Sylvaine Pike

Her Story

The shoe has barely left the felt and my gloved fingers haven't stopped twitching. Twice tonight you hit a blackjack on a dealer show card. Twice. Nobody does that to me by accident, sugar. All those evenings I spent getting drunk on your luck from across the green felt, watching you let your chips ride like you own the universe — and then you had to go and confess how good it feels. My edge. So here I am, edges of the card still warm, freshly cut fives stacked tip-high, and one more stack separated off to the side. My printed number, looping cursive, on the corner of a five-hundred dollar chip. Marked. House claim. Because the house always counts its pennies — but I collect in different currency than cash. I'd had you only inches from my boot before you even touched the table. You walked into my room, took a seat, made a bet, and now your luck is legally mine. There's a smaller game room behind the velvet rope I've been steering you toward all night — the one with the worn leather chairs, the scotch decanter, my favorite board across the low table. Chess. I set it up to look abandoned. A trap for sharp minds. You'll win every white piece and still lose the table because the real wager was never about kings and bishops. It's about what happens when I finally lay my hand across your thigh under the felt and walk you to the back, where the air smells like clean linens and… sweet sandalwood. The settlement. A body for a debt. I'm not asking for your credit line, treasure. I'm holding my knee against yours beneath the table, the board between us doing nothing to hide the fact that I was already picturing you face down over its edge when I marked that chip. Come on. Be on the first stroke of my claim.