1 Runaway Man Read Online Free PDF

particular mother lode in the Leetes Group file. How come? Was it possible they hadn’t uncovered it? Or was their report redacted because they didn’t want me in the loop? I had no idea. I only knew that our case had just taken a sharp swerve toward weird.
    I looked back out at the falling snow, soaking in the enormity of it. Canterbury College was by no means a hotbed for intercollegiate athletics. It didn’t even offer athletic scholarships. But for the past two seasons the tiny Division II school had produced one of the top men’s basketball teams in the entire country, right up there with powerhouses like North Carolina and Kansas. Canterbury’s Athenians had been the Cinderella story of last year’s NCAA tournament, toppling the mighty UCLA Bruins and Pitt Panthers on their way to the Elite Eight before they were finally eliminated by Duke in a nationally televised prime time game. The Canterbury Tale , the media had dubbed this improbable run of upsets engineered by John Seckla, the team’s dynamic young head coach. And it was no fluke. Coach Seckla’s Athenians had kept right on winning this season. They were even favored to make it into the Final Four. And the overwhelming reason why was six-foot-five-inch Charles “In Charge” Willingham, their incandescent All-American shooting guard. Charles Willingham was a consensus top three pick in the next NBA draft who’d chosen tiny Canterbury over the traditional hoops schools because he was also a 4.0 brainiac who planned to go to law school someday. Charles was the ultimate feel-good story. A black hometown hero out of Harlem’s Martin Luther King housing projects who never made a false move on or off the court. He was modest in victory, gracious in defeat, polite, well-spoken and movie star handsome. The media adored him. Everyone did. Charles Willingham was a once-in-a-generation talent. The black Bill Bradley, old-timers called him.
    “Sara, how long have Bruce and Charles been together?”
    “More than a year. Brucie hasn’t told our folks because they’ll freak.”
    “About him being gay, you mean?”
    She nodded. “Their values are totally outmoded.”
    “But you’re cool with it?”
    “Of course. We are who we are. We can’t let … Oh, shit !” She narrowed her gaze at me. “Did you just scam me?”
    “Scam you how?”
    “You’re not going to go blab this to, like, TMZ or Gawker are you?”
    “Of course not. You can trust me.”
    “How do I know that?”
    “Because I just gave you my word.”
    She studied me carefully for a moment. “Benji, how old are you?”
    “Twenty-five, why?”
    “Because you don’t look like someone who’d do this kind of work.”
    “Looks can be deceiving.”
    “So that means you’re not?”
    “Not what?”
    “A total bunny.”
    I smiled at her. “My mom calls me Bunny.”
    “I would kill for your eyelashes. Are you married?”
    “No.”
    “Do you have a girlfriend?”
    “No.”
    “Are you gay? It’s okay if you are.”
    “I’m not gay.”
    “Good, I’m glad,” she said, showing me those dimples of hers again.
    “You were saying something about sneakers?…”
    “Well, yeah. Charles is going to pull down huge endorsement deals this spring after the NBA draft. Sneakers, power drinks, all of that. He is such a golden boy. Except he won’t be if the public finds out that the great love of his life is a guy named Bruce Weiner. So somebody wants to pay Brucie to go bye-bye. It’s got to be that, don’t you think?”
    I didn’t know. A sneaker manufacturer didn’t exactly sound like Bates, Winslow and Seymour’s usual sort of clientele. Then again, we were all working a bit harder these days. “Sara, I’m still wondering something. Why did you jump in my car?”
    She lowered her eyes. “Because I’m really worried about Brucie. The last time we talked he sounded incredibly down. Which is not a good thing. When nobody offered him a basketball scholarship he got super depressed and