by Jack Bunker
He found Bobby, a dealer from Midland, working a twenty-five-dollar table, and he sat down between an old woman with beet-colored hair and a black guy who looked like he was probably in the service. Mack thought about Buddy. He’d lose his mind if he knew Mack was up close to $60,000. Hell, with that kind of cash, he could actually invest some serious bucks in Buddy’s little business opportunity. Ha. Shark Tank my ass.
Not trusting his luck, Mack fingered his stack and watched a hand before he started. The black guy, who had only a few chips in front of him, busted out and left. The old lady followed shortly after, leaving Mack alone at the table.
“So what’s the biggest winner you ever saw?” he asked Bobby.
“Oh, we’ve had guys in here who’ve been up millions.”
“Is that right?”
Maybe Wanda was onto something. Somebody had to be the guy who goes on that million-dollar run. Why not him?
“What’s the limit on this table?” Mack asked.
“Five thousand.”
“Jesus, people bet five thousand dollars at a twenty-five-dollar table?”
“Well, sure. That’s how you make it up when you hit a cold streak. You double your bet every time you lose. That way, when you win, you’re sure to win all your money back.”
“No shit?”
“No shit,” said Bobby. “Of course, that’s why the casino puts the limit on there. Otherwise players could just ride it out forever. Two hundred losing hands in a row and they’d still come out ahead on number two-oh-one.”
“Is that right?” Mack looked up at Umpire Jesus. Could this guy, a fellow Texan, be bullshitting him right under Christ’s watchful eye?
“Yup.”
“So what’s the limit at the hundred-dollar table?”
“Ten thousand.”
Bobby went off shift. Mack had only played a few hands, but he’d still come out a couple hundred ahead. He thought about what Bobby said. It was time to hedge his bets. From now on, not only would he play exclusively with Texas dealers, he’d stick to the hundred-dollar tables so he could make it up, just in case he hit a cold streak. He got up from the table as the cocktail waitress, who looked a lot like the Hawaiian chick from Hooters, brought him another drink. Mack looked up again at Umpire Jesus and gave the girl a five-dollar chip.
Walking around the casino floor, every now and then Mack caught a glimpse of his reflection. He looked good. More importantly, he felt right at home, especially with his tip from his panhandle homeboy. His cell phone rang. It was J.T. Mack stared at the phone, unsure of whether to answer it, when it simply stopped after the fourth ring. Fuck him.
Mack couldn’t believe how he’d let a measly little $15,000 turn his head like that. He figured if J.T. was now giving him $30,000, that ambulance chaser was probably pulling in a lot more than that himself. Busted up his shoulder for fifteen grand and now suckered into some crazy scheme to marry Wanda. Marry her and join the fucking Coast Guard. If he ran this thing up to a hundred grand, that was like three or four years in the Guard. And that was three or four years maybe having to live on a base—a base full of dudes—not the Niteroi Suite at the Corcovado Hotel. No, sir. With a sound system of conservative betting, and the occasional inside tip from a real live Texan, Mack saw his future was as bright as that big fucking beam coming out of that pyramid at the Luxor.
Two drinks and another ski lift up to the feet of Umpire Jesus later, Mack found another dealer from Houston, Linda, at a hundred-dollar table. Sticking with his tried and true method, he started off slow. One hand at a time. After winning two hands at a hundred dollars apiece, he lost a hand worth $300. Mack decided to try out Bobby’s tip. He bet $600 and Linda busted. He was up $500, just like that. He’d have to remember to give ol’ Bobby a nice tip if he saw him again.
With steel discipline, Mack kept to his formula. Just as Coleen, his dealer from San Antonio, ended her shift, Mack saw Wanda out of the corner of his eye. Mack slid two black chips to Coleen across the green felt. Mack’s stack of chips was so big, there was no way he could disguise it before Wanda reached the table, and he didn’t bother trying. She wore a black cocktail dress with spaghetti straps, and big shoulders or no, she looked fantastic.
“Ohmigod!” Wanda said. “Is that all you? Ohmigod.”
“Yes, ma’am. I’m having a pretty good trip, how ’bout you?”
She smiled. “Yeah, I’m having a pretty good trip.”
“Well, you sure look good enough to eat, I’ll tell you that. How ’bout a drink?”
“Sounds great.” Wanda’s eyes widened as she did a rough calculus of Mack’s winnings. “There’s got to be close to fifty thousand dollars there.”
Mack cocked his head and looked at the stacks. “Fifty-two five fifty, to be exact.” He didn’t tell her about the other $40,000 in his wallet. His phone rang again.
“There’s J.T.”
“You going to answer it?”
“Fuck him. Let’s go get that drink.” Mack switched the phone off mid ring.
He put his hand on the small of Wanda’s back and steered her across the casino floor and toward the lounge. She had some kind of citrusy, lemon-grapefruit scent in her hair. He’d never seen her really dolled up before. Her skin on her shoulders was smooth and tan; the dress scalloped just beneath four inches of cleavage in the front. Mack recognized the shift in his boxers. His phone rang again.
“Maybe it’s an emergency,” Wanda said.
“Not likely.” He clicked the phone on. Wanda winced at the sound of J.T. yelling through the pinholes in the phone’s receiver a foot from Mack’s ear.
“What the fuck’s going on, Mack? You’re not taking my calls?”
“Hey, J.T.,” said Mack, smirking at Wanda, “you might want to slow down there, hoss.”
“What the fuck are you talking about? Where are you?”
“Vegas.”
“Vegas!”
Wanda winced again as Mack held the phone from his ear.
“Vegas! You’re supposed to be in Palm Desert!”
“Yeah, well, the plan got modified a little bit.” Mack smiled thinking about how red J.T.’s face must be by now.
“Since when do you unilaterally change the plan?”
“Hey, I’m on my honeymoon, man.” Mack looked at Wanda and smiled again.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“Means you might want to think twice about who you’re yelling at,” said Mack, and he switched off the phone.
TWENTY-ONE
The phone shattered when J.T. spiked it on the russet Saltillo tiles. He paced back and forth across the kitchen. He punched the Sub-Zero refrigerator. It was wood-paneled, so it didn’t dent, but now his hand hurt like hell.
Who does this little prick think he’s dealing with? J.T. opened a $120 Cabernet he’d bought a few years back. He sloshed the wine into a balloon glass and gulped half of it before the bubbles had popped. He ground his molars as he slugged another mouthful of wine. That little bastard.
A hot wave of dread washed over him as he realized if Mack bugged out on the scam, not only was he out the sixty grand or so he’d already spent in his head, he was still on the hook with Frankie Fresh for at least half of $28,000. As he downed the rest of his glass, he assumed the fat fuck knew all too well about joint and several liability. If Mack quit, J.T. would soon be rafting down el rio de mierda.
Wanda. Maybe she could rein in the little prick. She had dough riding on this too, although she also had to marry the dumb bastard. Maybe she could be sweet-talked. The important thing was not to let Mack know he held the whip hand.
A tall hostess, taller than Mack or even Wanda, led them to a dark corner table in the Leblon lounge. The band was on a break, and a soft bossa nova rhythm poured from speakers hidden in the ceiling.
Wanda ordered a martini and Mack ordered the same. He’d never been a big martini guy, but here in this swanky hotel, the flashing gin and the cool-looking glasses it came in made h
im wonder if maybe this shouldn’t be his new thing. The first one went down smooth and quick. He ordered another while Wanda sipped at hers, looking around the dark room with wide eyes. Beneath the dim light, her skin was the color of pecans. She nibbled an olive as she looked around the room.
She sure has pretty teeth. “You hungry?” he asked.
“Umm…maybe. A little, I guess.” Her fingers drummed lightly to the music, gently tapping the stem of her glass. “I don’t want the martini to go to my head.”
Mack couldn’t imagine one little drink could do much damage to a woman her size, but he remembered she hadn’t eaten much at lunch. “No, we wouldn’t want that,” Mack said, winking.
Wanda blushed. “I’ll be okay. It’s too early to eat anyway.”
They sat listening to the music without speaking. Mack downed a second martini. He felt relaxed. Looking at Wanda’s curls in the soft light, he felt the crotch of his pants self-adjust yet again. He was going to have to do something about this soon. A waitress even hotter than the hostess that had seated them brought him another martini without him even asking for it.
Wanda’s phone rang. She looked at the number. “It’s J.T.”
Mack shook his head and sipped his martini as she answered the call.
“Yeah, I can talk,” Wanda said, making a shushing motion to Mack. “No, I don’t think so. I think he just doesn’t want you yelling at him.…Yeah, we’re still here.…We got comped for another night.…I don’t know, he’s been in the casino.…No, not yet.…I don’t know…well, when we get around to it, I guess.” Wanda pointed to her ring finger and rolled her eyes. “They’re open all night, I’m sure. It’s no big deal.…Okay, now you’re starting to annoy me.…Will you just relax? We’ll leave tomorrow, no big deal.…Okay, bye.”
Mack chuckled. “He’s pissed I blew him off, huh?”
“It’s more than that. He’s freaking out that you’re going to quit.”
“No shit?”
“That’s not what he said, but I can tell.”
“What if I’s to tell you I’m thinking about it?”
“Are you really?”
“Look here,” Mack leaned closer over the table, “what if I’s to tell you I’m up more than ninety grand?”
“Ohmigod! Are you kidding?”
“No, ma’am. Which is why I ain’t particularly inclined to put up with J.T.’s bullshit.”
“Holy cow. I had no idea.”
“Well,” said Mack, leaning back on the banquette, “there you go.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Mack crossed his boots under the table and looked up at the head and torso of Umpire Jesus through the window behind Wanda.
“Run it up over a hundred. That’s it. I don’t want to be greedy, but I think I got this thing figured out.”
Wanda looked over to the stage as the band returned and was getting ready for their next set.
“I guess you think that’s pretty dumb, huh?”
Wanda looked back at Mack and leaned forward with her elbows on the table and her chin resting on the tops of her hands. Her cleavage plunged even deeper as her breasts mashed together. “Here’s what I think: I think it’s your money. I think that either way, you’re always going to wonder, ‘What if?’ I think that even if you lose everything, you’ve still got J.T.’s deal in your back pocket, so it’s not like you’re not coming out of this ahead no matter what.”
Mack took another peek at Umpire Jesus, finished his martini, and smiled into his glass.
“I think the odds are against you, but then again, if I’m so smart, why am I a thirty-four-year-old waitress at the 19th Hole of a crappy, semiprivate golf club?”
“Don’t go runnin’ yourself down, darlin’. I think you’re plenty smart. What’s your cut on this deal with J.T.?”
“Thirty.”
“Really? Shit, that’s what I’m gettin’.”
Wanda raised an eyebrow. “Well, if you go through with it, I think you ought to get more, don’t you?”
“Bet your ass.” Mack chewed on the olive from his vanquished martini. “I don’t want to let you down or nothin’, but if I get to a hundred, I will pull the plug on this. I can’t give you no thirty thousand, but maybe we can work something out,” Mack said, winking.
Wanda leaned forward, her breasts spilling out even more over the piping of her dress. Carmine lipstick accented her white teeth that flashed in the dim light like scalpels. With her grin framed by the deepest dimples Mack had ever seen, she looked like a movie star when she smiled.
She put her chin on her hands again, shot Mack another sultry raised eyebrow, and said, “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The show didn’t start until late, and Mack was too geeked up to focus on anything but getting his stake to $100,000. He gave Wanda another $200 to blow in the gift shop and went back to the casino. He ordered another martini and strolled around the hundred-dollar tables, looking for Texas dealers.
A hundred thousand dollars. He couldn’t believe how close he was. His daddy had never seen a hundred grand in his asphalt-spreading, forty-year life. Mack wasn’t sure how long this streak was going to last, and he didn’t want to risk it running out before he hit his hundred K.
He sat down at a hundred-dollar table with Donna, his first dealer from the other night. She remembered him with a big smile. Mack played two hands, $1,000 apiece. He got a pair of eights on one, ten-queen on the other. Mack split the eights and pushed another thousand from his stack. Drawing a queen and a jack on his eights, he stuck at eighteen. Donna had a six showing. She turned over a five, then a king. Twenty-one. Mack was out $3,000.
Mack played another two hands. Afraid of fully committing to the doubling strategy just yet, he nudged his bets up to $1,500. He won both. The system worked. If he doubled his bet after a losing hand, he made it back. Simple. He’d be up to a hundred in no time and could tell old Mr. Plausible to fuck himself.
Mack bet $4,000 on each of the next two hands and lost both. On the next, he pressed his bets to $8,000 per hand. He busted on one hand showing fourteen when he drew a king; he split aces on the other and stuck at soft eighteen and nineteen. When Donna turned over a second jack, Mack had lost $32,000 in three minutes.
His pile of chips now seemed anemic—hardly the stuff of a high roller who was going to slam the Corcovado for a hundred grand. He got a pen from Donna and swapped his $40,000 check for neat stacks of purple and orange chips.
When Mack tried to bet $16,000 on each of the next two hands, Donna reminded him that the table limit was $10,000. He bet the maximum on two hands, winning one and losing one. He’d almost thought his luck had run out, but seeing $10,000 in chips pushed his way convinced him otherwise. He finished his martini and ordered another. He resumed betting the limit on each of the two hands he played at the same time.
By the time Wanda found him, he was down to just under $15,000. She put one hand on Mack’s shoulder and covered her mouth with the other. He looked up with a crooked smile and pushed his remaining chips into the two circles in front of him.
“What the fuck, right? At least if I win, I’m up what that asshole was going to pay me anyway.”
Wanda tucked her lips inside her teeth and said nothing. She patted Mack on the shoulder and raised her eyebrows as Donna dealt the final two hands, all face cards. House drew a seven on top of its fourteen showing.
And Mack McMahon was broke.
TWENTY-TWO
“You ain’t gonna say ‘I told you so,’ are you?” said Mack, rising from the table.
“Not me. Like I said, it’s your money.”
Mack stared at the sixty-foot statue of Umpire Jesus rising from the far wall of the casino.
“So what do you want to do now?” she asked.
“I reckon I’m gonna have me a couple more of these,” he said, tilting his glass. Mack saw Restivo, the guy from the casino, walking toward him.
“Mr. McMahon,” said Restivo, “how
are the tables treating you this evening?”
“Not so great. Busted out.”
“Well, sometimes that happens. You sure gave it quite a run, though.”
Mack squinted at Restivo. He wasn’t sure if he was mocking him.
“I was really impressed,” continued Restivo. “You couldn’t have been counting. The way you kept changing tables…that was some system you had going, I have to give you that.”
“Well, thanks, I guess.”
“In spite of your turn of luck, I hope you’ve had a good time with us. We really value you as a guest. Are you at least going to have dinner and take in a show tonight?”
The ski lifts floated overhead toward Umpire Jesus. Mack looked up at the Lord’s impassive face, wondering where he’d gone wrong, what signal he’d missed.
“We were going to, but I tell you, right now I just feel like a drink.”
“I understand. Well, all the same, we wish you the best on your honeymoon.” Restivo extended his hand. “We hope to see you both again in the future.”
Mack shook Restivo’s hand, and the guy disappeared onto the floor without another word.
Wanda rubbed a couple of circles on Mack’s back. “You feel like getting some dinner? There’s a steakhouse that’s supposed to be really good.”
“That’s right,” said Mack, still dazed. “I forgot you were hungry. Let’s go.”
Mack took a final martini from the server as he followed Wanda off the casino floor and to the elevator bank. In the restaurant, Wanda ordered a petit filet mignon; Mack, a porterhouse. The waiter brought over an expensive Bordeaux with a note from Restivo, who seemed to Mack to be everywhere.
Mack ignored the wine. He ignored the steak. He ignored Wanda. He sat silently staring into the bottom of successive martinis. Every once in a while he’d tap his boot against the table’s stanchion. Wanda didn’t say anything.
Alvin Boyle hadn’t been informed of Mack and Wanda’s complimentary extended stay in Las Vegas. He had figured Mack should be well along in the plan by now, yet Al had heard nothing from J.T. Fucking shyster knows I’m on to him.