Something for Nothing by David Anthony Read Free Book Online

And he’d heard that with Carmine handling him, his morning splits had been fantastic. It was obvious that this horse was due.
    He jogged over to the betting area and found the shortest line. Charlene was at the window. She was at least sixty, but she tried to look thirty. She had tall, jet black hair, bright blue eye shadow, and heavily caked red lipstick. He’d placed bets with her before, but he usually did his best to avoid her window. She gave him the creeps.
    â€œHi there,” Martin said. “A couple of bets for the eighth,” he said.
    She gave him a crinkly-eyed smile, then took a big drag on her cigarette and blew the smoke off to the side. He had a feeling she wanted to blow it right into his face.
    â€œOkay,” she said. “I’m ready when you are, big spender.”
    Martin took a deep breath and peeled off four crisp fifties. “Two hundred on the two horse to win,” he said. It felt good. Yes, he’d planned on only betting a hundred dollars, but what the hell. He was going to win, and he knew it. Sometimes you could just feel it.
    Next he put Big Bad Wolf into an exacta with High and Mighty, who was drawing 9–1 odds (down from 12–1, but that was all right). He put fifty dollars on this, and boxed it, so he paid a hundred dollars. Two more fifties—boom, boom. So any combo of Big Bad Wolf and High and Mighty at one–two would be a winner. If he got both the win and the exacta, he’d make some serious money.
    T HE STABLES WERE IN a separate building. You could only get from the grandstand to the horses through a tunnel that ran underground.But Martin knew the way, and the big security guy with the Golden Gate Fields jacket waved him through the double doors. Martin liked that. He didn’t have an official track pass, but he liked being able to move around freely, to get access to the insider places. He ought to get something for all the money he’d plunked down here over the years, right?
    The stable smell hit him the second he walked through the door—horse manure and hay. He could tell that the horses were alert, tensed up, maybe excited. They knew they were going to race. A few neighed or made that blowing sound with their lips as he walked past. He tried to remember what that was called. Chuffing? Did horses chuff? He wasn’t sure.
    A couple of jockeys were milling around, lithe and colorful and maybe a little goofy in their racing gear. He was struck as always by how small they were—120 pounds at the most. Peter was heavier than that (though he was fat, of course). The first time Martin took him down to the stables, a few years ago now, Peter got scared. He saw that he was about the same size as the jockeys, and thought he was going to have to ride their horse in an actual race.
    Off in the distance he heard the seventh race start up. Val was over in the paddocks area, standing with a guy Martin had met a couple of times. A big shot. He had a bunch of horses—three or four, at least. The guy was about Martin’s age, but he was loaded. Some sort of commercial real estate thing.
    Martin could hear the announcer rattling off names during the race, and he could hear the crowd cheering, but he couldn’t make anything out clearly.
    Val looked over and gave him a quick nod. Martin hesitated—didn’t want to interrupt—but then Val broke away from the guy and walked over. He put a hand out to shake Martin’s and put the other hand on his shoulder. He was a good-size guy, with thick hands and a big nose. Slightly receding black hair, kind of bad teeth, not great skin. A few pockmarks. But also handsome in a rugged kind of way. He waswearing khaki pants and a maroon sweater, with a yellow collared shirt underneath. Not a great look. In fact, Val Desmond was a pretty lousy dresser. Maybe it was a requirement when you were a trainer. Maybe if your trainer looked too sharp, it was a problem.
    â€œMartin