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Zusatztext Praise for Severe Clear “Boasts an all-star lineup...Woods expertly mixes familiar ingredients to produce an intoxicating cocktail that goes down easily.”— Publishers Weekly More Praise for Stuart Woods “Stuart Woods is a no-nonsense! slam-bang storyteller.”— Chicago Tribune “A world-class mystery writer...I try to put Woods’s books down and I can’t.”— Houston Chronicle “Mr. Woods! like his characters! has an appealing way of making things nice and clear.”— The New York Times “Woods certainly knows how to keep the pages turning.”— Booklist “Since 1981! readers have not been able to get their fill of Stuart Woods’ New York Times bestselling novels of suspense.”— Orlando Sentinel “Woods’s Stone Barrington is a guilty pleasure...he’s also an addiction that’s harder to kick than heroin.”— Contra Costa Times (California) Informationen zum Autor Stuart Woods was the author of more than ninety novels, including the #1 New York Times bestselling Stone Barrington series. A native of Georgia and an avid sailor and pilot, he began his writing career in the advertising industry. Chiefs , his debut in 1981, won the Edgar Award. Woods passed away in 2022. Klappentext Someone wants to crash Stone Barrington's party in this New York Times bestseller in Stuart Woods's thrilling series. Stone Barrington is in Bel-Air! overseeing the grand opening of the ultra-luxe hotel! The Arrington! built on the grounds of the mansion belonging to his late wife! Arrington Carter. The star-studded gala will be attended by socialites! royalty! and billionaires from overseas...and according to phone conversations intercepted by the NSA! it may also have attracted the attention of international terrorists. To ensure the safety of his guests-and the city of Los Angeles-Stone may have to call in a few favors from his friends at the CIA... 1 Scott Hipp turned off I-295 South in Fort Meade, Maryland, at the dedicated exit entitled “NSA Employees Only” and drove to the mirrored black building that is the headquarters of the National Security Agency. The NSA was that part of the United States intelligence community responsible for communications surveillance and code breaking, and Hipp was its deputy director for cryptology, so he could park in the underground garage instead of in one of the eighteen thousand parking spaces surrounding the building. Feeling smug that he would return to a cool automobile instead of one baking outside, he inserted his ID badge in the elevator panel and rode up to his office on the top floor, which he entered at the stroke of eight a.m., as he did every day. Four people awaited him at his conference table, drinking his coffee. Hipp set his briefcase on the conference table and sat down. “Tell me something I don’t know,” he said without preamble. The four exchanged some glances and shuffled through their papers. Hipp watched them with satisfaction, since he knew they knew there was not much he didn’t know. “How about a cryptology joke?” asked one of them, removing a sheet of paper from a stack. “Amuse me,” Hipp said. “Overnight down at Fort Gordon, one of our computers picked up a twenty-two-second cell phone conversation between someone in Afghanistan and someone in Yemen. The conversation was too brief to pinpoint locations, and much of it was garbled. The funny part is that, in the middle of the conversation, two English words were clearly spoken: ‘the’ and ‘Arrington.’” “That is terribly amusing,” Hipp said with a straight face. “It’s also very common, since English is a worldwide language, and foreigners often use phrases from or fragments of English.” “Yes, sir.” “Does anyone at Fort Gordon, or for that matter, anyone h...
