F. Wilson - The Select

She shrugged off the feeling and braced herself for another nerve-wracking hand.

*

They won three of the next four hands, then a yellow card popped out of the shoe and the play paused. Tim stood up and stretched.

"Maybe we should have had dinner, hon," he said. "I'm starved. Want to get something to eat?"

Hon? Quinn couldn't figure out what he was up to, then she glanced at the dealer and saw her shuffling a stack of cards.

"Uh, sure, hon . I know I could sure go for a big fat juicy steak right now myself, hon."

Tim laughed out loud and began gathering up his chips. Quinn began stacking hers. She thought the pit boss was watching them a little too closely. Did he suspect?

"For a beginner, you're one lucky little lady," said the old fellow next to her.

Quinn nodded toward Tim. "I have a great teacher."

Her pile was about the same size as when she'd sat down, but Tim had accumulated a pile of his own. Her hands shook as she stuffed them into her pockets.

She saw Tim take a chip and give it to the dealer. Quinn wondered why. The dealer hadn't been particularly friendly or helpful. She shrugged. Probably a custom. Like tipping a waitress.

She pushed one of her own chips across the table.

*

Tim pocketed his chips and guided Quinn away from the table. He wanted to throw his arms around her and kiss her, but he settled for putting his arm across her shoulders. He felt a fine tremor running through her. He squeezed her upper arm.

"Quinn," he whispered, "you were great ."

"I think I need a shower," she said.

"Not bad for less than an hour's work," he said.

"How much did we make?"

"I figure we're almost two thousand ahead. And that's just the start."

Quinn sagged against him. "I don't know how much of this I can take."

"Hang in there, kid. That's about what I do alone. For the two of us it's just a start."

"You mean to tell me you clear two thousand every time you come here?"

"Not every time, but most times. Sometimes it takes longer than others. Sometimes you'll nurse a shoe all the way along and it stays even straight through, never swinging too far high or low. That's wasted time."

"But..." Quinn seemed to be having some trouble grasping the numbers. "If you take home two thousand dollars every time, and if you came here just once a week, you could..."

"Pull down six figures a year?" He shrugged. "Maybe. Don't think it hasn't occurred to me. Work one day, have the other six to spend the hundred thou you're taking home. Sounds great, doesn't it."

They wandered from the casino to the hotel section and strolled past the windows of the shops.

"I don't know," she said. "Does it?"

He noticed her watching him closely. He got the feeling the answer was important to her. But he didn't have to ponder a reply. Over the past few years he'd given the matter a lot of thought.

Still, he hesitated. He wasn't used to talking about himself—his real self. He'd spent his teen years cultivating an exterior that hid the sap inside. But this was Quinn and those big blue eyes were so close. Maybe he could risk it. Just a little.

"On the surface, yeah. It sounds ideal. But what have you got by the time you're old enough for Medicare?"

"I don't know," she said. "A pile of money?"

"Yeah. If that. Certainly not much else. There's got to be more to life than that, don't you think? Just making money isn't... doing anything. You haven't enriched anything but your bank account with your work. Like being a currency trader or a gossip columnist, or something equally empty."

"So you chose medicine—so you could do something with your life?"

This was getting a bit too sticky and Tim felt himself instinctively pulling back.

"Well, I figure medicine's a good thing to have to fall back on. And at least I'll have something noble-sounding to tell the kids— our kids—"

"Bite your tongue!"

"—when they ask me what I've been doing with my life."

"Can't you be serious for two consecutive minutes?"

"It's not entirely beyond the realm of possibility, Miss Cleary, but let's not fit me for a halo yet. As I've told you, mostly I'm at The Ingraham because it's free and it's a way to stave off adulthood a little longer."

"Uh-huh." He sensed that she didn't buy that, especially since she was nodding slowly and smiling at him. A very big, very warm smile.

"Let's go outside," Quinn said. "I could use some fresh air."

Tim sighed. He'd been hoping she'd want to go up to the room.

"Sure. This way."

*

"Aaaahhh!"

Quinn breathed deeply as she ran up to the railing on the leading edge of the boardwalk and threw her arms wide to catch the cool onshore breeze from the Atlantic. She reveled in the clean briny smell.

"Why can't they pump some of this into the casino?" she said.

Tim leaned on the rail beside her. "Because half the folks in there would probably keel over from an overdose of oxygen. Some of them haven't had a whiff of fresh air in twenty years."

She turned and looked at all the blinking lights, all the garish metallic colors on the cupolas of the Taj Mahal.

"Sort of adds new dimensions to the concept of gaudy, doesn't it," she said.

Tim laughed. "It could give garish a bad name."

They leaned and listened to the ocean rumbling beyond the darkened beach, watched the light from the gibbous moon fleck the water and glitter off the foamy waves. Quinn felt the tension of the blackjack table vent out through her pores. She noticed a stairway to their left.

"Let's go down on the beach, just for a minute." She kicked off her shoes. "I want to get some sand between my toes."

Tim followed her, grumbling. "I hate getting sand in my shoes."

At the bottom of the steps Quinn worked her feet into the cold, dry granules, and again felt that prickle at the back of her neck, that feeling of being watched. She turned and saw two dark figures moving along the boardwalk above them, hugging the rail, watching them. Something furtive about them...

She tapped Tim on the shoulder. "Maybe we should go back up."

"We just got here."

As Tim bent to empty the sand from his shoes, Quinn glanced up again. The two figures were at the top of the steps now, staring down at them, both definitely male, wearing knit watch caps. The lights were behind them so their faces were shadowed. They could have been sailors, but as she watched they pulled their caps down over their heads—ski masks!—and began sprinting down the steps.

"Tim!" she cried.

She saw him turn at the sound of their pounding feet but he had no time to react before they were upon him. They knocked him onto his back in the sand, punched his face, then began tearing at his coat pockets, ripping them open. For a few heartbeats Quinn stood paralyzed with shock and terror—she'd never witnessed anything like this, had always thought it happened to other people—before she began screaming for help and beating on the backs of the assailants. One of them turned and shoved her back. The blow was almost casual, but it over-balanced her and her feet slipped in the sand and she went down. In the cold moonlight she saw chips falling and scattering on the sand next to Tim as she continued to cry for help. The smaller of the attackers began to scoop up the chips while the bigger one kept battering Tim and tearing at his coat. Finally, after rocking Tim's head with a particularly vicious blow, the bigger one got to his feet at about the same time Quinn regained hers. He lunged toward her but she leaped for the stairs, shouting non stop for help, praying someone would hear, or maybe see her. She was half way up when he caught her, grabbing the waistband of her slacks and trying to pull them off her. With his other hand he began pawing between her legs. She jabbed back at him with her elbow but it glanced off his shoulder. She was losing her balance.