A day in my life? Buckle up and let me tell you about yesterday. My name is Davis Way Cole. I’m very happily married, the mother of toddler twin girls, and I work part-time on an undercover security team at the Bellissimo Resort and Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi. Where I live. In the President’s Suite on the twenty-ninth floor of the hotel. Because my husband is the president. So even though my job is part-time, mostly running background checks on potential employees and cyber-chasing the occasional casino crook from my home office, it’s my phone that rings in the middle of the night. Because I live there. Maybe I should move.
Sleep, factoring in two-year-old girls who love to pile in the bed with us before daybreak, is a precious commodity in my home anyway, and means absolutely nothing in casino world. Incidents happen around the clock. And it was three o’clock in the morning when a man’s emotional support tarantula crawled out of his pocket at a bank of Wicked Winnings slot machines.
“It was hanging off a chandelier above the slot machines by one furry leg.”
“Was?” I had a casino security suit on the other end of the line as I stumbled to the kitchen so I wouldn’t wake the whole house. “Where is it now?”
“It fell,” he said.
“Fell where?” I asked. “And how big is this tarantula?”
“It’s huge,” he said. “Like my-hand-all-the-way-open huge.” (Oh, dear Lord.) “And it fell on a lady.”
“On a lady?” I glanced at the coffee pot but changed my mind. It was too early, and I wanted to go back to bed. “Get it off the lady. Give the man his emotional support tarantula back and get all three of them out of the casino.”
“Well, it’s stuck.”
“On the lady?”
“Between her. . .”
“Her what?”
“Hooters.”
I pulled my phone from my head and looked at it. “Excuse me?”
“Her lady jugs.”
“Her what?”
“Okay, Mrs. Cole, here’s what happened,” the security suit said. “This man was climbing up the tower of a Wicked Winnings slot machine. He was trying to get his tarantula. I evacuated the bank of slot machines so I could catch the tarantula.”
“Catch it with what?” I asked.
“A blowtorch.”
(Oh, come on.) (Big sissy.)
“But it kept running away from me.”
“Did you torch the whole bank of slot machines?” I asked.
“They’re smoking real good.”
Great. It was 3:05 in the morning. I looked at the coffee pot again. “And?”
“Then it fell,” he said. “On the lady’s big boobies. Between the lady’s big boobies.”
“I thought you said you evacuated the bank of slot machines.”
“She wouldn’t get up,” he said. “She was in the middle of a bonus round.”
“You’re telling me a tarantula the size of your open hand fell on her and she didn’t get up?”
“The bonus round,” he reminded me.
I was losing my patience. “Where’s the tarantula now?”
“Well,” he said, “it couldn’t breathe.”
“The tarantula couldn’t breathe? How do you know this?”
“Mrs. Cole, that woman has some big knockers.” I made a mental note to speak to Human Resources about appropriate workplace. . .communication. “And that tarantula didn’t make it.” By then, I was making coffee. “The man wants to file a report about her murdering his emotional support tarantula and wants it back so he can bury it.”
“Give him the dead tarantula,” I said.
“She won’t give it up.”
“What in the world does the woman want with a dead tarantula?”
“She says it’s her good luck charm. She’s going to take it to a taxidermist and make a necklace out of it.”
“And you want me to get dressed, come to the casino, and mediate between these two about a dead tarantula?”
“No,” he said. “I can handle that. I need you to come verify her win.”
“What’d she win?”
“She had a bonus round.”
“I got that part.” I reached for a mug. “What’d she win?”
“Twenty-seven million dollars.”
I got dressed, went to the casino, verified the win, walked the casino cashiers through the payout, signed off on everything, then stood as far from the lady with the dead tarantula between her massive breasts as I could as I watched her pay the tarantula’s former owner five million dollars for a dead tarantula.
And that was just the beginning of my day.
Giveaway: Comment below for a chance to win a print copy of Double Agent. U.S. entries only, please. The giveaway ends March 30, 2019. Good luck everyone!
You can read more about Davis in Double Agent, the eighth book in the “Davis Way Crime Caper” series, released March 26, 2019.
THIS JUST IN—
On the weather front, Category Four Hurricane Kevin took a last-minute left and is headed straight for the Bellissimo Resort and Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi.
In breaking news, Undercover Casino Operative Davis Way has one foot out the evacuation door when fifty million dollars disappear, and in its place, a dead body.
In other news, if forced to ride out the storm on the hotel’s thirteenth-floor fortress, Davis won’t be alone. Her husband, Bradley, her best friend, Fantasy, and a crew of highly trained first responders will be hurricane hostages too, along with Mississippi State Gaming Agents, a FEMA agent, an insurance agent, a State Special Agent, and an Emergency Response Agent—at least one of them a double agent.
The good news is her high school reunion is cancelled. The bad news is everything else. The fake news features a castaway pig named Bacon.
The hurricane heist headlines will be sensational. If Davis survives to see them. Grab your rain slicker and galoshes for Double Agent, A Davis Way Crime Caper, and prepare yourself for a perfect storm of humor, hijinks, and heart.
Purchase Link
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About the author
Gretchen Archer is a Tennessee housewife who began writing fiction when her daughters, seeking higher educations, ran off and left her. She lives on Lookout Mountain with her husband, her son, and a Yorkie named Bently. She’s the author of the bestselling Davis Way Crime Capers. For more information visit Gretchen’s website at website.
All comments are welcomed.
So need to binge-read this series…
Thank you for the giveaway…
Hi, Cyn! Start with Double Whammy!
OMG hilarious! I needed this start to my day!
Gretchen, you make me laugh out loud!
Connie, I make myself laugh out loud. The very reason I started writing, to entertain myself. Hahahaha!
Funny scene for a day in the life! Double Agent sounds exciting.
Thank you, Sharon!
I’m not entering the giveaway but I just wanted to say how grateful we should all be to have Gretchen bringing such humor and pure fun into all of her reader’s lives! What talent!!! Thank you so much Dru Ann.
Cynthia
Thank you, Sweet Cynthia!
Oh my goodness! I loved this interview and laughed so hard as I read it! I have to admit I have missed a couple books in this series, and I definitely need to catch up! Thank you for prodding me! Thanks also for a chance to win a copy of this book-autographed I hope!😉❤
Barbara! Catch up with Double Up soon. It’s $.99. And thank you!!!!
Emotional support tarantula — I love it! Thanks for giving me a laugh to start the day, Davis and Gretchen ~
I don’t know where I come up with this stuff, Celia. 🙂
Sounds like a series I should be reading. Thanks for the chance.
I’d love that so much! Start with Double Whammy, Dianne.
Delightful and entertaining. Thanks for your books which give me great enjoyment.
Oh, Ruth. Thank YOU. xo
Now I’ve heard it all. Thank god he wasn’t on an airplane with his emotional support critter.
Right? I’d flip out.
Oh yes, please!
haha! 🙂
Sounds like a wild read. Thanks for the giveaway.
Good luck, Doward!
Love this series!! Only problem is that Gretchen can’t write fast enough for me so I purchase the new releases then wait a while before reading them. Like savoring fine wine!!
I wonder, if I were to drink more fine wine, if I could write faster. Hmmm.
Thank you, Connie!
This series is a hoot (I did that on purpose)!
🦉
Witty as always.
Thanks for the laugh!
Thanks for reading, Mary!
Lol! Thanks for the chance! Recuperating from second. Surgery in five weeks…and I’ve got cabin fever…..I could use a new book!
Good luck, Renee!
“Emotional support tarantula” cracked me up & creeped me out at the same time.
Poor Davis. She’s seen it all. Even tarantulas.
Sounds like a great read.
It was so much fun to write, Karen.
Sounds like a series I can’t wait to discover. A hilarious series. Thanks for a chance to win.
Start with Double Whammy, Linda. You’ll meet the whole gang.
“Double Agent” sounds ever so interesting. Yes, I think I’d like to read this series.
Try it, Pauline! Start with Double Whammy.
I have heard of this book and I would love to win it! Thanks for this chance!
Music to my ears, Linda, because word of mouth, or in this day and age, word of FB, is still the best way to find your next book adventure.
Even this excerpt is a HOOT–er, downright hilarious!! Just a glimpse of how the mind of the incredibly talented, genius at humor, Gretchen Archer works. Every book just gets better. If I could only figure out how she does it… but then I’d have to get rid of the body. ;-D HAHAHA! Can’t find a better series! Better than Janet E. Seriously.
Oh, Meg. xoxo
LOL!
Congrats, Gretchen, looks like you did it again! You know how much I love Davis and the series.
You never cease to surprise and make me laugh!
So so so funny–still laughing here!!! I love everything about this series. Thanks for the chance to win a print copy of Double Agent.
Thank you, Linda! And good luck.
All of Gretchen’s books sound great 👍
Thanks for the chance to win 😃💖😍💗
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