Cut Back by Todd Strasser Read Free Book Online

beneath him.

Nine
    F or a split second Kai’s heart jumped into his throat. Ever since Bethany Hamilton lost her arm to a fifteen-foot tiger shark back in Hanalei, he’d been acutely aware of things in the water beneath him. But this was just a black plastic bag. These days the ocean was filled with them.
    Kai started to paddle back in. By now more of Lucas’s crew had arrived for the morning session. There were even a couple of new kids Kai had never seen before. Since the waves weren’t worth fighting for, Kai didn’t see the point in hassling with them, and he paddled toward Sewers instead. A little while later he joined Booger, Bean, and Shauna on the outside.
    â€œNot much of a day, huh?” Bean said, sitting on his board.
    â€œBeats working,” said Kai. He turned to Shauna. “How’s it going?”
    â€œGreat,” she said. “The only thing I don’t get is why when I catch a wave, I always go straight toward shore, but when you guys catch a wave you go sideways.”
    Instead of answering, Kai looked out to see what was coming in. A smallish set was on the way. “Let’s see what you’re doing,” Kai said. “Maybe you could take one of these waves.”
    â€œOkay.” Shauna got prone on her board and started to paddle without really watching the wave behind her. She managed to catch it, then got to one knee as it closed out. For a second Kai thought she was going to eat it in the suds, but she held on and rose to both feet and rode the rest of the way in.
    Kai turned to Bean and gave him a questioning look.
    â€œI counted at least four, maybe five major mistakes,” Bean said. “How about you?”
    â€œSomething like that,” Kai replied. “You want to tell her?”
    â€œNo way,” Bean said. “She asked you, notme. In fact”—he turned his board around and started to paddle—“I think this is a good time to catch a wave myself.” With a few almost effortless paddles, he caught a wave.
    Chicken
, Kai thought with a smile while Bean rode down the line, walking his long board like a dancer. By now Booger had paddled out on his bodyboard.
    â€œAbout that guy you’re looking for with blond dreadlocks and a red Jeep,” he said. “I was thinking … I bought some turntables and a mixer from a guy last year. He had
brown
dreadlocks. I think he was driving an old beat-up BMW.”
    â€œHow’d you find him?” Kai asked.
    â€œHe posted an ad in the music store in town.”
    â€œHe was from around here?”
    â€œYeah, I’m pretty sure,” Booger said. “Maybe a town or two over. It had to be a cash deal. No checks or money orders. Funny thing was, he brought the turntables over to my house, you know? Like he had all this stuff in the backseat of his car. So I paid him, and he asks me if I’m interested in anything else, and I’m like, what’ve you got? He opened the car’s trunk and it’s like a fricken miniwarehouse.He’s got brand-new MP3 players still in the box, cell phones, a couple of electric guitars, boom boxes … You know my carve board? That’s where I got it. He had three of them packed in there. And get this. He says if there’s something I didn’t see that I want, he can probably get it for me.”
    â€œYou remember his name, phone number, anything?” Kai asked.
    Booger shook his head. “Tell you the truth, dude, the whole thing kind of freaked me. Like what if all this stuff was hot? And the way he acted was like … I had this feeling that if I’d asked him for a Glock nine he probably would have said ‘No sweat.’ I just wanted him to go away and never come back.”
    â€œOkay, thanks for telling me.”
    â€œI mean, it might not even be the same guy,” Booger said.
    â€œHard to say,” Kai replied.
    A small wave jacked up behind them. “I’m going.