Excerpt from His Name Is George Floyd by Robert Samuels, Toluse Olorunnipa, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

Floyd made his way through the aisles, passing display shelves that offered Oreo cookies and Little Debbie snacks. He then grabbed a half-rotten banana and said something to a teenage cashier, before bending over in a fit of laughter. The cashier, whose father was one of the store's owners, looked puzzled but shrugged it off and pointed his finger with a get-a-load-of-this-guy smirk.

Christopher Martin, another teenager behind the register, immediately noticed Floyd's size-six foot six, 225 pounds, bulging biceps--accentuated by the snugly fitting black tank top he was wearing. Martin asked him if he played baseball.

Floyd stuttered and rambled for a moment before responding that he played football. Martin, tall and slender with light-brown skin, had seen drunk and high customers come into the store before, and he thought Floyd might be under the influence.

Around that time, Hill walked inside and glimpsed Floyd's muscular silhouette.

"Oh my God, Floyd," she said.

"Baby," Floyd said, "I was just thinking about you."

He wrapped his arms around her, and she kissed him where her lips met his body: on his chest, at the valley of his tank top.

Hill, though, was surprised to see Floyd dressed that way, knowing his mother had taught him to look presentable when he was out on the street. Hill asked why he was wearing a tank top and baggy pants.

"I've been moving," Floyd explained. And before all the errands with Hall, Floyd said he had been playing basketball.

Floyd suggested that maybe they could head to a park and catch up. After Hill told him that she needed to watch her granddaughter, Floyd offered to give her a ride over there. Hill smirked.

"I was thinking I was going to get me some," she recalled.

Hill and Hall had never met each other before, but the trio ended up leaving the store together. Before they left, Floyd also bought a pack of menthol cigarettes.

"He gave him the money, I saw them take the money," Hill said. "They give him the cigarettes, and they give him the change. We walked out the store, went in the car, we were in the car, and we talked like, I don't know, a good eight minutes ..."

Back inside CUP Foods, Martin lifted the $20 bill above his head and held it up against a light. He noticed it had the bluish hue of a $100 bill and suspected it was a fake. He took the bill and showed it to his manager, who asked him to go outside and summon Floyd back to the store. Because Floyd was a regular at CUP, the manager figured it was a mistake that an old customer would be willing to fix.

Inside the Benz, both Hill and Hall sensed the day's errands were catching up with Floyd. While they were chatting, he started to fall asleep in the driver's seat--a trait his friends said was typical. Hall grew nervous. Because the corner was known for gang activity, he didn't want to draw the attention of any police.

"We gotta go from here," Hall said.

Just then, Martin and another teenage employee from CUP walked up to the car on the passenger's side. They told Hall that the boss wanted to see them because the money was counterfeit.

"I didn't give him that," Hall said.

The cashiers pointed to Floyd, who was still slouched over, struggling to stay awake, as the culprit.

"Floyd, did you really do that?" Hill asked in surprise, since Floyd was not known to cheat people out of money.

"Why is this happening to me?" Floyd said, before brushing off the requests to go back inside. Martin gave up and walked away with the other employee.

A few minutes later, Martin returned to the car with two other employees, again asking Floyd to come back inside. But Hill and Hall thought Floyd was too exhausted to understand what was happening.

"We kept trying to wake him up," Hill recalled.

She searched her pockets but didn't have any more cash on her. She apologized to the employees and promised that Floyd would speak to the manager as soon as he woke up.

Excerpted from His Name Is George Floyd by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa. Copyright © 2022 by Robert Samuels. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.