What Are the Odds?

As always, this is a work of fiction, a flight of fantasy. All characters are over 18. All errors are mine alone. I hope you enjoy.

"What do you mean when you say you're lucky? You don't look very lucky to me sitting here in jail."

"I guess I'd say that most things came easy. They just seemed to go the right way enough of the time."

"Was winding up in jail an example of being lucky?"

"No, but I'm interested to see what comes after this. Maybe something good comes from this as well."

"You're awfully calm for someone accused of murder."

"When you didn't do it, it's easy to be calm."

"Well, good luck with that."

"Exactly."

I was sitting in the San de Christo county jail, talking with Detectives Barton and Elliott. I had been arrested because I was new to town, had no roots, had no alibis. I was the proverbial drifter. They had no evidence to tie me to the crime scene and they knew it. They were just trying to provoke me or scare me to make some mistake. When you tell the truth it's easy to keep your story straight.

My parents had died when I was eleven years old, leaving home in the family car and never returning. The truck that crossed the center line and hit them head-on ended their lives in a split second. I went to live with my grandparents, where I lived until I was eighteen. School often seemed easy to me and I was seemingly in the right place at the right time often enough in sports that I was a minor star. Leaving school behind, I made money by working hard. In time, I found an easier way: I became a poker player. I had a knack for it and I practiced hard. I found I had to find new games after a while as people grew suspicious and angry if I won too much, too often. I started drifting from town to town, region to region, finding games and winning enough to support myself. I certainly wasn't living large, but it was a pleasant enough existence. I had just shown up here when there was a murder, the death of a young woman. I was part of the roundup after they confirmed my lack of any kind of local story. I was a 'person of interest' in the vocabulary of the police world. My almost complete lack of verifiable background was a red flag to them. They were just trying to push me into a mistake. I was sorry to disappoint them.

"What do you do?"

"I play poker."

"What do you do the rest of the time?"

"Eat, read, walk, drive, look, smell."

"Don't you work at all?"

"My job is poker. I mostly work nights. Though given the number of casinos now spread out everywhere it is easier to find a game than ever before."

"Where were you before you came here?"

"Des Moines."

"Why there?"

"Why not?"

"Where will you go next?"

"I don't know yet."

"Where is your family?"

"My parents are dead, killed in a car crash. I was an only child. My grandparents raised me but they are now dead as well."

"So you have no family. You have no friends or associates. You have no history of living anywhere for any period of time."

"Exactly."

"And this doesn't bother you?"

"Why would it bother me?"

"Don't you want to live somewhere? Have a real place to live?"

"You mean be tied down with a lease or a mortgage, credit card debt, obligations and responsibilities?"

"Yes."

"No."

"No, what?"

"No, I have no desire to live somewhere, have a real place to live. That's not living, that's existing in my book. There's no freedom in those choices."

"You're not free now."

"But I will be soon enough. You don't like it but you have nothing implicating me in this terrible crime. I'm very sorry to hear of this woman's death far before her time but I have experienced such a loss in my family. I know how that must feel to her parents."

"You're free to go, but stay in town. Leave us a list of where you've been and people you've talked to. We'll be in touch."

"I have no phone. I have no address. How will you keep in touch?"

"We'll find you."

"I'll be at the Beau Rivage casino on Route 89 off and on for the next few days. I'll check out the others as well."

With that I went out of the jail and back to my truck. They had gone through my truck with a fine tooth comb but found nothing. They had questioned the custom safe I had welded to the frame. I had finally opened it, showing them the contents. I had almost $25,000 in cash in hundred dollar bills in there. That got them going, big time. I keep the cash for 'just in case' times. I wasn't sure what those were but it was my security blanket. I put cash into ATMs for deposit to an account I had elsewhere. That money was my retirement. I sometimes worked half a year and loafed the rest someplace warm.

I found a motel and took a room for a week. I stripped down and stood in the shower for seemingly forever luxuriating in the warmth. Putting on clean clothes, I did as I had said I would. It was still afternoon but the Beau Rivage was already humming. I observed a couple of poker games already in action looking for the usual things; tells, bluffs, card handling. Taking a seat at one of them after the previous seat holder left for the day I settled in and proceeded to win almost five hundred dollars over time. Never wanting to overstay my welcome I cashed out and headed back to my room. I had once weighed myself down with a phone and Internet access but had finally learned there was nothing there for me. I knew no one who would call me and there was nothing going on in the world that truly interested me. It was just the same things: wars, disasters, disappointments and just enough accomplishments to give you hope for a future that never happened.

I had dinner at the attached cafe, then headed back to my room. It was going to be an evening of television, a distraction at best.

An hour later, a knock at the door announced Detective Elliott.

"How'd you find me?"

That truck just stands out."

"Oh, right."

"Did some looking, trying to find out more about you. Seems things tend to happen when you're around, maybe more than might otherwise be expected."

"I've heard that a time or two."

"Talked to one sheriff who told me you helped him solve a crime there, a murder."

"Yep, I did. I noticed a couple of things that seemed odd, told him about them."

"How'd you do that?"

"My job is poker. When I'm not at work, I have a lot of time, more than most anyway. A man with a lot of time and an eye for detail can sometimes see things that people who are otherwise too busy to look don't see."

"Well, while you're here would you keep an eye out for anything that seems different?"

"What happened to that poor woman?"

"She was found in a dumpster in town. Somebody had strangled her and then had dumped her body. She was found naked, her clothing and purse have yet to be found. She wasn't raped or otherwise had sex. She was last seen at one of the local dive bars on the eastern side of town."

"Which one?"

"Portnoy's"

"As in 'Portnoy's Complaint'?"

"Yes, indeed. Owner thinks he a learned man. Made him seem highbrow or something."

"Or something..."

Elliott smiled for the first time. "You're a smart man. What are you doing living like this?"

"I tried living life according to the rules. I found it didn't suit me very much. I get by."

"But not much more than just get by."

"Everything I own is paid for and I have money in the Bank of Chevrolet."

"Yeah, that safe is a nice touch. Hasn't anyone ever threatened turning you into the IRS?"

"I estimate my earnings every year and send them a cashiers check for the taxes on that amount. Never heard back from them."

Elliott laughed and said, "That's because they don't know how to reach you."

"Actually I have a general delivery post office box number in a town along the way. Having it in a state with no income taxes just makes for one less complication. I stop by there at least once a year to pick up any mail worth keeping. Tell me, what goes on in this town? Is this murder a big deal or just another day in the life?"

"It's more the big deal. We've got the typical low-life undercurrent.. Drugs are a big deal as they seem to be everywhere. What people want tends to get satisfied. There's low life sellers, a couple of bigger dealers with lots of runners. It's more crimes against property than people; petty theft, car break-ins, stolen property, people looking for enough to get a fix. There's more than a few men who beat their wives, but usually nothing more violent than that. A variation on that now is more wives beating their husbands. A lot of fights on Friday and Saturday nights, otherwise it's pretty quiet. This is the biggest deal here in a long time."

"Did she belong at Portnoy's? Or was she slumming?"

"Hmmm. I'd say she was slumming now that you mention it. Her friends say she usually went dancing elsewhere. They were surprised to hear she had been there."

"Anything unusual at the bar? Do they have tapes?"

"The usual fights, no tapes, nothing unusual according to the staff."

"Do people go slumming here a lot or was this unusual? Did she stand out in that crowd?"

"I don't know."

"Did she go there before? With whom? Anything happen?"

"I don't know."

"What was she wearing when last seen?"

"Red dress, low black heels, black coat."

"Did she go alone?"

"No, she went with a girlfriend but they became separated. She didn't notice anything unusual."

"So her friend abandoned her."

"Yes."

"Great friend. Does this mean she has a habit of leaving with others?"

"Good question."

"I'd lean on the girlfriend. If it had been me I would have called the cops if I could not find her. There should have been something between them to say it was all right to leave without her. Was it used? Were they really that casual as to not have some signal?"

"I'll have Barton get on it." He picked up the phone and had a one minute conversation, then returned to talking with me.

"I'd talk to the other friends as well to find a pattern over the last six months. Were there any changes in behavior or actions? Was she taking more chances than normal? Boyfriend activity? Jealousy? Something changed or she would not have there virtually alone with such a poor plan."

"The sheriff said you were good. Now I believe him."

"Donaldson is a good man. He kept an open mind and listened both to me and others. It's about emotion and logic. There is constant tension between the two. What tipped the balance?"

I drove out to Portnoy's. It certainly didn't look highbrow to me, just your usual dive bar with flickering neon outlining the roof, topped with a martini glass outlined in yellow neon. I went in and saw the usual wannabes, a few honeys sticking together, waiting for the music to start so they could dance, various low-lifes and in this town, the red necks who worked in gas and oil. They made good money and spent it all on booze, drugs and sex, keeping places like this in business and making money. I ordered a beer, paid and asked the bartender, "Get a lot of women slumming here?"

"Slumming?"

"You know, who look out of place. Not the type who usually hangs out here. Professional workers, college girls, women like that."

"You a cop?"

"Do I look like a cop?"

"No"

"Then why do you ask?"

"Lots of questions around here after that girl was found dead. Probably just a reflex question at this point."

"I heard about that. Was she here?"

"According to her friend, she and the dead woman were here dancing but they got separated. She went home, called her the next day. When she didn't answer, she drove by her apartment. Her car was there but when she knocked there was no answer. She got worried and called the police. Hours later there was a report of a dead woman in a dumpster on the other side of town. They put two and two together."

"Putting two and two together. That's a lot to ask of the police."

He smiled for the first time. "I've not seen you in here before."

"I came into town a few days ago." I didn't tell him about spending some of that time in the jail, nor that I was a poker player. "Where's the good food in town?" I asked.

He leaned on the bar and replied, "Francesco's is good. So is the Piñata. If you like good bar food, go by Charlie's. Good food, reasonably priced. Go early though. It gets crowded."

"Thanks." I took my beer and wandered off to a corner where I could see everyone coming at me. A guy once taught me that. Never let somebody come at you from behind. No surprises is a good thing, even if it leads to strange looks when you say that's what you want.

I didn't see anything out of the ordinary, though I left before it got busy.

Elliott was leaning against his car when I got back to the motel.

"If you'd ask I would have told you I was going to check out Portnoy's."

"See anything?"

"No, not really. Bartender was a little defensive but not paranoid. Just said there's been a lot of questions."

"Locals went in first, then the state police followed. Nobody's got nothin'. Barton's running down the things you mentioned. He'll get the interview with the friend this evening after she gets off work. Any other thoughts?"

"What's the organized drug trade here? This town sits at the intersection of two interstates so you've got a lot people coming and going. All of those hotels around there must be a hot spot."

"We use license plate readers every night around there looking for suspicious cars. We get quite a few hits. It's trafficked through here from the border, then goes east/west as well as north. We roust the ones ID'd at the border. sometimes we just get lucky. I'm thinking we catch so little that organized crime just ignores us. There's the usual low-level dealers here but nobody big. Prices are fairly low here because of the availability. I'll ask Barton to ask the friend that question."

He pulled out his phone and made another one-minute call, put it away, and asked, "Anything else to make my job easier?"

"Why was she there? Was it spur of the moment or was it planned. If planned, why? Is it common for the college girls to go there?"

"College girls are there for the forbidden thrill. College guys stay away. They got into too many fights they couldn't win." The girls get treated ok in general. Portnoy's is not interested in a police presence, so they keep it cool."

I waved him off. "I'm going to take a nap. I'm here unless the truck is gone."

The next morning he was back.

"The friend says it was planned. Stevie, the dead woman, was making a drug buy with a dealer named Brando, a typical lowlife. She said Stevie was talking with Brando for a long time. She danced with a couple of guys. When she looked around they were gone, so she left and went home. No calls, No texts. Never heard from her again. She's pretty torn up about it. Blames herself. We're looking for Brando, just haven't found him."

With that, he was gone and I made the rounds of local casinos making money. There are a lot of tells in cards. I think I've seen most. You just have to watch the logic and emotion. It's the rare player who keeps an even keel. They look morose with a bad hand. They get excited when it's a good one. Just read the face and watch for a tell. Bet accordingly. It's a living, far easier than most. Now that smoking is outlawed, it's a lot easier and healthier. i was out making money almost every day.

A week went by before Barton and Elliott showed up at my door.

"Brando's dead. Found by a hunter in the forest. Shot in the head. We sweated his friends, nobody had seen a change in him, then he just disappeared. Missed his usual buy so word hit the streets about him. Nothing."

"So was he seen alone after he and Stevie left together? Was he jumpy? Nervous? They left together. Did something split them up? Did somebody offer to give her a ride back to her place? Why else would she have left him? Did the two of them leave with anyone else? Who drove? Was it casual stuff or what?"

"How much longer are you around?"

"I may stay longer than normal. I bought a phone with prepaid minutes. Here's the number. Call me if you have anything. I'm interested in this." With that I handed Elliott a slip of paper and they left. I went for my evening jog, then got some dinner, followed by tv and then bed.

At the Baccarat, I met a woman. I was watching a table of four, looking for tells and realized a woman there was doing the same. An impassive face, calm movements, no tells to her at all. I waited until she left, then followed her.

As she went to her car I said to her, "You are really good. How did you get so good?"

She rounded toward me, her keys arrayed between her fingers, ready to rake my face if necessary. Then she saw who it was and dropped her arm. She looked at me with bright eyes and a wisp of a smile.

"Let's get some coffee."

It was a statement, not a question. She motioned to her car and I went around to get in after she had unlocked it. We drove to an upscale coffee bar, bought our drinks and found a table, which took some explaining as I was adamant about a corner table so I could see in all directions.

"I'm Cam, by the way," I said to her.

"Brittany" No hand was offered for a handshake, so I kept my hands on the table.

"You're really good. It took me a while to see you, you just blended in so well I didn't notice you and when I did it was as a woman, not a player. It was only then I saw the careful eyes, the calm face. Well done."

"Thank you. I noticed you before at another place. You were winning in a slow way and left before it became really noticeable. After you left I heard them talking, wondering who you were. Call me Britt."

"No short name for Cam, I'm afraid. My mom called me just C sometimes but that was a long time ago. There's a long version of the name but that's best left unsaid. My mom used it when she was angry, otherwise it's not been heard in a long time. How long have you been doing this?"

"Seven years. I would play locally where I lived, then started playing in other regional cities. After a while, it just seemed silly to maintain an apartment when I was seldom home, so I take short-term rentals and live in one area for a while before moving on. Being a woman helps, because most security offices don't really look for a woman. They catch enough male card sharks for the casinos to think they're doing a good job. I play at night when there are other women playing. I don't stand out that way."

We settled in, slowly letting down our guards, slowly relaxing. I ended up taking her to dinner, letting her choose. Afterwards, she drove me to my truck.

"That's a classic truck."

It was. It had been my grandfather's truck which I had restored after he died. A few changes, like disc brakes, air conditioning, a modern engine, locking bed cover and other things made it livable. It had been my obsession over several years. I hired a veteran crew to do the work and paid for it all with my earnings. It helps me keep his memory alive.

"Never gets broken into. Everybody looks for late model high end stuff." I glanced at her Lexus as I said that and she laughed, catching my look. It was a nice laugh, an easy, real laugh. "I'd give you my address so you could visit, but you'd probably see the police car there and drive away."

She smiled and laughed again. "That's got to be some story:"

"It kind of is." I told her the truth, mixing in my night in jail. "I haven't seen them lately, so maybe there's some progress in their case." As if on cue, my telephone rang for the first time. "It's them. No one else has this number." I put them on speaker.

"You were on the right track. Brando took her to his dealer to get the drugs. His dealer, who is our snitch, told us she left with Brando and another guy, who he didn't know. He said it was unusual for a dealer to bring a buyer along when he picked up his stuff. He said they looked very comfortable with each other. The other guy never said a word. He had keys in his hand and played with them, so maybe he was the driver. We've got a possible description of the car and we're looking."