Payback Read Online Free PDF Page B

Harley talk to the dealer and give him a green slip of paper. The dealer pushed the paper across the table toward Mahanani. He knew what it was. A credit slip. He looked at the amount. A thousand dollars. That would put him into the casino for six thousand. How much was the Buick worth? Nine thousand tops. Nowhere near the fifteen he paid for it. He looked at the green slip. The dealer closed the game and he wasn’t in it. Harley came up and touched his shoulder.
    â€œYeah, some bad luck. Three hundred ain’t no stake for this table. With a thou you can drop a few hundred and come back.”
    â€œCan’t do it, Harley. I’m in too deep now. You know what I make a month? I can’t afford to sell the Buick. Got to have wheels.”
    â€œYou get healthy tonight and get your pink back. Give it a try. Hell, it’s only money.”
    Mahanani stared at the green slip with his name on it and the printed figure of a thousand dollars. This was getting serious. He told himself he could stop anytime he wanted to. Now he wasn’t so sure. The green slip or his Buick. What would he do without wheels?
    Hell, why not? His luck had to change. Logic. He had to think his way into each round. Logic. Yeah, he could do that. He took the pen beside the slip, signed it, and pushed it over to the dealer, who counted out a thousand dollars for him mostly in hundreds. Mahanani pushed the hundred-dollar chips back and asked for tens.
    He took his first two cards. A seven in the hole and a jack showing. Good bluffing count, only these dealers never bluffed. Dealer showed sixteen. He watched two players break, saw the next one hold with a nine showing. Probably a nineteen. He looked at the dealer, who had to hit sixteen. The last two cards played out were under five. Bad odds. He put his two ten-dollar chips on top of his cards and waved the dealer off.
    The next woman stayed with an eight showing. The dealer checked the hands still alive, then dealt himself a card. Adamn four. It would have been his damn four if he’d taken it. The dealer closed out with twenty. He paid one player.
    One of those damned nights.
    By eleven-thirty that night, Mahanani was down to his last four ten-dollar chips. He shrugged and played all four. He came up with twenty on the deal and stayed. The dealer hit seventeen and pulled a five to break. The house paid.
    Mahanani felt a lucky streak coming. Should he let the eighty dollars ride? Hell, no. He grabbed the eight chips, went to the cashier, exchanged them for money, and got out of the casino before he saw Harley.
    Six thousand fucking dollars in the red to the Indians. He could stop anytime he wanted to. Sure he could. He sat behind the wheel of the Buick that he owned less than half of, and swore for ten minutes. Then he backed out slowly and took the freeway downhill to his apartment in Coronado. He had to work tomorrow. He was a SEAL. He frowned. No, they just came back from the Caribbean. He was on a four-day leave. What the hell was he going to do for four days? Surf. He’d hit Wind and Sea Beach and surf his balls off.
    He wouldn’t gamble anymore. Never again. He laughed. Sure, never again until tomorrow night, because he was off duty and they didn’t have a night maneuver or training. He was a shitty gambler, didn’t have the knack for it. But he knew he couldn’t quit. Not until they refused to let him in the door without a wad of cash. Where would he get a stash of cash? In two or three days his Buick would be gone. The casino’s dollar-a-year lease price would be jumped to four hundred a month and he’d have to bow out. Then how in hell did he get to the casino? How did he get to work? How did he get anywhere?
    He parked at his apartment and went up the steps two at a time the way he always did. How was he going to do anything after he lost the Buick? Fuck it. He’d think of something. Fuck it.
    Â 
    Murdock had called a Saturday training