Cold Hit (45 page)

Last year I lost two friends, each of great spirit and heart. Whenever Alex Cooper goes to the ballet — as she does here with Natalie Moody — she will be watching the dancers at American Ballet Theatre and honoring Howard Gilman, an extraordinary man whose spirit lives on in all of those — man and beast — whom he embraced.

And my young protégée, Maxine Pfeffer, who lost her valiant struggle with cancer, will always be Coop’s paralegal, Max. Thinking of her will forever bring a smile to my face.

Some of my Vassar classmates asked me to create a character-in memory of one of our dear friends, the actress Marilyn Swartz Seven, who also died too young. She is here as a woman of mystery — a role I hope she would have enjoyed performing.

The crews at Scribner and at Pocket Books have been a delight. I am especially grateful to Susan Moldow, for her support; John Fontana, for his stunning design; Giulia Melucci, for her relentless and enthusiastic efforts on my behalf; and Sunshine Lucas, for her patience and efficiency.

My thanks to all the booksellers and librarians who continue to put this series in the hands of readers, and to readers who wait for more.

The collaboration with Susanne Kirk, friend and editor, has been one of the blessings of this business. She has helped me make this a better book.

I have seen so many books dedicated to Esther Newberg in the last year that I have run out of superlatives for her. The best thing my husband ever did for me, other than ask me to marry him, was to introduce me to Esther — brilliant agent, brilliant friend.

My family remains my most precious gift. My only regret is that my father — the gentlest man I’ve ever known, who introduced me to this genre when I was a child — did not live long enough to see the joy this career has given me. But I thank my amazing mother, Alice, and all the Fairsteins — Guy, Marisa, Lisa, and Marc — for their support, and the Feldmans and Zavislans — Diane, Jane, Jan, Matthew, and Alexander — for theirs as well.

Most of all, I am constantly inspired by the love of the most wonderful continuing character in this series — and in my life — Justin Feldman. He has made all my dreams come true.

Linda Fairstein, America’s foremost prosecutor of crimes of sexual assault and domestic violence, has run the Sex Crimes Unit of the District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan for more than two decades. A Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, she is a graduate of Vassar College and the University of Virginia School of Law. She is the author of two earlier international best-selling Alexandra Cooper novels,
Final Jeopardy
and
Likely to Die
, as well as the nonfiction book
Sexual Violence
, a
New York Times
Notable Book in 1994. She lives with her husband in Manhattan and on Martha’s Vineyard.