Once a cop in Chicago, Joe Kozmarski now spends his days as a private investigator. Judge Rifkin, considered a great family friend until he betrayed Joe's father, calls Joe and invites him to his house with the pretense of a fishing trip. Joe knows full well the judge has an ulterior motive, although he does agree to meet with the judge, if only because they were once close.
Bob Piedras works for the judge. Bob is suspected of murdering his girlfriend, an Asian beauty who likes to pose provocatively in front of cameras. The judge wants Joe to find the real killer. He agrees to take the case, which is anything but simple.
The murdered girlfriend's brothers are thugs who trail Joe and rough him up, hoping he'll tell them where Bob is hiding out. Joe's mother dumps his 11-year-old nephew on him right when the investigation is getting tricky. To add salt to injury, Joe's ex-wife might want to let him back into her life, but doesn't want kids, and Joe's female police partner in the search is looking pretty good to him. Then the judge is murdered and Bob has disappeared. Evidence is piling up to make Bob look more than guilty for more than one murder.
Michael Wiley's debut, THE LAST STRIPTEASE, is an enjoyable, fast-moving whodunit that is sure to entertain.
Private eye Joe Kozmarski has just been asked to clear his
childhood friend Bob Piedras of murder. Bobโs latest
girlfriend, a young Vietnamese-American beauty, has turned
up dead in an airport hotel. No oneโs very surprised. She
had a taste for hard liquor, drugs, and stripping in front
of a camera. And Bob has a history of violence. But Bob's
boss, retired judge Peter Rifkin, is convinced Bob is
innocent and he thinks Joe is the one to find the real
killer.
But Joeโs life is complicated. He hasn't spoken to Rifkin
for fifteen years---ever since his father, now dead, found
out that the judge had double-crossed him. The dead
womanโs brothers, a pair of tough guys, are bent on being
the first to find and punish her murderer. On top of that,
Joe and his wife have separated and his mother has dropped
his eleven-year-old nephew on him. But the more obstacles
Joe encounters, the more determined he becomes to see this
case through.
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