The Side Effect - A Novel

Informationen zum Autor BOB REISS has written for many notable publications, including The Washington Post, Outside, Parade, Smithsonian, GQ, and Rolling Stone . His reporting on the Amazon earned him a place as a finalist for the National Magazine Award. He has written 2 non-fiction books, and The Side Effect is his eleventh novel. He currently resides in New York City. Klappentext It's the night the President has resigned. In a Manhattan town house! the head of Lenox Pharmaceuticals! the world's most powerful drug company! lies dead. Through the morning darkness! security chief Mike Acela drives his BMW to the scene. Mike's job has been to defend the Chairman against all enemies. But this street-smart! battle-hardened former FBI agent is about to find out how little he knows about his mentor! his job! or the dangers swirling all around him. Somewhere within Lenox's global web of government contracts and cutting-edge medications! the Chairman kept a terrible secret. A secret that has already started changing the world. To find out how the Chairman really died! Mike must uncover the truth behind Project HR-109. But what the Lenox scientists discovered is worth killing for. And the killing has just begun. ONE       The Chairman died the way he had lived: alone. Sometime between two and four A.M. on a muggy Wednesday in late July, while the rest of the New York City sweltered through the worst heat wave in history, 66-year-old James L. Dwyer walked into the bathroom of his East 58th Street townhouse, ingested a mix of prescription drugs, ironically manufactured by our own corporation, left a note on his study desk and convulsed into permanent sleep.   At least that’s the way it seemed to the Filipino houseman who found Dwyer when he let himself in at four to prepare the Chairman’s usual steak and eggs breakfast. Dwyer had always been a punctual riser.   The houseman, Aguinaldo, was a former Manila EMS attendant who checked for a pulse and tried CPR, but the body was cold, the color gone. He phoned me instead of the police.   “The Chairman always told me, if there’s a robbery, or any reason to call the cops, phone Mr. Acela if you can’t reach me. He said there might be important papers here. He said—”   Aguinaldo was starting to ramble, so I interrupted. I told him he had done the right thing. I calmed him enough so he could answer questions. “Was the front door locked when you arrived?” I asked.   “Yes, Mr. Acela.”   “What about the patio door and the windows?”   Aguinaldo took some minutes to check. “All locked from inside except his bedroom window. That one was open by an inch, but it’s on the third floor.”   “Any furniture out of place, drawers open?”   “It does not look like a break-in, sir.”   “Did you touch anything besides the body?”   “I read the note. But it makes no sense for him to do this. Did you read the Wall Street Journal article about his big deal last month? It called him Lucky Jim.”   “Don’t touch anything else. Don’t phone anyone. I’ll be there in half an hour.”   I hung up and sat for an instant, stunned, in my den in Devil’s Bay, Brooklyn, the boyhood neighborhood to which I’d recently moved back after twenty-six years away. The first-floor windows were open in my remodeled Cape Cod, and I could hear the sound of surf half a block away. I hadn’t been sleeping. I’d been glued to my TV for the last few hours, watching the disturbing news from Washington. The President—a good and fair man—had resigned tonight, citing health reasons, handing the reins of power to his number two, a man known for extreme right-wing inclinations.   In fact, the summer so far had been marked by numerous sudden departures in the capital: a Supreme Court Justice; a crusading Washington Post editor; the head of the FBI, my old boss, another good man.<...

Product details

• Authors: Bob Reiss
• Publisher: Dell Publishing Inc.
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback
• Released: 25.07.2006
• EAN: 9780440243083
• ISBN: 978-0-440-24308-3
• No. of pages: 464
• Dimensions: 106 mm x 175 mm x 25 mm