More Deaths Than One Read Online Free PDF

well and cost
three hundred dollars.” Since he hadn’t driven for many years, he’d
had a hard time finding his rhythm, but he saw no reason to mention
that.
    She flicked back her hair. “You’re not big on
commitment, are you? You won’t even commit to an apartment or a
real car.”
    A ragged old man smelling of whiskey and
urine entered the restaurant, sat on a stool, and carefully laid a
few coins on the counter. Kerry poured him a cup of coffee,
refilled the woman’s cup, then paused by Bob’s table, still
clutching the pot.
    “What about you and the cheat?” he asked.
    She smoothed her apron with her free hand. “I
have some more thinking to do on that, so for now I’m still
peddling porches.”
    He gave her a quizzical glance.
    “Didn’t I tell you? I guess not. He owns a
construction company that builds porches and decks. Calls it Pete’s
Porches.”
    She left, refilled the cups of the three or
four other customers, made a new pot of coffee, then stopped at
Bob’s table once more.
    The pressure in his head started to build. He
rubbed his throbbing temples with two fingers of each hand.
    “Headache?” she asked sympathetically. “Do
you want an aspirin?”
    “No, that’s all right. It comes and
goes.”
    She chewed on her lower lip, watching him
with narrow-eyed concentration. “A couple of times I’ve seen you
leaving the Chinese restaurant across the street. Do you eat over
there a lot?”
    “Most days.”
    “Well, no wonder you have a headache. All
that MSG.”
    Bob blinked. “I’d forgotten about that. A
long time ago, Robert Dunbar told me he loved Chinese food but
could never eat it stateside because of all the additives, which
gave him a headache. He said that since we made the food at The
Lotus Room from scratch, using fresh and natural ingredients, he
could indulge himself. I guess I need to cook my own meals. Where
can I find Chinatown?”
    She shot him a perplexed look. “You mean like
in San Francisco?”
    “I mean here in Denver. Don’t all major
cities have a Chinatown?”
    “Not us. The Asians here have been mostly
assimilated into the community, but there is a shopping center over
on Alameda where you can find all sorts of special Chinese
products. Why the insistence on Chinese food?”
    “It’s what I’m used to.”
    She laughed. “Why, are you from China?”
    “Close. Thailand. I’ve been living in Bangkok
awhile.”
    She gaped at him, then broke out into a
smile, her eyes dancing. “Your shallows seem to be growing ever
deeper. What’s it like living in a foreign country? What’s The
Lotus Room? Is that where you worked? And who’s Robert Dunbar?”
    Bob deliberated a moment and answered the
last question first. “Dunbar is an electronics engineer who works
for Data Management Systems, a corporation based here in Colorado.
He has the same fake chummy manner as the salesman at Lemons R Us
where I bought my car, and he makes much of the fact that we share
the same first name.”
    “As if that means anything,” Kerry said.
“There must be millions of Bobs in the world. Where did you meet
him?”
    “At The Lotus Room shortly after I started
working there. He always tried to get me to go golfing with him at
Bangphra on the Gulf of Siam. According to him, it has one of the
longest, most beautiful, and most challenging golf courses in the
world. You’d think he owned stock in the place the way he
rhapsodized about it.”
    “Did you ever go?”
    “No. I’m not fond of golfing.” Nor of Dunbar,
he almost added, but caught himself in time. He’d have to be
careful around this young woman; she had a way of disarming him so
that he imparted more than he intended.
    “I don’t like golf either. Not enough action.
But I don’t think I’d mind it so much if I could play somewhere
exotic like Thailand.” She flipped her hair out of her eyes. “I
never associated Thailand with golf. I’ve only heard about it in
relation to sex and sin.”
    “For the most part,