Ricky had sworn off gambling, scores of times though no resolution had ever stuck. With a marriage and a mortgage already in the wind because of his addiction to slot machines, you’d think this young man would have learned his lesson already. But he’d be the first to ‘fess up' that, next to sex, nothing got him off like a long, smoking run on the tables down at the Vegas strip, or the video poker machines you could find literally everywhere you looked in his home town of Reno/Tahoe.
After a long but particularly profitable day in the Bay Area selling printed circuit boards for a Play Station affiliate, Ricky stopped off at a 7 Eleven to pick up a half rack of Amstel and some Camels before heading home.
He was almost out the double doors and into the cool breeze of the early evening when he halted, at the little alcove behind the ATM and magazine rack, where the slot machines were set up, just like coin booths in a fuck shop with reclining vinyl chairs and semi privacy for every player. He stood there for a second; five or six c-notes burning a man-size hole in his 501 pockets.
“Fuck it, he said suddenly, and stepped through with an exhalation of purpose, to find himself a free screen.
He saw her almost immediately, sitting at the second-to-last machine on his right, a young green-eyed honey-blonde, pretty lip corners twisted with the intent she focused on her game. This was a look Ricky knew by heart-- the mercurial intensity no inveterate gambler could ever hope to disguise.
And did this bode well, or ill? Superstition spinning off the sweet close smell of point-blank snatch?
Impossible to tell, thought Rick, only certain of the fact that she was simply a stone hottie, who certainly seemed to share his disease-- her young hands with the topaz and turquoise adornments on deft fingers lightly tapping the slot buttons... enough to make his dick hard just staring at those hands, as he took an empty seat at the machine directly across from her.
It quickly became clear to Ricky that this sweet young thing was going to be a serious distraction indeed, albeit a pleasant one. She tapped black leather pumps impatiently on the linoleum, and insolently chewed a piece of bubble gum, occasionally making it pop, blowing bubbles like erect nipples rising through clenched white teeth.
Her black lace pullover, unbuttoned down to tan midriff, pulled and tugged against her slim muscular torso and gorgeous tits. The gray skirt that rode right up to her ass crease, showed off long legs that kept crossing and recrossing themselves.
He groaned, breathed through his nose and tried not to stare. He was already down $270, and really needed to focus.
He just couldn’t keep from looking her over, though, at one point doing a double take as she blew wisps of flaxen locks from her forehead, chewed on her lower lip and muttered little endearments alternating with obscenities at the machine that was clearly vexing her.
Ricky’s sidelong glance turned to a full on slack jawed stare, which she quickly busted him on, then glared right back.
“Catchin’ flies?” she hissed , putting those beautiful hands on her scant-clad hips: “Take a fuckin’ picture why dontcha, it’ll last longer…. Jerk“”
Rick looked away, properly chastised, mumbling “Sorry” as he shoved another c note in the video poker machine’s greedy-tongue-like bill sucker.
“Hmmmm’, he hummed softly to himself, pretty sure that, although dissed, he’d detected the vaguest hint of a smirk on that beautiful face, through veiled mini-tantrum and feigned scorn. Hadn’t he? Seen that look? Yes, he was sure of it.
“Luck,” he whispered. “Oh luck be a fucking slut tonight!!” He shifted his prickling sweaty ass in the seat, sighed softly, and pushed the button to deal another hand.
**********************
Ricky swallowed hard, switching games on his machine-- from Deuces Wild, back to Jacks or Better, Aces Bonus, Joker Poker. If he lost this last hundred, he’d have no choice but to belly up to the ATM in the corner, like the degenerate gambler he was; but he wasn’t going there.
No way-- he’d lose face with this beautiful blonde across the aisle and that would hurt more than losing money.
His pulse quickened as he caught another glimpse of her out the corner of his eye. She dragged on a Dunhill, her mouth locked in a perfect jaw pumping “OH’ to blow a succession of smoke rings across the aisle that settled on him like her scent when he’d first seen her.
“Damn,” he muttered, raising his bet to the maximum the machine could take-- $25 a hand. “God DAMN, man…..”
Seconds later it happened, so fast that it took a triple-take from a low-whistling Rick for the reality to even register. He gaped at the screen. It had dealt him a natural Royal Flush, in the suit of hearts.
The machine began to shake, and noises came out of it like little air raid sirens in a blitzkrieg. Now, across the aisle, it was the knockout babe’s turn, to stare long and hard at him.
“You lucky fucker,” she said in a falsetto tennage phone sex kind of voice.
The 7 Eleven clerk, flanked by two burly security guards, brought Rick’s payout in a shiny black vinyl valise with a little zippered slit down the middle, half open for him to dig in there and count his winnings.
There was twenty-two grand in there, a fat progressive jackpot nobody at the store had hit for months. Rick had to run his tongue on trembling fingertips to properly flick through the thick stacks of crisp bills.
