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Overview
Enlisting the help of handsome professor Julian McIntosh, Max boomerangs across the continents to unlock the mystery of her father’s research, struggling to keep one step ahead of a powerful German pharmaceutical company who will stop at nothing to keep the disturbing document under wraps.
A perfect blend of humor, romance, and suspense, Ranjini Iyer’s debut novel throws audiences into this all-too-plausible mystery, hurling thrills and twists that will keeps readers guessing until the chilling finale.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781938231865 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | HighLine Editions |
| Publication date: | 02/07/2015 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 254 |
| File size: | 859 KB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
The Colossus
By Ranjini Iyer
Astor + Blue Editions
Copyright © 2014 Ranjini IyerAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-938231-86-5
CHAPTER 1
Maxine Rosen's apartment Lincoln Park, Chicago June 2000
The alarm went off. The first few bars of "Metamorphosis" began to play. For the sixth time.
This time, Max raised her groggy, disoriented head from her pillow. Her long curls were plastered about her head and face. She brushed some stray hair out of her eyes. A power nap had turned into a two-hourlong siesta. With a grunt, she turned the alarm off.
Even though it was Philip Glass, at this quiet twilight hour the soft piano notes felt like a grater against her nerves.
Max threw her legs over the side of the bed and looked down. Bare thighs stared back at her. One of these days, she promised herself, these soft thighs would not rub. No sir. They would stand taut and firm, with that fashionable gap between them. She'd finally start wearing mini skirts that would ride up, revealing—
Max jumped off the bed before her mind could race off to unpleasant places.
She set a pot of coffee to brew and looked out the window at the lake. Her condo, inherited from her late father, was a large two bedroom with a magnificent view of Lake Michigan and the curving Lake Shore Drive. Joggers were moving up and down the running path parallel to the lake, their rhythmic movement taunting Max for her lethargy.
Why couldn't they stay in just once? Watch TV or something.
The aroma of coffee slowly filled the room. Max poured herself a cup. It was almost 8:00 pm. Late, but she could still go for a run. She should go for a run. Well, more of a lumbering jog, really, one that would have her looking like she was about to keel over with every step. Unless she kept at it at least twice a week, her happy size ten would be quickly left behind. Going up half a size over two weekends was not unusual for Max. It was a battle she had grown up fighting, and one she felt herself losing at every turn.
Her phone started to ring.
She answered it. "Maxine Rosen speaking."
"Front desk, Miss Rosen. Good evening. There's a visitor for you. A Mr. Lars Lindstrom from London."
"Who?" Max rubbed her eyes.
"He's been calling for you all day. He's finally here now. He says he knew your grandfather Samuel in Germany. It's urgent, he says."
Max yawned. "How's he dressed? How does he sound?"
"Impeccable."
"Okay, send him up, please. Uh ... in about ten minutes."
Max pulled on a skirt and scrubbed the sleep off her face as she went over her schedule for the next day. At noon she was seeing the principal of a private school about catering their lunches. After that, she had meetings with her accountant and two organic meat and produce vendors. Her accountant was insisting that it was time she mastered QuickBooks. He would send her into a dizzy spell with lengthy discourses on cash flow management. Bargaining with the vendors would feel like a fencing duel. Max wondered, not for the first time, why she had taken all this on.
Because I love to cook and this is the best way to do what I love and make money, she told herself. It was an oft-repeated mantra.
She went to the kitchen and looked over her tasting menu for the school. Ravioli, check. Chickpea salad, check. Sweet potato fries, and yes, the hummus and the peas curry. She had prepped some of the items. She could do some more tonight and finish first thing tomorrow morning.
An unwelcome pit formed in her stomach. She shouldn't do the fries. They would turn soggy. In fact the entire menu she had planned was child unfriendly. She began twirling a lock of her hair, slowly at first, then at a more frantic pace.
Calm down, she told herself. Hadn't they asked for healthy, and if possible, vegetarian food? Well, that was what she was giving them.
There was a knock at the door.
It would be fine, she thought as she undid the various locks. The school would hire her. And there was that one lead to cater board lunches at the Jewish Students Awareness Association. They might want kosher though. With a sigh she opened the door.
A man, probably in his late seventies, stood in the hallway, wearing an expensive-looking charcoal suit. He was slim. His head was covered with thinning white hair and his eyes were dark behind rimless glasses.
"Mr. Lars Lindstrom?" Max said. "I'm Max Rosen."
He took her hand and held it in a firm, almost desperate grip.
Max winced.
"You ... you look like your grandfather," he said in a polished but shaky voice. "The same large brown eyes, blemish-less skin. He was a handsome man."
Max blushed, not sure how to respond.
"Seeing you reminds me of times I have done my best to forget. Still, it's nice to meet you," he rasped.
Max stood aside. "Uh, come in, have a seat. I don't have much time, I'm afraid. I have several meetings tomorrow that I must prepare for."
"I'll make this brief. Let's see, what time is it now?" He glanced at the cuckoo clock by the door and started.
Max laughed. "That clock has never told the right time."
It was her 11:32 cuckoo clock. Or rather, her father's. The cuckoo clock's needles were frozen at 11:32, had been for years now. Since just before Papa died, actually. Every time she was tempted to throw it out, she stopped. She and Papa had laughed about the fact that the clock, which had never told time correctly, would now at least tell the right time twice a day. It had been one of their last happy moments together.
"Would you like some coffee and a sandwich, Mr. Lindstrom?" Max asked, moving towards the kitchen. "I was about to have dinner."
"Call me Lars. Just coffee sounds wonderful."
"Please make yourself comfortable," Max said, motioning toward the living room. She made a sandwich with leftover chicken and homemade red pepper paste, poured two cups of steaming coffee, and settled down in a chair facing Lars.
"So you knew my Opa—my grandfather," she said.
"I knew Samuel well, yes, but I'm really here to talk about your father."
Max took a sip of coffee and bit into her sandwich. "Hope you don't mind if I eat while we talk. I'm famished."
"Oh no, go ahead," Lars said, his voice and manner tense. "Now, before I say what I must, I need you to trust me. I'm one of very few people that have an ancient seal from the Indus Valley. Samuel gave it to me when he returned from his visit there. Do you know about this seal?"
Opa's Indian seal.
Yellowed memories began to grow vivid in Max's mind.
When she was about ten or eleven, she had stumbled upon her grandfather's diary. Not long after she'd turned to the first page, where she saw a bright red seal's embossment looking like a melted piece of candy, Opa had found and scolded her. Her tears had softened him, and he told her that the mark was made by his lucky seal. "This seal is from the Indus Valley, formerly in India," he had said as he showed her the seal. "An advanced civilization lived there thousands of years ago. This is a copy of a real seal. The original belonged to a man they called the Colossus. An archeologist friend gave it to me when I was in India visiting the Colossus's tomb."
His face and voice had taken on a somber tone. Max had wondered why was he so sad talking about it, if it was his lucky seal. He didn't offer any more stories, and asked her not to mention it to anyone else. It was to be their secret.
A few months later, Opa died. And with him all his stories.
Max put her sandwich down. "I do know about the seal, but—"
Lars Lindstrom held up his hand. "Hiram—uh, your father—was doing some research before he died. It was work he took over from Samuel. I knew this work too. You see, I was Samuel's assistant in his lab at Berliner Pharmaceuticals. In Germany."
A knot formed in Max's stomach, its grip slowly growing stronger. She drew back a little.
"Oh dear, I've upset you," Lars said gently. "This must be so unsettling. A stranger comes to your door and starts yammering about your father and grandfather."
Max shook her head. "It's fine," she said. "I'm just—" She gave a little laugh. "I've had a harrowing day, that's all."
They sipped their coffees.
"So you're from London," Max said at last. "I'd love to visit someday. What brought you to Chicago?"
Lars smiled. "I came here to say goodbye to some old friends at the French pastry school. And I thought it was time that I see you." He let out a loud sigh, rubbed his hands together, and put them on his thighs. He looked at her with melancholic eyes. "Five years ago, following your father's death, I received a package from him, sent by his lawyer."
Max raised her eyebrows. "Oh?"
"It contained a coded research document and a letter." Lars handed her a sheet of paper.
Max recognized her father's handwriting.
"Go ahead, read it," Lars said.
CHAPTER 2"Dear Lars," Max read aloud, "You are in possession of my most important work. I have not been able to show it to the world and I'm no longer around to do so. You should know that for the past several months I have been receiving threats from our former employer, Berliner Pharmaceuticals."
Max let out a stifled cry.
"Steady, child," Lars said.
She read on. "Consider it a dead man's last wish to make sure this research sees the light of day. I'm arranging to send you two packages. As a precaution, this package with the coded research will be rerouted prior to reaching you.
"The other package contains a sheet of paper with the key to decode the research, and a vial. The vial contains the health pills my father got from the Indus Valley dig in India. These are the pills you and he worked on at Berliner just before the war.
"Since you are familiar with the origins of this work, I am making a huge assumption that you might still have an interest in it. If not for my sake, do this for my father's. But please do not involve my daughter. I want to spare Max any pain associated with this work. I trust you to do the right thing. Call my lawyer at 773-555-8327 if you need to.
"Yours most gratefully, Hiram Rosen"
Max gripped the arms of her chair. The room began to blur. Don't faint, she told herself over and over. She put down the letter, moved unsteadily to a corner of the living room, and threw up all over a pot of pink begonias. Memories of Papa began playing like a movie in her head, and she broke into heaving sobs.
Lars went to her and held her shaking shoulders.
"That was insensitive of me," he said in a pained voice. He handed her a large white handkerchief and led her back to her chair.
"You think this means Papa didn't commit suicide," Max whispered. "These threats from Berliner ... you think they were carried out? Is that how he died?"
How angry she had been with her father. And now, this ... this meant she had been unfair to him for years, even if it was only in her thoughts.
But how was it possible? Scientist and researcher Dr. Hiram Rosen's death was caused by alcohol and aspirin poisoning, accidental or self-inflicted, the newspapers had reported. There had been no doubt in the police's minds about that, she remembered.
"Perhaps they drove him to suicide," Lars said with some hesitation.
Max tried to suppress the pangs of grief filling her chest.
"But how? Why?" she cried. "I mean, what is this research about, anyway?"
"I must give you some background. About me, about this whole business. I'm going about this all wrong." Lars pursed his lips and pressed his hands together. "But first, a glass of water for you, my child." He went into the kitchen.
Max took the water from him and sipped slowly. They didn't speak for a while. Max stared at the floor, her mind numb, her body drained of strength.
"Let's see," Lars said slowly. "I was a student at Berlin University when I worked with Samuel. This was in the mid to late thirties. During this time, Samuel was invited to India on an archeological dig. They had found some mysterious little green discs in the Indus Valley—medicinal pills—that the locals claimed was the pill of immortality."
"Really?" Max said.
"Well," Lars said with a wave of his hand, "they were health pills that helped the ancient Indus people live longer lives, a potent combination of herbs and vegetable matter. But because of its legend, Samuel was excited."
"What happened then?" Max refilled their cups with fresh coffee.
Lars smiled gratefully. "Samuel brought some back to Germany. We found that the pills did prolong life by reducing metabolic rate. My memory fails me now as to the details. But I do remember that we found a contagious bacterium in the pill. In 1939, the war began. As a Jew, Samuel's heritage became an issue when the Nazis came to power. When Berliner couldn't protect him anymore, he was sent off to Krippenwald labor camp. We were unable to finish our work."
"So Papa presumably took over the work you and Opa had left unfinished," Max said. "But Papa worked in genetics. What's the connection between your work and his?"
"I don't know," Lars said. "After Samuel was taken away, I couldn't bear to remain in Germany. I went to London. There I met my future wife and took over her family patisserie. It was a good life and I lost all interest in returning to a career in pharmaceuticals. Samuel and I stayed in touch off and on, but we never met again." Lars stared out the window, eyes unfocused. "Samuel once mentioned to me that Hiram was interested in our work on the Indus pills. I didn't know the extent of Hiram's involvement in Samuel's research until after your father's death. But by the looks of it, he unearthed something about the pills that made Berliner nervous." Lars turned back to face Max. "I called on you because I thought you might have some relevant papers Hiram or Samuel may have kept."
"I have nothing work related of Papa's," Max said. "As for Opa, he burned almost all of his papers in a fit of rage one evening. All I have left from him is his seal and a diary, but most of it is torn and burned."
"Why don't you give this some thought?" Lars said. "Perhaps you might be able to guess the key to decode Hiram's research."
"It's a really, really long shot," Max said. She put her hands over her thighs to stop them from jiggling, picked up her sandwich, and stared at it. Gosh, she was hungry. How morbid that she would want to eat despite their conversation, despite throwing up, despite feeling such raging sorrow. Disgusted with herself, she took a defiant bite.
"Of course, once we crack the code, if we ever do, we'll need the actual pills," Lars said, his face somber. "For peer review, et cetera. Otherwise Hiram's findings, whatever they are, will make a weak case."
Max stared at Lars. "Papa arranged to send this to you five years ago. Why did you wait this long to—?"
Lars turned away. "My wife was ill at the time. She died, but there was our daughter. I didn't want to put her in danger." He paused. "In case Hiram had been—well, if Berliner Pharmaceuticals had in any way been involved in his passing. Besides, the second package containing the key to decode the research and the vial of the pills never arrived. All I had was his research, but it was coded and therefore gibberish. I called Hiram's lawyer and told him that I would protect the research but would do nothing with it. It was a coward's act, but ..." Lars shrugged.
"What did the lawyer say to that?" Max asked.
"What could he say? He agreed that without the key, the research was useless. He asked me to let him know if the key ever surfaced. But it never did. He was rather puzzled that I had received the package containing Hiram's research. Hiram had rerouted it several times and sent it to a post office box in London addressed not to me, but to Dr. Klein, about which I received detailed instructions."
"Who's Dr. Klein?" Max asked.
"Me! Your grandfather called me that. Klein means "little one" in German. I was rather young then, you see."
"All right, what about the second package?"
"That had been sent directly from the lawyer's office, also to that same PO box. But it didn't reach me. Possibly mislaid. Or, more likely, stolen."
"By Berliner?"
"Only they would have known Samuel's nickname for me," Lars said. "So yes."
That her father had been involved in all this intrigue stunned Max. It was as if she hadn't known him at all.
"What changed your mind?" Max said with a frown. "Why now?"
"I needed to do it," he said tightly.
Max was surprised at the calm she was starting to feel. Lunches delivered late were usually enough to leave her in a cold sweat. Maybe this was how numbing fear felt.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Colossus by Ranjini Iyer. Copyright © 2014 Ranjini Iyer. Excerpted by permission of Astor + Blue Editions.
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