She’s staring, open-mouthed, with flickers of questions on her eyebrows. The way she shakes and trembles makes me I think I’ve done it.
We fall together onto the bed. I kick and shuffle off the rest of my clothes and hold her close as I’m drowsily caressing and exploring her. I murmur into her ear. “Where the fuck have you been all my life?”
She holds me, warm, tender as she whispers, “That was fucking wonderful.”
“How long is your break?”
She comes to life in my arms, “Not long enough,” and she searches my eyes and my face. “Have you got a name, Player One?”
“Adam.” Her lips press together as she runs her finger over the cleft on my chin. “Adam Doyle. We can do it again in a couple of minutes,” I tell her.
“Who’s got time for that, Adam Doyle?” she has fire in her eyes and she licks her lips, “We’re doing it again right now,” and her face is in my lap, spilling her hair over my thighs as her soft lips suck me in and she rolls me on her tongue.
Chapter 12
Adam
She sucks gently and pulls me all the way into her mouth. I’m straightening and lengthening, fattening to fill her mouth. “God, woman, you’re a magician. You’re a fucking witch.”
Slowly, she pulls herself off and looks up into my eyes. “You’d better believe it, Player One.” Then she plunges straight back down on me.
I’m hardening up to fill her from her tongue to her palate, nosing my head at the back of her throat. I hold her hair but I tell her, “See how your concentration holds up when I stick my tongue inside you,” she shakes her head, sucking harder and wriggling as I grab for her ass.
She tries to scoot her hips away, but I’m too fast. And too strong. She moans as I flip her on top of me and kiss greedily up the insides of her thighs. Teasing. Working my way up slowly. But fiercely. I tell her, “I’m going to lick your navel,” she groans as she sucks me deeper in, “From the inside.”
I convulse as her head bobs, and she pulls me into the dark warmth of her throat.
I quickly learn the motion she likes. Her speeds. Her rhythms. And her triggers. The place she wants me to approach last. Slowest. The ways she likes to be shaken. And stirred.
I trill my lips and my tongue around her folds and make passing sucks inside her hood before I start to nibble and graze on her mound, letting my tongue stray down to her lips and the base of her clit.
Sucking on her clit and sliding my tongue up inside, to be seized on by her trembling walls, I’m prying, poking, sensitive to learn how and when to hit her buttons. I am going to own her like a mark. I’ll flip her inside out and she won’t know what’s hit her.
I know that she’s the dealer I want, and I’ll take all of her. I don’t care how long it takes, never mind the speed, I’m all about the need. I’m going to make her come so hard, before we leave this room, she’ll be addicted.
Her hips twitch as they roll and grind. I’m definitely getting there. Feeling the walls of her throat pull me deeper and her lips nuzzle and tighten on the base of my cock is likely to have me exploding if I don’t watch my own concentration. I dig my fingers into her ass as I pull her as far into my mouth as I can.
When I squeeze her thighs at the top, she spasms. I press my thumbs when I’ve found her spot and she shudders as she gushes. Her moan vibrates along the length of my cock and it’s almost too much for me to take. I’m delirious with the taste of her.
She pushes her head deeper and I feel her teeth against my pubic bone.
When I run the tip of my tongue between her folds, high in front, she sucks hard. Gripping the wet shaft of my cock like a baton, she hauls her mouth off me and her face reddens. “What are you doing to me?” She gasps and her ass clenches as she gushes again. I stay sucking her while she trembles and bursts.
As soon as her peak subsides, I flip her onto her back and pull up her thighs. Her mouth sags, “Wait,” then her eyes roll back as I slip the head of my cock into her trembling entrance.
“Ready?” I’m watching the pulse pound in her neck.
Her eyebrows steeple and her head shakes from side to side. “No,” but her hips don’t lie.
As I slide in to fill her and stretch her wide, her arms and legs all spring around me. Her ankles lock behind my ass and her teeth sink into my shoulder as her arms wrap tight around my neck.
I slide, slow and deep, rolling my hips around, making the thrusts as complicated as I can to distract myself. I want to make her come again before I let go.
I pull her pelvis higher so I can scrape farther and deeper into her channel at the front. I find her button high up. Her eyes widen and plead when I tease it for four strokes, and they stretch wide when I hit it on the fifth. Her head thrashes from side to side and I feel her calves clench as her feet stretch and her toes curl. Her wrists band and her fingers claw. She bites harder.
She clings tight to me. Wet slaps resound from our bodies and the big bed shakes.
I pound into her as she shouts my name, over and over. At last I let got and blast her, coating her inside with thick bolts of hot, sticky, baby-batter.
I stroke her hair and she caresses my body and we doze and drowse.
It’s only been about forty-five minutes, but I feel like I slept a whole night of the best sleep. And I’ve woken up feeling like it’s a new day.
Chapter 13
Grace
When my eyes open, snuggled in soft pillows, I see his face next to mine.
He says, “I ordered up sandwiches and champagne.”
My head shakes as I take his face in my hands. Study his lips. Watch the sweep of his eyelashes. Take a soft kiss. His arms wrap around me. The hard mounds and ridges of his body feel like home. A home I never knew.
“I have to go back to the PleasureDome, Player One.”
His arms are snaking around me. Pulling me close, crushing me gently into him. “What did you call me?”
“Look,” I tell him, my head is racing but I’m relieved that there’s one thing I am able to think through. I put a finger on his lips. “I think there may be a way we can survive this.”
I love the way his eyes glitter and his dark chuckle, even though it’s provocative.
“We?”
My lips pinch together and I shove his chest. “It will just mean that you can’t play in the PleasureDome any more. Probably never again. But certainly not for a while. A long while, at least.” I realize that I’m babbling. My feet scuffle and my fingers are twitching. Fidgeting. “Not for a month. Most likely not at all while I’m still working here.”
I grab his face again to pull him to me.
He holds my wrists. Gently, but firmly, he resists.
“Wonderful,” his head shakes and his face is more serious, “I’ve become instantly and totally obsessed with a mad person.”
“No. Really. It will be okay.” Obsessed? He can’t mean that.
His eyes flash. “It will ‘be okay’?” He hauls himself up to prop on his elbow and he looks down at me, “So, I’ll just blow off my plan, then, shall I?”
“Plan?” Oh, that’s sounding kinda awks.
“The high-rollers and the whale,” his eyebrow curls up and I bite the side of my lip. “The fat wallets I’ve been stalking, studying and practicing against? The ones who will all be in the PleasureDome by tonight?”
Oh. “I think I might know who you mean.” All week, croupiers, dealers and pit bosses have been talking about a group of particularly lavish spenders who are due to start arriving tonight.
“Yeah, I’ve only been studying them all for about three months. Analyzing their play, re-running their games, reading up on their personal histories. I’ve run psych evaluations on them. All of them. But hey, maybe I can just, you know, not bother.”
“Oh.”
“Oh, yeah, and I’ll call my backers. Mmm. yeah.”
“You have backers?” I swallow. “Can you just give them their money back?”
“Mm.” He�
��s serious, and he’s twinkling at the same time. I knew I was going to be in trouble, falling for a poker player. “Could be tricky.” He cocks his head on one side. The way that he’s looking at me, I feel like I could be a snack.
My mind is a haze of distraction. I’m wondering about the sandwiches. What they’ll be. When they’ll be here. I can’t drink champagne in the middle of the day. But I’m sure he knows that.
“See,” he settles his elbow and explains as if he were a teacher, “My backers are expecting quite a lot more than that.”
“Oh.”
“Mm. And quite a lot of money is involved. I can’t say too much about the backers, obviously, but they haven’t struck me as the kind of people who take disappointment in their stride.”
It’s sinking in. I’m not liking the implications.
He says, “You know I shouldn’t have told you any of that. Right?”
Propped up on my elbow, I say, “So, you’re thinking I should just toss my job. The job that I paid myself through schooling for, worked to get certificates, and took whatever front of house work I could get in a prestigious casino so I could work my way up. Up to a position I finally got, and I only just started. Today. The poker room. My ambition has been to deal in a poker rom. Now you think I should flip it off after one session so you can have your game. You may have worked hard for this weekend’s play, mister, but it’s still only one weekend. You want me to drop my whole career out of a window.”
He shrugs with his eyebrows. “Has to be one of us.”
Chapter 14
Adam
So I’m killing time. Grace’s going to talk to her pit-boss. She’s got some crazy idea.
I don’t think she’s got a hope in hell, but, just for this afternoon, I won’t work the public poker rooms at the PleasureDome. I’ll stay on at the Lucky King and gut some tourists here instead. It puts a dent in my plan, but it’s recoverable.
It’s insane, but I feel like she’s with me. As if, everything I do, I’m feeling what she thinks about it.
I’ll need to make good use of the time. My whole outlook has pivoted. I’ve had some kind of a quake in my psyche, and that’s not a good thing. Surprises are bad news when it’s right before important games. And this surprise feels like a whole mind shift.
I haven’t time to test the theory or call a therapist. I need to work with the change. If I can.
While I’m here, I take a trip to the penthouse bar, the Atomic Bar, and get to know the bartender. When he brings me a drink, I chat a little and ask him, “Hey, do you make more from your salary or from tips?”
“Tips? here? You’re kidding, right? All the tips are in the Circle Bar downstairs. People come here because they think they’re about to get laid, or to drown their sorrows. Either way, the last thing on their minds is looking after me.” I gave him a healthy enough tip already, so I know that he’s not hustling me.
All over the Strip, I want service workers to know me, to know that they can trust me, and to see me as generous as well as understanding. If there’s anything I can do for them, I’ll always go out of my way to do it if it’s at all possible.
My business lives and dies on information. Bartenders and limo drivers are some of the best sources.
While I’m talking to Jason, though, I feel the change in myself. Like I’m watching myself from the outside. An unfamiliar lightness. It’s pleasant. Better than pleasant. But I don’t know if I can trust it. Hell of a time for an upgrade of the operating system.
I find a poker room and settle into a table. Right away, my urge is to tip the dealer more than I need to on the buy-in. That’s got to be Grace’s influence. I’m feeling better disposed and more generous to the other players. Right before the play that I’ve prepared for the weekend. Those contests will be no-holds-barred. Cut-throat matches.
I need to know if my judgement is skewed. If my instincts are blunted. By my calculations, I’m outclassing all the players I’ve profiled for the campaign by at least a rank and a half. I need to be sure I’m not going to be distracted, though. Or, even worse, go soft.
I picked a room with what they call a high-stakes table in public rooms. It’s not, by my standard, but that’s okay. It’s a big enough stake to create a sharp edge, put a buzz on the risk.
I check around the table for the most vulnerable player and I see her right away. A student. She’s concentrating so hard. She thinks this is a game you win when you watch the cards, check the odds, and make fast calculations.
Her appearance tells her story. She’s dressed carefully and spent all that she could afford to present the right semi-casual, semi-nerdy image. Probably been practicing for months in on-line games.
She’s hiding desperation, but she’s covering it well. I think she’s in trouble. She probably needs to earn her school fees, and this is how she’s decided to do it.
The other four players are suits. Three men, one smart and canny woman in her forties. All middle to senior management. All from flyover states, so they’ll try harder and concentrate. They won’t rely on charisma and charm to win.
None of them are great players by any means, but they’ve got the killer instinct. And they smell blood in the water. They all know how to play. And the little student doesn’t stand a chance.
I need to test myself. It won’t be hard to take all the suits down. But I need to know that I can clean the little student out. Gut her without blinking.
Eight hands in. The suits have all seen that I can eat them alive. One-by-one, I let each one of them think they got a secret glimpse at a weakness, in my betting or my play. Now all four of them have a reason to believe that they could be the one to take me down. Good, so far.
On the ninth hand, the student’s bankroll is weakened. If she doesn’t make a play on this hand, she’s done. I don’t think she can buy in any more. This is her last gasp. I wonder what she’ll have to do if she doesn’t make her fees.
The suits have all sensed it. Their eyes gleam and they lick their teeth. The student caught some luck in the deal, often fatal for a lesser player. She had no choice, anyway. This hand, she had to stay back until the last community card, and then go all in, whatever the deal.
The suits think they’ve got this in the bag and, before you know it, all four of them have moved their piles of chips all in, too. I’m the only player still sitting down for the showdown.
I take the pot and clean the table. As the dealer neatly moves all the chips from the center of the table to me, the three men and the corporate woman all seethe. They’re stiff and resentful as they all make a tip, near the minimum, to the dealer. Every one of them knows I hoodwinked them. Suckered them in.
In my head I hear Grace go, tsk. But it’s an approving tut. At least, I’m taking it as that.
The student holds her head up and keeps a smile on her little face. Behind her eyes, it looks like the San Andreas fault yawned open and everything fell in. I order drinks, one for her and one for me. I steel myself to watch her.
She accepts the drink with a good grace. I know she needs it. What is she going back to?
I did what I needed to do. I have scooped all of her desperate life chances off the table. They all belong to me. I can walk away with them. If I had the slightest doubt that I could, I would be gone with the money. Just to engrave the lesson deep for myself. Now, I know. I can let her go home, broken and destitute.
But I don’t have to.
I pass her a hundred in small chips.
“One more?”
She frowns.
I chip in an ante and wave a signal to the dealer.
After hesitating, the little student shrugs, takes a, ‘Why not’ pull on her cocktail, and she’s in.
I get an indifferent hand, and I do nothing to improve it. By the flop, she has two pair. On the river I’ve got a hole in an inside straight.
I push my chips all in and stand. She looks up, startled. She knows I gave her the pot.
The dealer smiles brightly
at my tip, as she’s pushing all those chips to the student.
I have to leave, but I feel like the Lone Ranger. I need to scoop some bigger pots, and fast.
Chapter 15
Grace
I know that Saul knows the moment I see him. Somebody will have shown him a tape from the deal and then one from the elevator. We all know how this works.
His face is hard as rock. “I’ll give you five minutes, Grace.” He takes me into a tiny meeting room. “You’ve got five minutes to tell me why you’re not fired right away.” He shows me to a chair behind the hard table, in the corner of the windowless room.
I sit with my hands on the table. He takes his time settling into the chair opposite. He looks big and I feel small.
He waits. He hasn’t said a thing, so he’s waiting for me to make my confessions. But he knows.
I can’t think of a better way to show him I wasn’t planning to try and hide anything from him, so I open clean with, “I’ve made an emotional and personal connection with one of the guests. It was sudden and unexpected. One of us has to not be here. Me or him.” I say, “I understand that.”
He watches me for a moment. His voice is flat. “How do I know that you two didn’t know each other from before?”
I tell him about the coffee bar and the incident with the ice bucket. “Take a look at the tape. I haven’t watched it, but I’m sure that you’ll see. I was embarrassed and desperate to get away. I’d never seen him before in my life.”
“You could both have been playing a part.” He’s watched the video.
“It’s true. But look, he came to the room I was dealing in and played a single string of hands, against one other player, a seasoned pro. Like I believe he is himself. None of my deals gave any advantage to either player and there were no surprise turns. Even the other player, the one who called himself Carl, he left happy.”
Double Down: The most precious pot (Hot Kings and Curvy Queens of Las Vegas Book 1) Page 4