuffs. A blazing red designer tie hung loose and careless around his neck. Remnants of lunch or breakfast spotted the shirt. He had not shaved, and his eyes were dark-rimmed and bloodshot.

“Mr. Spenser?”

I nodded. He studied me as we shook hands, before slumping into an office chair. He leaned back against a headrest. His eyes darted around the room.

“Wayne Cosgrove is a good reporter,” he said. “He’s always been fair with us.”

“And me as well.”

“It’s been a tough twenty-four hours.” Rose pulled a pair of half-glasses from his breast pocket and glanced down at a cell phone. “First, we learn of what happened with Rick, and then someone broke into our offices. They stole several files and fifteen computers.”

“Anything else?”

“Whoever broke in knew what they wanted.”

I nodded. “And you believe this had something to do with Rick Weinberg’s murder.”

Rose shook his head, placed the cell on the table, and stared up at the ceiling. He folded his hands over his chest and took in a great deal of air. He nodded as if agreeing with the direction of his thoughts and looked over the glasses.

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