Read Online No Way to Die by M. D. Grayson - Free Book Online Page B

We’ll go over it at the briefing.”
    Kenny is technically a private investigator, but he’s also our head of technology. The fact is, he’s a tech genius—one of those boy wonders who has the ability not only to understand but also to master—and even pioneer—new technology ideas. From concept to code to application, Kenny’s the best. It seems like half of a PI’s work nowadays involves data mining of one sort or another—accessing this or that database. Fortunately for us, Kenny’s got mad skills in this area—what he calls a “big propeller.” Almost without fail, he’s able to quickly get in, get what we need, and get out without anyone ever knowing he was there. This comes in very handy.
    Kenny’s as short as Doc is tall—he’s five eight and one-fifty, soaking wet. He has thick, dark hair and bushy dark eyebrows. He doesn’t have the greatest people skills in the world, but he’s good looking in a nerdy kind of way.
    At nine o’clock, I walked across the hall to the conference room. Everyone was assembled—even Richard Taylor. I bought the company from Richard four years ago after he built it from the ground up over a twenty-year period. It took me a couple of years to pay Richard off, but during this time, I found that Richard’s years of PI expertise, along with the thirty years of Seattle Police Department expertise before that, could be had for the asking if I simply provided him an office and allowed him to participate in the briefings. This deal was a no-brainer in the bargain department.
    Richard's in his early seventies. He’s tall and thin with white hair and brilliant blue eyes. He’s a wonderful steadying influence on us—always in a good mood, always smiling. When we started out, I didn’t expect that our relationship would develop the way it has—he’s turned into a very valuable mentor and, even more important, a good friend. He’s always willing to listen and provide advice when I hit a tough spot. As the saying goes: he's probably forgotten more than I’ll ever know about this business.
    “Good morning, everyone,” I said. “I’d like to start by—”
    “Danny,” Toni interrupted, “before you get started, may I say something first?”
    I looked at her, confused. She had an odd look in her eyes. I shrugged my shoulders. “Sure,” I said. “Go ahead.”
    “Thanks. We’re all detectives here, and I have a little detecting I’d like to do.”
    “Go ahead,” I said again.
    “Okay,” she said, a sly smile starting to appear on her dark-red lips. She stood up and looked around. Her eyes settled on Kenny. “I’d like to point out that Mr. Kenny Hale here is wearing an interesting black turtleneck.”
    I looked at Kenny and saw that this was true. I hadn’t noticed before. Hearing his name called, Kenny’s eyes glanced upward from the notepad he’d been focusing on. He immediately started to look nervous.
    “We’ve not seen young Mr. Hale wearing a turtleneck before. I checked—it’s not his birthday, so that means his mom probably didn’t buy it for him. And, since it’s March now, if he got it for Christmas, we’d probably already have seen it. Furthermore, since it’s almost fifty degrees outside, it’s obviously too warm for a turtleneck, even if you customarily wore them—which Mr. Hale does not. From this behavioral anomaly,” Toni continued, “I propose that we can deduce one of two things.”
    She paused, allowing the tension to build.
    “The first possibility,” she said, “is that Kenny has suddenly developed a Steve Jobsian–type style jones. As you all may know, Steve Jobs wore a black turtleneck almost every day. So it’s entirely possible that, to honor Mr. Jobs’s passing, Kenny has decided to adopt a black-turtleneck look as a sort of homage.” She paused. We all paid attention, interested to know where she was going with this.
    “But we all know that there’s a problem with this theory, don’t we?” She nodded as she