THE BODY OF DAVID HAYES
By Ridley Pearson
Hyperion, April 2004
ISBN: 0-7868-6725-6
Reviewed by Shirley H. Wetzel
If there is a theme for Pearson's new Lou Boldt mystery, THE BODY OF DAVID HAYES, it might be "Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practise to deceive."
Six years ago, during a low point in Lou's marriage, his wife Liz had a brief affair with David Hayes, a computer whiz kid at her bank. Hayes was later arrested for wire fraud and sent to prison. Now he's out of prison, and her past indiscretion comes back to haunt her in ways she could never have imagined. Her marriage, her family, her job and her life are at risk as the complex, twisted, multifaceted case unfolds.
The story begins on a misty, cold Seattle night. Detective Lou Boldt is called to a crime scene in a dilapidated trailer park. While there is ample evidence that violence has been done in the trailer rented to David Hayes, there is no body. There is, however, a potential witness, but he can't remember anything because he's been shot with a stun gun, roughed up, and dosed with Rohypnol. The witness is Danny Foreman, a former colleague of Boldt's in the Seattle PD who now works for the Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Foreman has been known to be a solo player, earning him praise as well as demerits, and it looks like this is another case he's working off the books.
Foreman and his wife Darlene were once also friends of Boldt and Liz. The two men spent many long hours together at the hospital while their wives battled cancer. Liz Boldt survived the battle; Darlene Foreman did not. After that Boldt and Foreman slowly drifted apart, and Danny tells him the reason at the crime scene: "Liz lived." Subsequent events in the case of the missing crime victim cause Boldt to wonder just how deep Foreman's resentment goes. He wonders, too, what his old friend's stake is in recovering the seventeen million dollars Hayes had stolen from the bank where Liz Boldt is still an officer.
As the case progresses, Boldt becomes unsure of the motives of others in the legal system as well, leaving him with only a few people he can trust. In this most personal of Boldt's cases the beleaguered detective has to deal with corruption in high places, the Russian mafia, torture (ouch, those torn-out fingernails!), purloined millions, counterfeit caviar, and the survival, physically as well as emotionally, of his family. Liz has her own set of problems, her own worries about who she can trust, and a fear that a certain videotape might go public and bring her more trouble than Paris Hilton. She is torn between her husband and several other interested parties who all have their own agendas for her and her skills in retrieving the missing millions. At one point she is even forced to don a Flying Nun outfit and participate in a Rocky Horror-esque version of The Sound of Music. To add insult to injury, she then has to change clothes in a bathroom stall with a psychologist who'd had a one-night stand with Lou. How much can the poor woman take!
This is Pearson at his best. Sit down, put your feet up, and enjoy the long and bumpy ride.
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