Private investigator Ian visits his friend unannounced, only to discover the man lying in bed, not asleep but dead. Ian resolves to find out how his friend died and, if he was murdered, to bring the killer to justice. But the details of the case are bizarre: the door of the condo unit is locked and the only other occupant is a bodybuilder, Horst, found sitting on the living room couch, half asleep or drugged. Ian calls 911 and the cops, when video footage showing no one entered or left the condo around the time of death, fixate on Horst as the most likely suspect. Ian is convinced Horst is innocent and offers his services to help the police solve the mystery of his friend’s death. But the situation is complicated, not only by the self-contradictory nature of the physical evidence, but by the fact that Ian increasingly finds himself drawn to Horst. Worse, the lead police detective shows increasing signs of interest in Ian himself. Love and death become strangely intertwined, their resolution not easily discovered. Is Horst as innocent as Ian believes? Can Ian help solve the locked-room mystery?

Bliss

“I was wracking my brains, trying to think where it might be—and then it hit me: the only places were where I didn’t clean. One of them was between the headboard of Quentin’s bed and the wall. And there it was!”


At last, we were seated in the kitchen with fresh coffees, the final volume of Quentin’s diary before us on the table. A dozen pages were filled, and we read them all. When we had finished, I sat back.


Horst looked at me questioning. “What do you think?”


I pursed my lips. “Well,” I said cautiously, “there’s more rumination about death. Look here.” I flipped the pages. “A quote from Wittgenstein: Death is not an event in life. Then there’s this:


Chapter 29