Smoker - Hardcover

Rucka, Greg

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 055310716X ISBN 13: 9780553107166

Publisher: Bantam, 1998

Synopsis

Greg Rucka has won national acclaim for his two gripping thrillers, Finder and Keeper, which have been hailed as "impressive" (People), "remarkable" (The Orlando Sentinel), and "full of surprises" (The Houston Chronicle).  Now, in Rucka's most explosive novel to date, professional bodyguard Atticus Kodiak returns to confront an enemy without conscience or mercy--a master of manipulation, a pure connoisseur of killing.

For a professional bodyguard, there's nothing worse than being tagged as a man who attracts danger.  But after his last job, that's just what they're saying about Atticus Kodiak.  In fact, there's only one person in the business willing to touch him with a ten-foot pole.  

An easy job, according to Elliot Trent, head of New York's biggest security firm: baby-sit a pampered playboy hiding from the angry brothers of an ex-playmate.  It's a job Kodiak finds himself forced to accept, a decision that draws him into a multimillion-dollar game of cat and mouse.

The mouse: Jeremiah Pugh, a material witness whose testimony can knock the legs out from beneath America's mighty tobacco industry.  Racked with guilt, Pugh may be his own worst enemy.

The cat: known only as John Doe, one of the Ten, designated by international law enforcement as one of the ten most dangerous contract killers in the world.  A ghost, unknown and unidentified, who changes with the wind and adapts to any situation.

Drawn into the field of fire by Elliot Trent, Atticus finds himself exactly where he doesn't want to be--between the killer and the target.  For Atticus and the assassin are bound by a common thread: their obsession to get the job done.

It's an obsession that will connect the assassin and the protector in the most intimate of relationships, anticipating each other's moves, exploiting each other's weaknesses, baring each other's secrets, and raising the stakes in a game where the first player to flinch...dies.

In Smoker, Atticus Kodiak meets his match in a thriller of unrelenting suspense guaranteed to suck you in, blow you away, and leave you breathless--a novel that confirms Greg Rucka's place among today's top suspense writers.

About this title

About the Author

Born in San Francisco, Greg Rucka was raised on the Monterey Peninsula.  He has worked at a variety of jobs, from theatrical fight choreographer to emergency medical technician.  He and his wife, Jennifer, reside in Eugene, Oregon, where he is at work on his next novel, Chasing the Dragon.

From the Inside Flap

as won national acclaim for his two gripping thrillers, Finder and Keeper, which have been hailed as "impressive" (People), "remarkable" (The Orlando Sentinel), and "full of surprises" (The Houston Chronicle). Now, in Rucka's most explosive novel to date, professional bodyguard Atticus Kodiak returns to confront an enemy without conscience or mercy--a master of manipulation, a pure connoisseur of killing.

For a professional bodyguard, there's nothing worse than being tagged as a man who attracts danger. But after his last job, that's just what they're saying about Atticus Kodiak. In fact, there's only one person in the business willing to touch him with a ten-foot pole.

An easy job, according to Elliot Trent, head of New York's biggest security firm: baby-sit a pampered playboy hiding from the angry brothers of an ex-playmate. It's a job Kodiak finds hi

Reviews

Vulnerable macho heroes are always in demand. Here, as in his two previous outings (Finder and Keeper), Rucka's Atticus Kodiak fits the bill in spite of his unlikely name. A personal security specialist ("bodyguard" to the unenlightened) with a bad rep from a botched job, Atticus parlays a new job offer from fellow bodyguard Elliott Trent into a flush gig protecting a "smoking gun" witness from an international assassin hired by Big Tobacco. Anti-tobacco lawyers fortify a Westchester mansion to keep the witness alive, and Kodiak and Trent share guard duties in a very uneasy (and suspenseful) peace. Trent's daughter, Natalie, a bodyguard herself and heir to Trent's sizable firm, adds fuel to the fire as Kodiak's secret lover and new business partner after a rift with Dad. This doesn't please Erika (Kodiak's teen ward), who is pulling for his estranged lover, Bridgett. The assassin's attempts, when they come, show evidence of an inside job and open a can of narrative worms so deftly deployed that readers will bite nearly every hook. Rucka juggles a large cast and complex plot with aplomb and packs enough real action and character depth to please a wide audience. Every nuanceAfrom high-tech security gizmos to personality quirks, the New York setting, and the surprising range of women charactersAcomplicates and deepens Atticus's victorious return.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Bombs, bullets, and killings galore in a third adventure for bodyguard Atticus Kodiak. After burning up a dozen pages untangling loose ends from Finder (1997), Rucka brings his brooding, sufficiently alienated noirish action hero, who drinks boutique beer and bakes his own bread, within spitting distance of his erstwhile employer, Elliott Trent. Trent, though leery of Kodiak's lone-wolf ways, still wants him to guard Carter Dean (a.k.a. Jeremiah Pugh), a sleazy New York yuppie whos been getting death threats from the brothers of a woman Dean refuses to marry. Kodiak, living under a cloud from botched jobs in his past, reluctantly accepts, letting Natalie, Trents estranged daughter and Kodiak's current lover, lend an assist. After Natalie blows away a machine-guntoting killer, Trent informs Kodiak that the dead man was the infamous ``John Doe,'' one of ten international assassins so accomplished that nobody knows who they are, what they look like, when they're about to strike, or how to hire them. Soon enough, Kodiak learns that Carter Dean was a decoy used to lure John Doe into the open. It seems that Doe has been hired to kill the real Jeremiah Pugh, a former tobacco industry executive prepared to offer damning testimony in a lawsuit against his former company. But not even Neil Lamia, the industry's pricey lawyer, can believe his good-ole-boy clients would sic a deluxe hit man on Pugh. Kodiak and his bodyguard buddies soon become victims themselves in an absurdist drama as they routinely question, doubt, then deny that far-fetched villainy is afoot, only to discover bombs, bullets, and worse awaiting them around the corner. Kodiak not only has to protect Pugh from further assaults but has to figure out, from among a pack of suspects (both male and female), just who John Doe really is. Tiresome, preposterous plotting in an otherwise compelling tale filled with well-drawn, believable people and nicely turned- out scenes. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

It is not enough that the tobacco industry has been slowly killing people for a century or two?now they've hired a mysterious contract killer to take out a witness to their nefarious deeds. In this third thriller by Rucka (Keeper, LJ 5/1/96; Finder, LJ 6/1/97), professional bodyguard Atticus Kodiak is hired to protect Jeremiah Pugh, a biomedical research scientist. Pugh is willing to testify that DTS Industries puts additives into their products to make them more addictive. If this allegation stands up, it will leave DTS open to lawsuits costing zillions of dollars. But Smoker, despite the title, is less concerned with the evil cigarette companies than with thwarting a clever killer?there's a lot of Hollywood, Steven Seagal stuff: guns, bombs, explosions, fighting. Several ongoing characters left over from the first two books are insufficiently reintroduced, and the plot line is minimal, but otherwise this is not a bad book for thriller fans.?Dawn L. Anderson, North Richland Hills P.L., TX
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Jerry Pugh, former head of research at one of the world's largest tobacco companies, has agreed to testify that the company orchestrated its advertising to appeal to kids and that research was focused on more addictive cigarettes. Bodyguard Atticus Kodiak is hired not to guard Pugh, rumored to be the target of an infamous hitman, but to guard a red herring whom Pugh's lawyers hope the assassin will mistake for Pugh. Kodiak is not informed of the ruse and isn't pleased when a hit is attempted. Finally hired to guard the real target, Kodiak oversees Pugh's protection in the face of ever-increasing violence and the suspicion that Pugh may be more at risk from internal than external forces. This exciting, behind-the-scenes glimpse into the world of high-stakes personal security offers myriad details regarding procedure, weaponry, and the mental chess game that takes place between killer and protector. Kodiak's soap opera^-like personal relationships hurt the book a bit, but not enough to seriously detract from an exciting action adventure. Wes Lukowsky

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

I'd been waiting for forty minutes in the Oak Bar of the Plaza Hotel.  Outside, coachmen smoked cigarettes and made jokes about the weather while their horses shifted in the heat, anticipating the order to drag another tourist couple around Central Park.  I was wearing blue jeans, white sneakers, a white oxford shirt, a gray and blue tie, and a dust-colored linen jacket.  My glasses were clean, and the two small surgical steel hoops in my left earlobe sparkled.  It was the fourth day of July, and instead of fighting my jetlag or enjoying a holiday barbecue, I was nursing a club soda and wondering why Elliot Trent was late.

For the most part, I like the Oak Room.  It stirs cultural memories of the alcoholic idle rich, the Roaring Twenties, and makes me think of literary giants like F.  Scott Fitzgerald and Hemingway's moveable feast.

But after a while I start to think about the rest of it--the complacency, the arrogance. . . basically, everything that Fitzgerald talks about in The Great Gatsby.

My watch agreed that I'd been waiting forty-two minutes.  I figured to make it a round forty-five before calling it quits.  Trent hadn't said why I should meet him, only that it was "extremely urgent." That, in and of itself, was barely enough to draw me out.  But there was a chance he wanted to talk about Natalie, and although I didn't think Elliot Trent knew the extent of my relationship with his daughter, I'd been wrong before.

I was reaching for the check when Trent arrived.  He looked unhurried and cool, his summer-style business suit marking him overdressed, even in the Oak Bar of the Plaza Hotel.  It may have been the Fourth of July, but according to Trent's clothes, this was a business day like any other.  He made me in my booth and took his time heading over, even stopping to order drinks from the waiter by the bar.  If Trent thought he was late, you couldn't tell by looking at him.

He had company, too, a man in his mid-twenties who followed a few steps behind.  The man was very pretty, strong featured, with dark eyes and black hair cropped and styled in the same fashion almost every man had worn in prime time this last television season.  The combination of looks and dress made him seem familiar, the way, after a while, every magazine model seems familiar, and I decided I didn't like him on principle.  I also decided I was in a bad mood.

"I ordered you another of the same." Trent reached my table and waited for the other man to take a chair before seating himself.  "I hope that's all right."

"It might go to my head," I said.  "I've been drinking for a while."

Trent frowned.  He has a good frown, with creases in the right places and the silver hair above it to make it all look distinguished.  The other man smiled.  The smile, too, was out of a magazine.

"Carter Dean," Trent said, "Atticus Kodiak.  Atticus, this is Carter Dean."

"Of the Greenwich Deans?" I asked.

Carter Dean looked vaguely alarmed.  "No," he said.

"Good.  Can't stand the Greenwich Deans." To Trent I said, "I've been here for forty-five minutes."

"I was held up at the office," Trent said, and that was all he was going to give me by way of an apology.  In one sense, it was an adequate explanation: Elliot Trent runs Sentinel Guards, one of the biggest security firms in Manhattan.  Over sixty men and women on the regular payroll, with an additional stable of part-timers for when the going gets really rough, covering everything from personal protection to corporate security.  Trent himself is ex-Secret Service, and had worked the presidential detail for Carter and, briefly, for Reagan.

The waiter brought our drinks.  When he had gone, Trent said, "I've been trying to reach you all week.  Erika said you were out of town."

"I got back today," I said.

"Working?"

"Yes."

"Not local," Trent declared.

"Los Angeles.  I know a couple people out there."

"I didn't think it was local." Trent reached for his drink.  "What were you doing?"

"Auditing.  A Saudi princess is starting at UCLA in the fall.  You know the story."

"So you weren't actually guarding."

"Nope."

"I'd imagine business has been rough.  Not a lot of work."

"There's been enough."

"Really?" His creases went a little deeper in concern.  "Even considering everything that's happened?"

I just looked at him, wondering what he was playing at.  Pulling this shit in front of a client--if that's what Carter Dean was--made no sense.

"That whole SAS business, I mean." Trent shook his silver head.  "And before that, the doctor, you remember.  The one whose daughter was murdered."

"I remember."

"You were guarding them both, weren't you? The doctor and her daughter." He kept his gaze on me as he spoke, kept his voice wrapped in fatherly tones.  His eyes are hazel.

I looked at Carter Dean.  Carter Dean looked out the window.  Out the window, one of the coachmen was tucking an octogenarian couple into his carriage for a ride around the park.  The couple were holding hands.

"You know damn well I was," I told Trent.  He also knew the rest, that one of the guards in the detail had died, and that the guard in question had been his daughter Natalie's lover and my best friend.

Elliot Trent took a sip of his drink, then wiped his fingers on the cocktail napkin.  He glanced at Dean.  Dean took that as his cue.

"I'm looking for some protection," Carter Dean said.  He said "protection" like he was Al Pacino and Trent was Marlon Brando.  I didn't want to know who that made me.

"Why?"

Trent answered for him.  "Mr. Dean has just ended a relationship with a woman several years his junior.  Of legal age, but young nonetheless.  The lady in question has brothers.  Irate brothers, who are unhappy with the disposition of the affair."

Dean made a face, probably at Trent's choice of words.  "They feel I should have married her," he told me.  "That just wasn't going to happen, and Liz understood that.  They didn't.  They don't.  They're pretty angry right now."

"Wonder why," I said.

"I've told Mr.  Dean there's probably nothing to worry about," Trent said, commiserating with me.  "But he is insistent.  Apparently, both of the Thayer brothers own guns."

"You're offering this to me?" I asked Trent.

"We're short-staffed at Sentinel right now.  I can supply guards for Mr.  Dean, but I have nobody free who can run the detail.  So, yes, I'm offering it to you."

"It's not a detail," I said.  "It's babysitting."

Trent stood up, and I thought the interview was over, but instead he just moved out of the way to let Dean pass.  "Will you give us a few minutes alone?" Trent asked him.

Dean nodded, and I watched him head to the bar.

"I know it's babysitting." Trent sat down again.  "You know it's babysitting.  The threat is minimal, at worst.  Neither of the brothers--Joseph and James--has a record.  I've already tried to dissuade Dean, but he's after the peace of mind, and he's willing to pay for it."

"You can't really be so busy at Sentinel you don't have anyone to spare," I said.

"We're running a major operation upstate, and it's taking all of my resources." Trent leaned back in the booth to appraise me.  I don't imagine he liked what he saw, but I couldn't argue with that; lately, I didn't like what I saw in the mirror either.  It wasn't just the need for a haircut, or the scar that ran along my right cheek from temple to jaw.  It was the suspicion that the whole Atticus Kodiak looking back at me wasn't much of a package.

"It's an easy job, Atticus.  We plant Dean at the Orsini Hotel, button him up there for two weeks, tops.  Two thousand dollars for the work, and you don't even have to sit on him twenty-four/seven.  I'll supply three or four other guards to make him feel safe, you'll all keep him company, and everyone will be happy."

"I'm wondering if I should be insulted," I said.

"The word is out." Trent said it gently.  "Some people in our business--in this city, at least--don't want anything to do with you.  After the death of that little girl, after the death of Rubin Febres, after the whole mess this last winter with the SAS, they figure you're dangerous.  It's not hard to see why.  You've had gun battles in downtown, for God's sake."

"Just the one," I said.

"There have been similar situations, but all right.  Just the one." He smiled again, and I decided this smile was more condescending than paternal.  "But the fact remains that another mishap will get you blackballed in our business.  Right now, you're poison.  If you do this job for me and you do i...

Edition details

• Publisher: Bantam
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 055310716X
• ISBN 13: 9780553107166
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320