The Broken Window: A Lincoln Rhyme Novel
by Jeffery Deaver
Summary
Lincoln Rhyme and partner/paramour Amelia Sachs return to face a criminal whose ingenious staging of crimes is enabled by a terrifying access to information....
An information service company—the huge data miner Strategic Systems Datacorp—seems to have all the answers but is reluctant to help the police. Still, Rhyme and Sachs and their assembled team begin uncovering a chilling pattern of vicious crimes and coverups, and their investigation points to one master criminal, whom they dub “522.”
When “522” learns the identities of the crime-fighting team, the hunters become the hunted. Full of Deaver’s trademark plot twists, The Broken Window will put the partnership of Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs to the ultimate test.
Excerpt
Chapter One
Something nagged, yet she couldn’t quite figure out what.
Like a faint recurring ache somewhere in your body.
Or a man on the street behind you as you near your apartment...Was he the same one who’d been glancing at you on the subway?
Or a dark dot moving toward your bed but now vanished. A black widow spider?
But then her visitor, sitting on her living room couch, glanced at her and smiled and Alice Sanderson forgot the concern—if concern it was. Arthur had a good mind and a solid body, sure. But he had a great smile, which counted for a lot more.
“How ‘bout some wine?” she asked, walking into her small kitchen.
“Sure. Whatever you’ve got.”
“So, this’s pretty fun—playing hooky on a weekday. Two grown adults. I like it.”
“Born to be wild,” he joked.
Outside the window, across the street, were rows of painted and natural brownstones. They could also see part of the Manhattan skyline, hazy on this pleasant spring weekday. Air—fresh enough for the city—wafted in, carrying the scents of garlic and oregano from an Italian restaurant up the street. It was their favorite type of cuisine—one of the many common interests they’d discovered since they’d met several weeks ago at a wine tasting in SoHo. In late April, Alice had found herself in the crowd of about forty, listening to a sommelier lecture about the wines of Europe, when she’d heard a man’s voice ask about a particular type of Spanish red wine.
She had barked a quiet laugh. She happened to own a case of that very wine (well, part of a case now). It was made by a little-known vineyard. Perhaps not the best Rioja ever produced but the wine offered another bouquet: that of fond memory. She and a French lover had consumed plenty of it during a week in Spain—a perfect liaison, just the thing for a woman in her late twenties who’d recently broken up with her boyfriend. The vacation fling was passionate, intense and, of course, doomed, which made it all the better.
Alice had leaned forward to see who’d mentioned the wine: a nondescript man in a business suit. After a few glasses of the featured selections she’d grown braver and, juggling a plate of finger food, had made her way across the room and asked him about his interest in the wine.
He’d explained about a trip he’d taken to Spain a few years ago with an ex-girlfriend. How he’d come to enjoy the wine. They’d sat at a table and talked for some time. Arthur, it seemed, liked the same food she did, the same sports. They both jogged and spent an hour each morning in overpriced health clubs. “But,” he said, “I wear the cheapest JCPenney shorts and T-shirts I can find. No designer garbage for me...” Then he’d blushed, realizing he’d possibly insulted her.
But she’d laughed….
Copyright © 2008 by Jeffery Deaver. Reprinted by permission of Simon and Schuster Inc.
Reviews
“Topical subject matter makes the story line particularly compelling…fans will relish Deaver’s intimate exploration of a tragedy from Rhyme’s adolescence”—Publishers Weekly
“A thrill ride between covers”—Los Angeles Times
“Deaver pulls out all the stops”—The Denver Post
Author's Biography
Jeffery Deaver is the bestselling author of The Sleeping Doll, The Cold Moon, The Blue Nowhere, The Bone Collector, The Empty Chair, The Devil’s Teardrop, and fifteen other suspense novels. His book A Maiden’s Grave was made into an HBO movie starring James Garner and Marlee Matlin, and his novel The Bone Collector was made into a feature release from Universal Pictures, starring Denzel Washington. He lives in North Carolina.