Free Stateline by Dave Stanton Page B

meantime you’re on vacation with a pay check coming in.”
    “You got that right, Dirt. So, what the hell are you doing?”
    Cody Gibson and I had known each other since we played football together in high school. Cody was our star defensive lineman. Sometime after high school, he began calling me Dirty Double-Crossing Dan, the result of a forgotten, drunken episode at a pick-up bar. The nickname had survived the years. Cody was like that—on impulse he would nickname people, and the names tended to stick for life. His mom was Old Glory, he called his dad The Big Guy, and one of our old running buddies was No-Morals Andrew. He called Wenger “The Sniveler.”
    I quit football after I blew out my knee in my junior year and took up wrestling, but Cody went on to play on the defensive line for Utah State, despite being expelled from high school for throwing his coach in a Dumpster. By that time Cody was six-foot-five, 270, and still growing, and was wearing the trademark red beard he grew every winter since. He came back to San Jose after college and worked for a private security firm for a few years before hiring on with the San Jose Police Department. They promoted him to plainclothes detective three years ago.
    “I’m working a case up here freelance,” I said.
    “Yeah? You going to be up there for a while?”
    “Could be.”
    “What’s The Sniveler have to say about that?”
    “I haven’t told him yet.”
    Cody laughed. “You think you could run a couple names through the system for me?” I asked.
    “Shouldn’t be a problem. Fast Eddie owes me.”
    “Right. The names are Sylvester Bascom and Sven Osterlund. Bascom’s a murder victim, and Osterlund’s a suspect.”
    “I’ll have their records pulled. Call me in twenty-four hours,” Cody said, still chuckling.
    “Thanks, buddy.”
    I left my drink half-finished and walked out of the casino. If Osterlund wasn’t already being held as a witness, I wanted to talk to him. But first I needed to sit down with Whitey and Brad. I drove back down 50, to the Lazy 8 Hotel. The light was on in their room. It had been about five hours since I dropped them off, and I imagined they were sitting around watching TV before revving up for another long night of partying. Hopefully they had got some sleep. Whitey parted the drapes and looked out the window when I knocked.
    “Dan, what’s up?” he said, opening the door. He was wearing boxer shorts and a t-shirt.
    “You guys rested up?” I said. “You ready to go do some drinking?”
    “Shit, I’m dying for a beer,” Whitey said. The room smelled like pot, and his bong was smoldering on the nightstand. “Brado’s in the shower, he just woke up. I’ve been up for about half an hour. I’m freakin’ starving, I’m ready to split and get some fast food. You want a bong hit, man?”
    “No, thanks. But let’s go out and I’ll buy you guys dinner.”
    “No way!” Brad yelled, walking out of the bathroom with a towel around his waist.
    “Yup,” I said. “I’m up a hundred at the casinos. Come on, get your asses dressed. I’m buying.”
    “Right on,” Whitey said. They threw on their clothes and we were on the street in two minutes flat. The Lazy 8 was one of a number of cheap hotels on the California side of the state line, across from the casinos. We crossed the street over to Buffalo Bill’s Casino, which had a good all-night restaurant. The joint was raging with a rowdy Saturday night crowd. Rock n’ roll blared from the speakers, blending with the ring of slot machines, the clatter of dice, and the buzz of cards being shuffled. A couple of girls in tight jeans were trying to dance at the craps table and knocked a guy’s beer all over him. We wedged our way through the masses over to the restaurant. I steered us to a table toward the back, away from the noise.
    “Brad, you’re looking a little better than you did earlier today,” I said.
    “Shit, man, I felt my temperature shoot up, and I was