Free Anonymous Rex by Eric Garcia Page B

that her name, Shirley?—tell Mrs. McBride that I’m in the building, I can assure you that the good lady will see me. We go back.”
    Another fake smile, another laser look of death. Reluctantly, she lifts the phone. “Shirley, it’s me again …”
    I am shuttled off to wait in a corner while Shirley and the receptionist chat it out. This time, within minutes—seconds, even!—I am approached by the suddenly respectful secretary and told that Mrs. McBride will see me now, sorry for the inconvenience, I will find her offices on the seventy-eighth floor.
    High-speed elevator. Love these things. Good thing I don’t have eustachian tubes.
    On the forty-sixth floor, two dinos in the guise of beefy human secret service guards—black suits, ear mikes, and all—enter the elevator, coming around to flank me on either side. They radiate physical power, and I would not be surprised if either had brought along some sand for the express purpose of kicking it in my face. I suppress a strong urge to engage in isometrics.
    “Morning, fellas,” I say, tipping my hat. The move tickles me somewhere deep within my archetypal detective conscious, and I resolve to do a lot more hat-tipping.
    They do not respond.
    “Looking very spiffy in your costumes. Good choices, all around.”
    Again, no response. Their pheromones—the dark, heavy scent of fermenting oats, brewing yeasts—have already gained control of the elevator, taking as their hostage my own delightful odor.
    “If I had to guess,” I continue, turning to the behemoth to my left, “and let me warn you, I’m good at this—I’d say that you’re an … Allosaur, and this li’l tyke over here is a Camptosaur. Am I right or am I right?”
    “Quiet.” The command is soft. I obey it instantly.
    A good word to describe Judith McBride’s office—which encompasses the whole of the building’s seventy-eighth floor—is “plush.” Word of the day, no doubt about it. Plush carpets, plush fabrics, a plush view of the Hudson and distant Staten Island out the floor-to-ceilingwindows that comprise the entirety of the structure’s exterior walls. If I go to the bathroom, I am sure to discover that they will have found a way to make tap water plush as well, probably via NutraSweet.
    “Nice digs,” I say to my muscle-bound friends. “A lot like my office, actually … in the sense that mine is square, too.”
    They are not amused. I am not surprised.
    “Mr. Burke?” It is Shirley, the infamous Shirley, calling me toward the main office double doors. “Mrs. McBride is waiting.”
    The guards move to flank the office doors as I enter the inner sanctum, drawing the wide brim of my hat down and across my eyes. The goal is to start out low-key and slowly whip the interview into a nice cappuccino froth, maybe work in a few questions about Ernie for a topping. Light levels are dim, the slatted vertical window shades casting dark prison bars across the carpet. Fortunately, the mirror theme has not been duplicated in this room, so to those random thoughts of
condom building, condom building
I can say adios. Instead, all manner of paintings, sculptures, and objets d’art fill the available wall space, and if I knew anything about the illustrative humanities, I would probably be astounded at the breadth of Mrs. McBride’s collection. Might be some Picassos, maybe a few Modiglianis, but as it is, I’m more impressed by the wet bar set off in the far corner.
    “I don’t have a wet bar in my office,” I say to no one in particular. The doors close softly behind me.
    “Donovan?” A shadow detaches itself from behind the desk, stands rigidly behind a chair. “Is that really you?” Her voice carries the affected aristocratic lilt of someone who wishes to give the impression of being money-born, of having come from great status through the accident of birth rather than having achieved it.
    “Morning, Mrs. McBride.”
    “My lord … Donovan, you … you look well.” She