Crazy Little Thing by Saxon Bennett, Layce Gardner Read Free Book Online

to plan everything
out in detail. Planning takes all the fun out of it. Whatever happened to
adventure?”
    “Well, maybe we should have planned some stuff. Look
how our last adventure turned out: D.I.V.O.R.C.E.”
    “I know how to spell,” Ollie grumbled. She crunched
on a pork rind. She was hungry for real food. And she was tired. Maybe finding
a place to rest and grab some grub would make her feel better. “Find a place
with a pool,” Ollie said. Water always improved her mood.
    Suddenly, G-Ray sat bolt upright, held up both hands
and commanded, “Quiet!”
    Everyone held their breath and listened. After
several long moments, Claire whispered, “What exactly are we listening for?”
    “I can hear them,” G-Ray said.
    “Who?” Claire asked. “Your tocks?”
    G-Ray shook his head. “Tapping. Listen.”
    Ollie strained her ears. Sure enough, she heard
tapping noises. There were a series of long taps, interspersed with short taps.
“Does anybody know Morse code?”
    “I do,” G-Ray said. “They’re saying… Stop car. Stop
car. I have to pee. Pee. Stop car.”
    “Oh my God,” Ollie said. “It’s EZ! She’s awake.”
Ollie put on the blinker and took the next exit, which happened to lead
directly into the parking lot of the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino.

Between a Hard Rock (Hotel) and a Place
     
    As soon as G-Ray untied EZ and lowered her to her
feet in the parking lot, she took off running for the hotel lobby. Well, she
didn’t exactly run. When you’re tied up on top of a van going fifty-five miles
an hour for eight hours on the Interstate, your muscles seize and freeze. So
what EZ did was more of a herky-jerky strut. She looked like a puppet that had
a drunk guy pulling its strings. She bounced off a couple of cars and a camper
before straightening out and finding the front doors of the hotel.
    Oscar led the way on his leash, excitedly pulling
Ollie behind him. Claire and G-Ray followed them into the hotel lobby. As soon
as the door shut behind them they were swallowed up by loud noises, bright lights
and eye-watering smells. Thousands of slot machines whirred, purred, dinged,
donged and beeped. Dolly Parton’s voice boomed 9 to 5 over the
loudspeakers. Colored lights flashed and strobed. The fumes of stale smoke, old
whiskey and White Diamonds perfume assaulted their noses.
    Claire dug in her purse, found her sunglasses and
put them on.
    Ollie plugged her ears with her fingers.
    G-Ray pinched his nose and said, “I’mb going to get
us a roomb.”
    “What?” Ollie said. “I can’t hear you. I have my
fingers in my ears.”
    “I want my very own room,” Claire said.
    G-Ray turned loose of his nose, but continued to
mouth breath. “I know, man, I know,” he said. “It was in the contract that
Scarlet drew up and I signed.”
    Claire was glad she had a lawyer for a girlfriend.If not, she would probably be sleeping in some
skanky motel, sharing a bed with all of them. She looked over at Ollie.
    Ollie was standing still with her mouth hanging
open, her fingers still plugging her ears and her eyes bugged-out. Claire
followed Ollie’s gaze. “Holy shit,” Claire muttered. And she didn’t use that
phrase lightly because personally she had never understood how shit could be
holy. But this time the phrase was warranted for its unrealistic appeal if
nothing else. Because what she was seeing was totally unreal and made her
wonder if they had somehow been transported to another dimension or another
plane of reality or perhaps sucked into the Twilight Zone.
    The hotel lobby was crawling with animals. Big animals. Big, furry animals. People-sized animals, clad in fur
head-to-toe, with tails, and walking on their hind legs. There were dogs, cats,
kangaroos, coyotes, birds, and a wide assortment of cartoon characters.
    “What the…?” Claire said under her breath to Ollie.
    “You can see it too?” Ollie asked without turning
her head away from the sight. She unplugged her ears and winced.
    Claire