Chapter One

 

"Is it hot in here?"

"You're asking me?" Ava shot back, "I'm naked under this thing."

The sheath of black satin complimented Ava's body perfectly. The shimmering fabric even clinging in the sexy curve of her navel. And there certainly weren't any panty-lines, or any other lines for that matter, unless you wanted to include the outline of a nipple where the silky material clung to a breast. Even the curly puff of pubic hair was perfectly defined, looking like a small Brillo pad where her thighs came together under a crowning pubis.

Ava was hot... And it had nothing to do with the damned temperature in the room.

But it had always been Ava; the one who attracted the attention of both the pit-boss and the customers; the one asked to deal the cards at the private parties hosted by the Casino: The parties where the girls were required to work semi-nude.

Ava, married now to a successful landscape architect, avoided that kind of work. Her husband held contracts with most of the major casinos so money was rarely a problem but there had been occasions, early on, when the one-thousand dollar a night pay-packet to bare her flesh, plus the tips, had come very handy. But Ava had always lived in fear that word might get back to her husband. She was always very careful.

Kathrine, still single at forty, didn't have that problem.

During the fifteen years she had worked the gaming floor at the Adobe, Kathrine had never been asked to work nude. Maybe her sultry dark looks were perceived as a remote kind of beauty, cool and uninviting. She wasn't sure; not that it mattered anymore. Kathrine would never be taken for a party-girl, not now. She was too old for it.

Though Kathrine had successfully made her way up through the ranks, from server, then the gaming tables, and finally working as one of the highest paid hostesses on the floor, dealing with customers and staff alike, she had reached the top of her game. At forty-two years of age, a walk to the Personnel Department loomed in her very near future. There would be a polite, but uninspired discussion regarding her options. Or lack thereof.

 

"I think it's too hot in here," Kathrine said to Ava. "It's putting the old darlings to sleep. There must be a thermostat around somewhere. Or we can open a window."

Ava humped her lips and sipped soda water from a crystal champagne flute. "Never mind the damned heat. You're losing the game here, Kathrine. Your first one. Damn. I've seen more excitement at a funeral home. I started twisting open buttons an hour ago; three down. I almost lost one of the girls on that last shuffle; almost slid right out. Thought for a moment I was going to have to shovel it back into place. And the only one that noticed was flippin' Martin."

That was hard to imagine: Ava had been blessed with a magnificent pair of full natural breasts, ones that bobbled seductively when she dealt the cards; breasts that always seemed to be pushing for attention at the front of her signature, black satin dress.

"It's my fault," Kathrine said. "I brought too many financial types to the table; brokers and bankers. Party animals!" she said sarcastically. "If we had more hotshots like young Martin, we'd have ourselves a poker game."

Kathrine studied the men as they picked over the sandwiches that Mitz had arranged on the buffet table. Martin, with a glass full of scotch in one hand and a sandwich in the other, was in an earnest discussion with one of the financial nerds. Probably after free investment tips, Kathrine thought to herself. Despite Martin's starring role in two television sitcoms, movie roles, and national guest appearances, Kathrine was sure the financial nerd had no idea he was talking with a major Hollywood celebrity. She shrugged.

Mitz, tending bar, poured Martin another drink. Young Mitz had pussy-cat features; wide crystalline eyes with high cheekbones, narrow chin and a button nose. Her skin was clear and pale like milky-white porcelain. Her blonde hair was parted on the side and combed over, trimmed fashionably short, just below the ears.

Small breasted and narrow hipped, Mitz had a passion for dark, Brook's Brothers suits, men's suits; jacket and trousers that she bought and then paid to have tailored to hug her slim frame. A yard of pump water, Kathrine's mother would have said to describe the girl's figure. Mitz wore a man's crisp white Hathaway shirt with a thin dark tie.

She looked like a sixteen year old British school boy. But Kathrine knew Mitz had a half-dozen more years on her clock and, while still young, Mitz possessed the professional stature of a more experienced woman; chatting freely, but not to excess. Mitz knew instinctively when to move on, sharing her attentions equally among the men.

 

Kathrine was hosting her first private game and learning fast. But unfortunately it was a case of too little, too late. What had seemed like an easy way to earn some extra cash and maybe kick-off a new career, was quickly spiraling down into a yawn-fest. The buy-in was only one-thousand dollars. And that was way too low. The way things were going, the game would soon break up, leaving her to pay for the caterer, the bar expenses, plus the nightly rental on the hotel room. And there were her two friends; two-hundred and fifty each and not much in the way of tips coming their way. She felt a small surge of panic.

"How did all this get started in the first place?" Ava asked.

"Christ, it was fuckin' Martin," Kathrine replied, fighting the despondency.

"Our Martin?" Ava looked toward the buffet table.

"Yeah. Our Martin! He caught me at work a few weeks back; wanted to talk in private. Well I figured he'd had a problem with one of my dealers so I got him a drink and took him back to the customer service lounge. He asked me for a couple of five-hundred dollar poker chips; said he wanted to glue them to my nipples."

Ava's eyebrows came up. "He said that to you? He was going to pay you one-thousand dollars to drop the front of your dress?"

"Yeah. That's about the size of it. I guess I remind him of his mother."

Ava snorted. "So what happened? You didn't do it, for god's-sake."

"No. I told him I was all outta five-hundred dollar chips. That all I had were a couple of one-thousand dollar chips and he could stick those on my nipples if he wanted, but only after I stuck a couple of poker chips onto his eyeballs; with Crazy Glue."

"You said that? Right to his face?"

"Well I wasn't about to pull my top down; there are security cameras all over the damned place. I like my job, what's left of it. Anyway, he looked me up again, a few days later, with this idea for a private game. He wanted to know if I would put it together for him using my customer-contacts at the Casino. And asked if I would host it. So that's how this fuckin' fiasco started, and here we are: I'm about to lose my shirt. And that's what he wanted all along."

"You think he set you up?"

"Hell, I don't know. But if by the end of the evening I can't afford to pay my bills, Martin will be first-up to offer financial assistance. And lowering my top will seem like child's play compared to what he'll have in mind."

Ava reached out and placed a hand on her friend's arm. "Christ, Kathrine. We can't let that happen to you."

"Sure. But what's the alternative?"

"You damned well know what the alternative is. We have to jazz up the game. Increase the stakes. Get these guys excited about putting some real money on the table."

"But there's only one way for us to do that."

"Yes. And one of us has to ante up. We're in a tailspin here, we have to turn things around."

Kathrine touched her fingers to her forehead. "God. It has to be me. It's my party, my responsibility."

Ava studied Kathrine's face a moment. "Are you sure? I'm younger, would stand a better chance of making it work."

Kathrine ignored the inference to her age. "You know I can't let you do that. Not only isn't it fair, but you have a husband to think about."

"I know. I know... I'm just trying to work things through. Be rational about it. And none of these guys know me anyway, so forget about my husband. Logically, I would be the better choice."

Kathrine knew Ava was right but she wasn't about to let her friend take the hit for her mistakes. "Forget it Ava. I'm not going there with you."

The men were returning to the gaming table, leaving behind a ravaged buffet. They left partially eaten sandwiches and slices of buttered bread that had been pulled apart so that the insides could be picked over. Being wealthy didn't exclude poor table manners, or so it seemed.

Ava gave Kathrine a rueful look.

"Okay," Kathrine said, "let them play another couple of hands. And we'll see how it goes; see if I need to sweeten the pot."

Ava shrugged a shoulder and took her place at the head of the table and began to shuffle the cards.

 

The men played two more uninspired hands. They lethargically pushed poker chips into the center of the table, checked their cards and quickly folded. There was no gamesmanship, no strategy, no camaraderie. At the end of the second hand, the financial banker from Austin, Texas, yawned.

It was a big yawn.

He threw back his arms and stretched and yawned again. He'd had a snoot-full of Crown Royal, a dozen sandwiches and he had just lost two-thousand dollars. He was all done in and thinking of his hotel bed. Once he abandoned the table, the others would follow his lead and the game would be over; sure to go down in the annals of poker as the dullest game ever!

Ava looked over with raised eyebrows to where Kathrine stood at the opposite end of the table. The question was plain on her face. Kathrine looked away, didn't have the courage and buried her eyes in the palms of her hands. Kathrine wasn't at all sure if she heard Ava sigh, but she did hear the sound of Ava's chair on the carpet.

"Gentlemen," Ava said, standing at the end of the gaming table. Kathrine whirled around to face her friend. No... no... no! Kathrine screamed at the inside of her skull.

"If there's no objection, I am going to raise the buy-in to four-thousand dollars for the last five games," Ava announced. One of the men grumbled. "This will be a winner-take-all tournament; stakes to remain on the table for the event." Kathrine saw Ava reach for the buttons on her dress, heard the rustle of satin. Ava, don't! But Ava had already slipped the buttons open, down to her navel and her breasts were bobbing free like twin moonscapes, pale and full; the trumpet-shaped nipples, peaked.

"This sweetens the pot. Once again, winner takes all," Ava continued. "Do I hear any objections?" The room went still; a cloying silence.

The men gaped at the sight-of-sway of Ava's chest. There was uncertainty. What was being offered them? The men weren't sure they understood. The eyes of the investment banker from Austin were bugged out and his hands were trembling with anticipation as he judged Ava's weighty chest.

"Okay. The rules..." Ava said, "The game is five card draw, aces high, four-thousand dollar buy-in, five-game tourney. First man to win three games takes it. And winner takes all.

"Regarding my participation? I will avail myself to the winner, following the game, in the bedroom. No spectators, no oral, no anal. I am safe and clean, and I don't carry condoms. Any questions?"

Ava looked around the table. Nothing.

"Okay, gentlemen. Let's play some serious poker. A fresh deck of cards."

Ava tore the cellophane from a new deck and, with her breasts still protruding from between the folds of satin, she regained her seat and rattled through a preliminary shuffle. She then shot cards across the table in the rapid, machine-gun fire maneuver that was her trademark; a conjurer's slight-of-hand that was impossible for the eye to follow. Five cards per man, each card sliding neatly beneath the previous: The stack of cards positioned before each player, so tightly packed, that it could easily be collected up with one hand.

Kathrine snapped her focus across the room to where young Mitz stood behind the upholstered bar; a whiskey bottle poised over an empty glass. In turn, Mitz was focused on Ava's outrageous twins.

Mitz wasn't naive. She was aware of the Sidewinder Room, on the lower level of the Adobe where the Casino hosted its by-invitation-only parties: The private parties where the girls who flipped the cards and spun the wheels were required to leave the bottom half of their uniform in the change room locker before striding out onto the gaming floor.

The girls would come in waves, three or four at a time, like lines of catholic school girls; some with arms linked, laughing gleefully. Others, the younger ones, the first-timers, stayed focused on the money. They smiled nervously into the upturned faces of the men; sweaty faces that glimmered with surprise and hope at the sight of their favorite dealers from upstairs; jovial pubic parcels now exposed and rollicking, presented up for their enjoyment. The men would marvel, shamelessly, at all those rolling hips, punctuated with the dark swaths of pubic hair; accentuating each and every languid step.

Like Kathrine, Mitz had never been asked to work those kinds of parties. Coltish was supposed to be sexy, but maybe the casino boss thought Mitz took coltish to the extreme. When Mitz thought of her body, she didn't think of a little horse, she thought more of a goofy giraffe. Long everything: Arms, torso, neck. But the legs especially... her elongated thighs, knees a little pronounced and her calf muscles, while pleasing enough, lacked the sexy curves and definition: Nice straight legs. At least she had cute feet. She gave a little shudder and pulled her attention back to the job at hand: Martin's shot of bourbon. As she added ice, Mitz gave Ava a last, wistful look. Maybe it was better to be flat-chested.