BOOKS BY STUART WOODS
FICTION
Hot Pursuit
Insatiable Appetites†
Paris Match†
Cut and Thrust†
Carnal Curiosity†
Standup Guy†
Doing Hard Time†
Unintended Consequences†
Collateral Damage†
Severe Clear†
Unnatural Acts†
D.C. Dead†
Son of Stone†
Bel-Air Dead†
Strategic Moves†
Santa Fe Edge§
Lucid Intervals†
Kisser†
Hothouse Orchid*
Loitering with Intent†
Mounting Fears‡
Hot Mahogany†
Santa Fe Dead§
Beverly Hills Dead
Shoot Him If He Runs†
Fresh Disasters†
Short Straw§
Dark Harbor†
Iron Orchid*
Two-Dollar Bill†
The Prince of Beverly Hills
Reckless Abandon†
Capital Crimes‡
Dirty Work†
Blood Orchid*
The Short Forever†
Orchid Blues*
Cold Paradise†
L.A. Dead†
The Run‡
Worst Fears Realized†
Orchid Beach*
Swimming to Catalina†
Dead in the Water†
Dirt†
Choke
Imperfect Strangers
Heat
Dead Eyes
L.A. Times
Santa Fe Rules§
New York Dead†
Palindrome
Grass Roots‡
White Cargo
Under the Lake
Deep Lie‡
Run Before the Wind‡
Chiefs‡
TRAVEL
A Romantic’s Guide to the Country Inns of Britain and Ireland (1979)
MEMOIR
Blue Water, Green Skipper
*A Holly Barker Novel
†A Stone Barrington Novel
‡A Will Lee Novel
§An Ed Eagle Novel
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
Publishers Since 1838
An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
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New York, New York 10014
Copyright © 2015 by Stuart Woods
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Woods, Stuart.
Naked greed / Stuart Woods.
p. cm.—(Stone Barrington ; 34)
ISBN 978-1-101-66424-7
1. Barrington, Stone (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Private investigators—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3573.O642N35 2015 2015007427
813'.54—dc23
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Version_1
CONTENTS
Books by Stuart Woods
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Author’s Note
Stone Barrington and Dino Bacchetti were having dinner at Patroon, a favorite restaurant. Dino’s wife, Viv, was out of town on business—she was an executive at the world’s second-largest security company, Strategic Services, and had to travel a lot, so Stone and Dino were having, perhaps, their thousandth dinner together, just the two of them.
The owner, Ken Aretzky, stopped by and bought them a drink, then continued on his rounds. They ordered the Caesar salad, a house specialty prepared at the table, and the chateaubriand, medium rare, and Stone ordered a bottle of the Laughing Hare Cabernet.
“Laughing Hare?” Dino asked.
“A Cabernet you never heard of,” Stone said. “Honest public servants can’t afford it.” Dino was New York City’s commissioner of police, but the two men had been partners as homicide detectives many years before. “That’s why I’m buying.”
The waiter brought the bottle and poured them a taste. Dino sampled it. “So I should consider this a bribe?”
“Let’s call it a bribe in the bank, since there’s nothing in particular I want from you at the moment.”
“That makes a nice change,” Dino said, and took a larger swig of the wine. “Not bad.”
“You are given to understatement,” Stone said.
“Okay, it’s pretty damn good.”
Stone took a swig himself. “Better than that.”
“So how come you’re alone tonight? Where’s Pat Frank?”
“Who knows?” Stone said. “She has let it be known that she’d rather be alone than with me.”
“What did you do?”
“It’s what you did,” Stone said. “You arrested her boyfriend on a double murder charge and her old friend as an accessory after the fact.”
“And she blames you?”
“I tried blaming you—it didn’t work.”
“So she pulled the plug?”
“Not exactly, she just got really busy.”
“She just started a new business, maybe she is really just very busy.”
“When I hear that excuse twice, I usually pull the plug myself. But the second time I was understanding, then I heard it a third time, and I got the message.”
“I’m sure it’s you, not her.”
“Isn’t that line supposed to be the other way around?”
“It’s always you.”
“What, am I too nice to them?”
“Maybe. They don’t always appreciate that the way you expect them to.”