Double Strike (A Davis Way Crime Caper Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

might jump across the room grasshopper-style any second. I truly believe the next generation of gamblers, having cut their teeth on Xbox, will take it to another, higher, unheard of, level of casino gaming, because they’ll bring their Xbox energy with them.
    “So, dude.” He caught himself. “My bad. Davis. It’s fall break.”
    “It’s your school’s fall break? Didn’t your parents know?”
    He dropped his chin, then whipped his head up and to the right every three seconds as a hair-grooming gesture. “I do not know.”
    I rolled a hand between us. Keep going.
    “I got a ride.”
    “You got a ride?”
    I can’t imagine that he can continue whipping his head around like he does without surely, at some point, breaking his own neck.
    “A kid in my residence hall? He was coming and I rode with him.”
    “On what? A tractor? In a car? Delta?”
    “Private.” Then, in the space of one second, noises came out of Little Sanders perfectly mimicking jet engines starting, a takeoff, a flight hugging the East Coast, hanging a right along the Gulf, then coming in for a smooth landing in Mississippi. All males are born with these noises. In addition, this male was born with a silver shovel in his mouth. He’d probably never even heard of Delta, unless maybe he owned half of it, which was not out of the question. His maternal grandfather, Salvatore Casimiro, owned half of the Las Vegas Strip.
    “What’s this kid’s name, Thomas?”
    “Quinn.”
    “So his father is Mr. Quinn?”
    “No. Quinn is the kid at my school.”
    “What’s Quinn’s last name?”
    “Jennings.”
    “Were his parents with you?”
    “Negative.”
    “Do you know his parents’ names?”
    Also negative.
    “Do you know where he’s from, Thomas?”
    “Down here somewhere.”
    “Biloxi?” Jennings. Didn’t ring any loud bells. “Your friend is from Biloxi?”
    “Somewhere close,” Thomas said. “Georgia. Maybe Kentucky.”
    I’d get faster and more coherent answers from a computer than this one, which is what I intended to do before I reported back to Mr. Sanders.
    “How long will you be here, Thomas?”
    “Till, like, school starts again.”
    I see. “When does school start again?”
    “When fall break is over.”
    Which was as far as I was going to get with Little Sanders.
    I stood, walked behind the television, and dangled the cord. “About this morning.”
    He traced a line from his right temple to his jaw, where I’d slammed his head into the hood of a car.
    “Are we good?” The cord danced.
    It was impossible to read little Sanders’s face. His discerning smile reminded me of his father. The evil glint in his eye reminded me of his mother.
    “You don’t remember anything about a gun, do you, Thomas?”
    I swung the Xbox cord like a pendulum. He followed it with his eyes. “No, Dude.”
    I plugged in the game.
      
    *     *     *
      
    I wove in and out of emergency vehicles still parked in quickly abandoned ways down half a mile of Beach Boulevard against five lanes of heavy midday traffic, wearing a creamsicle silk robe that barely covered my butt, running shoes, and Bradley Cole’s RayBans. Bianca had confiscated every stitch of clothing I keep at work for her own temporary wardrobe. I had to go home to get dressed, but not before I flagged down three large men to help me get my Volkswagen bug out of the sand it was mired in.
    On the short drive to get dressed, I thought about what a missed calendar opportunity today was; it could have been, should have been, Friday the thirteenth, and it wasn’t anywhere near over.
    I could hear my home from the wrong side of the door. I snuck in and used a tall potted peace lily for cover. From the open foyer inside our condo, it’s one huge room. Three granite steps down lead to the living room and three granite steps up, to the dining room, kitchen, and breakfast nook. My sister Meredith was up, banging pots and pans at the sink. My father was sitting at the