Double Dip (A Davis Way Crime Caper) by Gretchen Archer

Author:Gretchen Archer
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Henery Press
Published: 2014-01-24T05:00:00+00:00

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The day was gone, replaced by a moonless night featuring thick, low clouds over the Gulf. The past year had taught me many things, including low clouds at night over the Gulf meant grab your Burberry rain boots tomorrow morning. Gulf rain was determined, purposeful, blowing in horizontally from the southeast, and, several times a year, running people out of their sea-level homes. A large slice of the Biloxi population pie gambled around the weather: If the forecast called for anything more than an inch, they checked in to the casinos to ride it out. If the rain had a tropical-storm chaser somewhere out there in the Atlantic, they packed heavily. The locals loved their rain, because the locals loved their casinos.

Beach Boulevard was packed with Friday night casino-hopping gamblers when I pulled my Bug into traffic. What I wouldn’t give—my RED Valentino Paillettes tote, my mother’s secret lemon pound cake recipe—to go home and sleep for twenty straight hours, but my new condo was minus Bradley Cole to warm the bed, and plus Peyton Beecher Maffini. She would be my houseguest for the foreseeable future, because without her insider knowledge, the So Help Me God monster might eat us alive, or worse, take six months to resolve. In addition to Peyton, I had a Bellissimo watchdog in residence, too, and he’d better get ready to sleep in a chair, because he wasn’t sleeping on my new white sofa.

Fobbing myself into the parking garage at the Regent, it occurred to me that with Thatch the Great in residence too, I’d better remember to duck my head going in and out, so he wouldn’t pull a “Don’t you know me from somewhere?” Our parking spaces were miles apart, and instead of driving straight to mine, I idled around the parking-level corner and took a look at his.

Occupied. Thatch’s parking place was packed out with a canary yellow Porsche 911 Carrera. I could smell his new car from inside my old one. He should write me a thank-you note. And put it in a muffin basket.

The guest-room door was closed. “What’s she been up to?” I asked the Bellissimo bulldog, a guy named Baylor—mid-twenties, built like a bulldozer, dark hair, dark eyes, baby face—who No Hair had pulled off vault-guard duty for condo-guard duty. I’m not sure if Baylor was his first, middle, last, or all of his names.

“As far as I can tell,” Baylor said, “she’s watched about eight seasons of Entourage and eaten popcorn and ice cream all day.”

I’m hanging out with her tomorrow.

“Other than that, nothing.” He rocked his substantial weight from foot-to-foot.

“Nothing?” I asked. “She didn’t ask for a phone? Didn’t try to sneak out?”

He shook his head.

“Did the doctor come by?”

“Twice,” he said. “Gave her thumbs up both times.”

I staggered down the hall, waving goodnight to him, locked myself in my bedroom, kicked off my shoes, then pulled open all six French doors to let the ocean in. Next, I dug through my purse and located Laura Kasden’s burner phone, something I’d been meaning to do all day.

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