“What’s the code, Daddy?” she asked, because resistance was futile.
Seventeen of the forty-two primates on the roster were not legally owned. They were “guests.” Or “friends of the family.” Or, in one memorable case, “a spiritual companion who happens to have prehensile tail.”
The first week was fine. Her father buried himself in ledgers – actual paper ledgers, because Gibbons distrusted computers almost as much as he distrusted the mandrill who did taxes – and Hope helped where she could. She organized receipts, catalogued feed expenses, and learned the alarming truth: Mr. Gibbons’ Traveling Primate Paradise was a tax shelter. Not for money. For monkeys. hope harper daddy's monkey business
The monkeys weren’t performers. They were cover. The whole operation – the poker games, the tax-filing mandrill, the sequined vests – was a front for laundering money and smuggling confiscated primate habitats out of Africa.
Her father smiled. “That’s the part I haven’t figured out yet.” “What’s the code, Daddy
Hope Harper knew two things for certain by the age of twelve: her father loved her more than anything in the world, and he was absolutely, certifiably insane about monkeys.
It was hidden under a pile of banana receipts: a leather-bound journal filled with her father’s cramped handwriting. But it wasn’t about bookkeeping. It was about heists . Her father buried himself in ledgers – actual
“Excellent.” Gibbons clapped his hands. “Now, let’s talk money.”