Chapter Nine
“OH MY GOD, I’M SO sorry. Holy shit.” I dropped the napkins on his boots again, my face going up in flames. I jerked my eyes to the ceiling, ready to cry with humiliation. I’d practically given him a hand job in front of no less than a hundred people. Someone nearby snickered. I decided a prayer to the universe was my only recourse. It couldn’t possibly make things worse. “Floor, if you will please swallow me now, I promise to dedicate myself to feeding the homeless for the rest of my miserable life.”
A hand gently grasped my upper arm. It was warm and big, the fingers going all the way around. “No need to sacrifice yourself to the Vegas gods on my account,” said the cowboy. “I’ll be fine. I’m just going to go wash up.” He leaned in close to my ear and whispered, “Watch my chips for me, would you? I’m on a roll and I don’t want to leave just yet.”
I nodded, sitting down in the chair he’d vacated, staring at his wide back and trim waist as he walked away. Holy shit, is this really happening? I sat up straighter, turning to face the dealer. I picked up a few of the chips, reading the amounts on their faces. Assuming my math brain hadn’t completely abandoned me in my moment of crisis and had allowed me to calculate correctly, there was over a thousand dollars sitting in front of me, and the cowboy had just walked away and left it with me. Is he crazy? Am I being punked? No, I can’t be in the middle of being punked when it’s my own fault that I’m in this situation.
I looked down at my feet. My aching feet. The heels were the problem. They were the cause of my complete humiliation. Not only did I let men run all over me in my pitiful life, I let my girlfriends do it, too. Kelly and Candice had insisted my practical heels were totally impractical in Vegas. The whole idea made me feel angry and sad and reckless all at the same time. I reached down and pulled the torture devices off, letting them drop to the floor beneath the stool. Ha! Let that be a lesson to you, Kelly! I’m leaving them here! I will not wear heels that hurt my feet ever again! This is the new Andie taking over! No more railroading. No more bossing me around. No more telling me what to do.
“Are you in or out?” asked the dealer. “If you don’t place your bet you’re going to have to leave the table.”
My mouth dropped open as he stared at me. “Are you talking to me?” I squeaked out.
“Yes, I’m talking to you.” He glanced at the chips in front of me. “This is a ten dollar minimum table.”
So much for people not telling me what to do anymore. I picked up a couple chips, my fingers not really wanting to cooperate. Could I spend the cowboy’s money while he was in the bathroom cleaning up my mess? Wouldn’t that violate every rule of socially acceptable behavior ever written?
I put two chips down on the table, mimicking the actions of the person on my right. I had no idea how much money it was. The old man to my left gave me a smile, revealing perfectly straight dentures and bright pink gums. “Ever play blackjack before?” he asked.
“No. Never.” I should have been scared out of my wits, probably. Gambling wasn’t my thing and spending other people’s money felt ten times wrong. But something about being here in this neon-glitzy place, my shoes off and my boobs pushed up to my neck made be feel bold. Daring. Ready to grab the world by the balls and make it beg for mercy. Rawr.
“Just get as close to twenty-one as you can without going over,” he instructed.
“Sounds easy,” I said, picking up my first card. I showed it to him. “Is this a good one?”
He nodded and leaned over to whisper in my ear. “Soft hand.”
I held out my fingers in front of me, smiling. “Thank you. I use hand cream to keep them moisturized.”
“Not your hand, the card. That’s an ace … possibility of a soft hand. It’s worth either one or eleven, you can decide which. If you get a ten or higher - any of the face cards - you win. You get a return of a hundred and fifty percent of your bet.” He glanced at the table. “You’ve put down two hundred dollars, so that could net you three hundred.”
I stopped breathing for a few seconds as the blood drained out of my face. My voice came out an octave higher than usual. “I just bet two hundred dollars?”
He chuckled, flashing me more of the dentures. “That you did.”
I looked around the casino, hoping the cowboy wouldn’t come back and see the huge pile of money I was playing with. Why didn’t I look at the chips closer? Why didn’t I check them first?
“Insurance anyone?” asked the dealer.
I felt the blood drain out of my face even more. I was a ghost now. “Insurance?” My voice came out as a whisper.
“Dealer has an ace. He’s giving you a chance to bet a little extra on the side. It pays two to one. If he gets a face card next, he wins automatically, so this can help offset your losses. You can bet up to half of what you have on the table right now.”
“He wins, even if I get blackjack too?”
“No, then it’s a push. But you’d lose your insurance money, so you’d lose net.”
“Should I do it?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I can’t tell you if you should or not. Gotta do what your gut’s telling you.” He examined his own cards and shook his head at the call for insurance.
“My gut’s telling me to run and lock myself in the bathroom.”
The old man shook his head. “Better not. Your boyfriend will lose his spot at the table and this dealer’s treating him right. He’ll be taking a break in the next twenty minutes or so and then your boyfriend’ll miss out on his run for good.”
I gritted my teeth together and took a deep breath in through my nose, trying to ignore the spinning of the room. Too many cocktails. So little time. “Okay, fine. I can be bold. I can be dangerous.” I shook my head at the dealer, trying to keep my game face on. “No insurance. But thank you for offering. That was very nice.”
The dealer gave me a small smile. “Rules of the house. I don’t make ‘em, I just play by ‘em.” He was kinda cute.
“Oh.” My face went red. Total rookie move. I slouched a little in my seat.
A cocktail waitress came up and stopped next to my chair. “Cocktail?”
“Oh, I don’t have any money right now,” I said. I’d left my wallet and credit card in Candice’s purse.
“They’re on the house as long as you’re playing.” She gave me a bored look.
“Well, okay then. If they’re free bring one for me and my friend.” I winked at the man next to me and he nodded back. “Gin and tonic for me and …”
“Make it two,” said my neighbor.
The dealer gave everyone else a second card. He lifted up the corners of own cards and then put them down, looking at the man farthest to my right expectantly.
The old man let out a hiss of air.
“What? What just happened?” I asked, looking at the dealer and then the old man again.
“Dealer doesn’t have a ten or higher on that second card. Your bet is safe for now.”
I watched the people around the table. They were all peeking at their second card and frowning.
I did the same, trying to mimic their technique of only bending up the very corner of the cards. Next to my ace sat another ace. My heart began pounding wildly. What does this mean? Twenty-two? That can’t be good. Twelve? That sounds too low.
“Help,” I whispered, wishing the gods of poker were on my shoulders in miniature, whispering in my ear and telling me what to do.
“What you got?” asked the old man, sounding amused as he leaned towards me a little.
I lifted up my cards so he could see them. “I think it’s bad news,” I said, dreading his response. I’d just blown two hundred bucks of someone else’s money. I had to find an ATM machine, stat, so I could replace it before he found out. I had to find Candice and get my stuff! I looked around, but she and Kelly were nowhere in sight.
He let out a long whistle. “You need to split.”
I jumped off the chair and looked around. “Okay,” I said, wringing my hands, trying to figure out where to go and whether I should take all the chips with me or just abandon them to my shame.
He put his hand on my arm. “What are you doing? Take your seat.”
I looked at him confused. “But you told me to take off.”
He laughed, his round belly jiggling under his shirt. “No, missy, I told you to split, not take off. Split your cards into two separate hands and play them separately.”
“What?” I slowly climbed back up onto the stool, not any less confused but at least reasonably sure I wasn’t supposed to run off for the toilets or my room.
“You can choose to turn one hand into two. You have to double your bet, but in your case, it might be worth it.”
I swallowed hard. “You mean, bet four hundred dollars instead of two hundred?” Dollars. Of this stranger’s money. Jesus, what the hell am I doing?
“Yep.” He looked at his own cards again. “You need to decide what you’re going to do before you miss your turn.” The old man nodded at the dealer.
I looked up to find the dealer staring at me expectantly.
“Um … I … uh … need to split.” My face was on fire. I needed a drink bad. Running to the bathrooms was sounding like a really good idea right now.
The dealer nodded. “Two hundred dollars.”
I searched through my chips, turning them over and reading their faces. Once I realized they were color-coded, I found two more like the ones I already had out and put them on the table. The dealer reached over and split my two cards apart, putting two chips by each single card. He sent out another round of cards, and now I had four cards in front of me. I noticed the man to my right tickled the top of the table with his index finger and the dealer threw him a card. Then the man floated his hands above his cards and shook his head.
The dealer was back to staring at me.
I stared back, now getting a little irritated at him. “What?”
“Do you want me to hit you?” he asked.
I looked at him aghast, wondering what rule I’d broken so badly I needed to be physically abused over it. “No, I don’t want you to hit me. Do you want me to hit you?” I stood up, ready to defend myself. This was the worst customer service I’d ever experienced in my entire life. He was probably pissed off that I had half the aces.
The old man put his hand on my arm. “He wants to know if you want another card. That’s a hit.”
All the fight club went out of me in a big wave, leaving behind humiliation in its wake. This was worse than losing toilet paper boobs in a wet t-shirt contest. I sat back on my stool, pulling my dress down my thighs a little to keep from exposing my panties. “Oh. Sorry about that. I apologize for threatening you. Yes, please, I’d like a card for both of them.”
“You need to give him a signal, not just words. Big Brother is watching,” said the old man, pointing to a security camera inside a black globe on the ceiling. “People who lose like to claim later they said stay instead of hit, so they want to see your intentions really clearly.”
I smacked a fist into my other hand. “Hit me.”
The dealer laughed and looked away for a second, like he was collecting himself.
The old man chuckled too. “Just tap your finger on the table. No need to punch anyone.”
“Oh.” Another rookie move. I probably should have been more embarrassed about it, but the cocktails were easing the sting. I tickled the table with my fingers, once near each card pile.
The dealer nodded and threw two cards down. Somehow he was able to flick them right to where they needed to be, even while his hands barely moved. He was like a magician. And he was staring at me again. It made me want to growl at him.
“Look at the cards,” said my helpful friend. “Try to get as close to twenty-one as you can.”
I lifted up the card on my right side. It was a king. “How much is this?”
“That’s ten. You need to stay.”
I smiled. “Oh, I plan on staying, believe me. I have to watch these chips ’til that cowboy guy gets back.”
“No, I mean, you have to tell the dealer that you don’t need anymore cards on that stack. Tell him you’re staying with a hand signal.”
“What’s the signal?” I asked.
The old man waved a flat palm across the table, like he was trying to make something levitate off it.
I copied his motion.
The dealer nodded and then looked at my next stack. I followed his gaze and then jumped a little in my seat, realizing I had to look at the cards myself. I picked them up and saw a two as my newest addition.
The old man frowned. “You can either stay or ask for a hit.”
“What should I do?” I felt the stress level rising. The glow from my earlier win was fading fast, and I hadn’t even had a chance to celebrate it properly yet. I was pretty sure a victory dance was called for in this situation, considering I’d just won like three hundred bucks. That’s an hour’s worth of my time as a lawyer and I’d done it in five minutes without having to do any legal research. No wonder people liked going to Vegas.
“I can’t tell you what you should do. Just consider that if the dealer busts, any hand that isn’t already busted is a winner.”
“Busted?”
“Over twenty one,” he clarified.
“Oh. Okay.” I counted up my card values. I had either thirteen or three. Neither sounded close enough to twenty one. “Okay, I want you to hit me.” I stared at the dealer, waiting for him to comply. He stared at me like I hadn’t just talked directly to him.
The old man nudged me. “Hand signals. Big brother. Remember?”
The guy to my right said nothing, but he demonstrated the table tickle for my benefit all the same.
I wiggled three of my fingers on the table, like I was tickling the felt too. The old man chuckled and the dealer smiled. “That works,” he said, throwing a card down on my second pile.
I lifted the corner. Five. That makes seven plus the eleven. Eighteen. I looked at the old man. “That looks pretty good to me.”
He nodded, all seriousness now. “Looks pretty good to me too.”
I waved my hand over the table. “I’m staying put, right here. Don’t hit me anymore. I’ve had enough hitting.”
I felt a presence behind me just moments before the heat of a large body standing very close came through my dress. I looked over my shoulder and saw the arresting good looks of the cowboy. I grinned, hoping my charm would keep him from being angry over the amount of money on the table.
He smiled back. “Looks like you’ve been busy.” He lifted an eyebrow at me and then looked pointedly at the table.