Chapter 19
Gustavo Vila Nova was equally frustrated and amused. The office complex's two wings deceptively posed as arms, welcoming visitors in the manner of a hospital or church plaza. But he was stuck in the center lobby, a cylinder-shaped space with a lofty ceiling and slate wall of babbling water that drowned out most of the footsteps, rings, and other sounds expected in a modern office building.
Looking again at his watch, Gustavo calculated he had been waiting more than seventy minutes for an answer to his request. He put down the sports magazine he had been thumbing through and approached the silver-haired woman with the precisely coiffed beehive hairstyle. Her reception desk was a wavy block of transparent glass. A stoic security guard stood several feet behind her.
"May I
