Double Strike (A Davis Way Crime Caper Book 3) by Gretchen Archer

have a shot at striking it rich, contestants had to qualify by playing a cyber scavenger hunt, bouncing around Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Vine, Instagram, Snapchat, Vimeo, Pinterest, Flickr, and Tumblr gathering clues. Of the fifteen thousand registered participants, seven thousand were successful. The seven thousand were allowed access to the virtual casino—strikeitrich.com—where a week of competition point play narrowed the field to two hundred. Forty-two thousand concurrent viewers attended the four-hour webcasted finals event that got down to a single hand of blackjack, seventy-two players against the house, and the fifty who didn’t bust against the house’s eighteen were the final contestants.
    The Bellissimo was feeling the buzz. Occupancy, gaming revenues, tempers, and without a doubt, social impressions were up. We were Internet Darlings.
    All anyone really wanted to do was sit in the chairs. The closer we got to Strike, the more we heard the word “chair.” Chair, chair, chair. Time for me to see the chair.
    No less than six hundred pounds of security stopped me at the door. “Ma’am,” the first three hundred said, “this area is closed.” The gold-icicle spike chandelier looked like the sun blazing behind him.
    “I’m an employee.” I flashed my new purple-eyed Amy Medina badge. “I’m here on behalf of social media.” They parted; I choked.
    What was that smell ? For the second time, I pulled my shirt over my nose.
    “Yeah, it’s strong,” the other three hundred pounds said. “It’ll calm down when this place opens and the players light up.”
    “Let’s hope.”
    I joined a roomful of people—technicians, construction-types, suits—all heads bent, all working. Levi Newman looked up from a clipboard. “Can I help you?”
    “I’m here to shoot you. Pictures of you. Pictures of the casino. I’m Amy Medina. I work for Elspeth.”
    His eyes wandered to my employee badge. Then back up to my purple eyes. “Have we met?”
    “Today’s my first day.”
    He looked at his Bedazzled watch, and told me he had five minutes. Which was fine, because I had four. “We have one kiosk up. This way.” I followed him through a maze of crates and cords, up three steps, then stopped cold. No wonder people were willing to stay up all night gathering cyber four-leaf clovers. It was about the chair.
    “Have a seat, Miss Medina.”
    It was a black leather recliner with wide arms and a wraparound headrest. I sat down and as soon as I did, the chair started moving.
    “You’re sitting in a chair made of full-grain European leather. It’s designed for every seating position from upright to fully reclined, and it knows you.”
    It must have known I needed a hug and that I was short and cold. It adjusted to my height, it closed in on pressure points on my back, and it radiated heat.
    “Lay your head back,” he said, “as if to rest.”
    The chair stretched me out like I was on the beach. The canned lights trained on the chair dimmed.
    “Say music.”
    I said music, and Bruno Mars came softly out of the headrest.
    “It’s equipped with THX surround sound,” he explained, “and an air filtration system to eliminate all traces of smoke for those who do and for those who don’t, and it has a built in light-therapy system, delivering full doses of Vitamin D at regular intervals.”
    Hashtag impressed.
    “It has a heating and cooling system that responds to body temperature and spa features from a low vibration to deep-tissue massage.”
    “So, where’s the game?” I got the chair. It’s a beaut.
    “Take your right hand,” he said, “and rest it comfortably on the arm.”
    As soon as I did, I felt four buttons at my fingertips.
    “Push the first button.”
    Goodbye, cruel Earth.
    Three 24-inch LED touchscreens dropped from the ceiling to land almost in my lap, and my jaw dropped all the way to the floor.
    He put the game in to demo mode. The screens tilted to wrap around me, then came alive.