THE DEAD AMERICAN (The Inspector Samuel Tay Novels Book 3) Read Online Free

asked.
    “A company here recruited him. They were undertaking their own driverless car project and they offered him the opportunity to be a senior software developer.”
    “Did he have any connection with Singapore before—”
    “None. He’d never even been here. He had lived in California all his life, but they offered him a lot of money to come to Singapore and I guess he was ready for an adventure.”
    It was difficult for Tay to think of living in Singapore as an adventure. For someone to see Singapore as an adventure, Tay figured they had to be living a shockingly dull life.
    “What was the name of the company that hired Tyler?” he asked.
    “It’s called The Future.”
    “The Future? The name of the company is The Future?”
    The woman nodded.
    Tay tried to imagine shaking hands with someone who had just introduced himself by saying Hello , I’m from The Future. He could imagine it, but not without laughing.
    “What does The Future do?” Tay asked, struggling to keep a straight face. No matter how much silly wordplay on the company name he could think of, he would be embarrassed under the circumstances to start snickering.
    “As I understand it, they’re building a driverless car for Singapore. That’s why they recruited Tyler from Google. I’m told Singapore is the ideal laboratory for such a project since it’s small enough to be easily mapped in the detail the technology requires. That’s one of the limitations Google has discovered in California. The United States is so big that mapping it at the necessary level of detail is an almost unimaginable undertaking.”
    Tay wasn’t sure he understood, but he nodded all the same.
    “How long had Tyler been in Singapore when he…” Tay trailed off, trying to think of a sympathetic way to put it. He couldn’t. “When he died,” Tay finished quickly.
    “About eight months. He had quit his job just before it happened, and he told his parents he was coming back to California.”
    “Do you know why he quit?”
    “His mother says he said he was afraid.”
    “Afraid? Afraid of something in Singapore?”
    The idea sounded ridiculous to Tay. Singapore had to be one of the least scary places on earth.
    “That’s what he said.”
    “What was he afraid of?” Tay asked.
    “His mother doesn’t know. Tyler didn’t tell her. But she got the impression it had some connection to his job. That it was the reason he quit.”
    “Did she tell the police this?”
    “Yes, but she said they didn’t appear to care. All they said was that she must have misunderstood Tyler.”
    “I can tell you from my own personal experience, Emma, the Singapore police don’t generally ignore—”
    “I don’t know what they generally do. I only know what they did this time. They made a determination of suicide, then they ignored everything that didn’t fit into that determination.”
    Tay said nothing. He wished he could tell Emma that was impossible, but he couldn’t. In fact he had very little difficulty imagining how something like that could have happened.
    “That’s why I need somebody who understands how things work here to help me,” Emma continued. “If we go back over the evidence, I think I can build a case that someone murdered Tyler and find out why they did it. Then the police won’t be able to ignore me.”
    In Tay’s experience, there was no one the Singapore police couldn’t ignore if it was politically expedient to do so. But he didn’t see any reason to say that right then, so he said nothing at all.
    “I’ll be happy to pay you whatever you ask, Inspector, within reason of course. I’ve been told you’re the best possible man to help me and now that we’ve met I’m convinced it’s true.”
    “It’s very kind of you to say so, Emma, but I still don’t—”
    “There’s something else, too.”
    Tay waited politely for the woman to go on.
    “There’s something very odd about this company Tyler was working for.”
    “The