Touch of a Button

I dug up the rest of the cash, not bothering to even fill the hole back up this time.

I could see the marks where someone had even camped there recently, they spent the night sleeping on top of my stash without a clue.

There was no sign of anyone around when I climbed back into the Corvette, I checked carefully.

All the way to Vegas I kept checking the rear view mirror. Sure as hell the bitch would have me followed, but I didn't see anything suspicious.

I know, I should have sold the Corvette but damn it, I liked it.

One nice thing is a man gets noticed real quick by casino management when he sits down and starts playing $100 slot machines.

A very pretty young woman came by and handed me a little card, telling me all about "comps". The last thing in the world I wanted was a record of what I was doing though.

I had checked in as George Johnson, paying for the room ahead of time in cash, just one night. I suspect the casino is very used to people using fake names, after all, what happens in Las Vegas stays there, right?

The young woman upgraded me to a much fancier room, free of charge she told me. Meals were on them, also.

Hell, I was trying to get rid of a pile of cash and here they were giving me stuff?

What the hell, I might as well enjoy my last fling, I was going to get rid of the rest of my cash one way or another.

I really was that pissed off at Jennifer.

But I was having this little problem, after nearly four solid hours I was about $40,000 ahead of the damned place. I kept hitting the stupid single bars with the 5 times pay icon which paid me $5000.00, it got to the point where the lady that was doing the running back and forth to pay me was just hovering. I lost track of how many of those slips I signed, I had given them my new Social Security number which meant records but by then I didn't care.

Fuck them, fuck them all. I had plans, I would just go see my guy and become someone else again.

Drinks were coming as fast as I could drink them until I could tell they knew I was getting plastered because they became mostly ice and soda pop with the bottle waved over the top.

Finally my arm got so tired I went upstairs to sleep, how the cocktail waitress ended up in elevator with me I have no clue.

I also have no clue if she was good or bad or if we even did anything that night but we sure as hell did the next morning.

Some guy showed up around 9 in the morning with a tray and enough food to feed the 7th army.

After a shower, downstairs I went to get the job done. I managed to get rid of about $150,000 playing roulette when I dropped a thousand dollar chip on the zero and naturally it came up. So did the red, three times in a row when I let it ride.

Frustrated, I threw some dice. How in the hell does a guy throw 7's so many times he starts to draw a crowd?

The casino even walked over and took the dice right out of my hand, gave me another set.

I threw a seven again.

I switched to blackjack, the table had a $2000.00 limit, I lost the first hand, got an ace of hearts and a king of spades on the 2nd hand.

Then I hit eighteen on the 3rd hand and drew the deuce for god's sakes to the dealer's nineteen.

He just looked at me and shook his head.

Next he dealt me a pair of aces, I doubled down and he dropped a 10 on one and a queen on the other.

Fuck that, I went looking for a thousand dollar slot machine but there wasn't any. So I played the damn $100 machine for awhile, ending up another $15,000 ahead.

I got up and saw three young women obviously together playing a row of dollar machines, so I walked up and put a $100 bill in each one of their machines.

One of them scowled at me, the other two smiled and giggled. I just walked away, leaving them with confused looks on their faces.

Somewhere in there I became invulnerable, I could not lose. I was on a roll, my plan of dumping all the cash and being broke just to get even with Jennifer was not working at all.

Yea, I know. But in my mind the bitch was going to get me again and so help me I knew I could not stand that.

I had loved her in a way I was sure I would never know again, the pain was so deep inside me that no amount of money, sex, booze would ever fix it.

I even thought of just getting into my Corvette and holding my foot to the floor until it was over, and had I been drunk enough at that point I might have done exactly that.

Yes, I know.

Stupid.

There was a period in there where I understood completely how a man can just kill his wife and then commit suicide.

I was sitting at the bar, miserable.

Someone sat down beside me.

"Hello, Roy." A voice said.

I looked over, it was Brenda.

Don't ask me why, I don't know why, but seeing her made me suddenly feel better.

"What are you doing here?" I asked her.

"I work here now, I might ask you the same thing?" She laughed.

"Trying to lose all of my money, and not doing a very good job of it."

She laughed at that, then for some reason I began to talk.

"You mean you are still hung up on that woman?" She asked after I had finished.

"I guess so. I want to hurt her and I want to....you know...all at the same time."

"You deserve lots better than that, no way in hell would I ever do anything wrong to a man like you." She said.

I looked at her, she looked right back.

"I am in room 1641." I told her.

"I know." She grinned.

We would have done it right there in the elevator except the doors opened and an old couple stood there.

"Well, I never!" The sour faced old woman said, the man just grinned. Brenda had gotten her left tit back inside her blouse barely in time.

We ran for my room, holding hands.

Someone can explain to me how making love to a slightly chubby, incredibly eager woman beats the hell out of messing around with several barely out of their teens girls, but it sure as hell does.

After several hours she sat up on the bed, the covers cradled around her waist, her mildly sagging breasts bare.

"I have to go to work, I am on the bar at six." She announced.

"Don't go, I will pay you 10 times that to stay right here." I told her.

"No. I don't want your money, I have to go to work. I can be back right here after two in the morning if you want me to."

"Yes, I want you to." I told her.

"OK then." She went into the shower, came out minutes later. She leaned down and kissed me and left.

A full week went by just like that. We ate together, made love together, slept together. I never touched one of the machines or even gambled at all.

I was like a drowning man, she was like a life jacket. Oddly, my thoughts of Jen were fading, I did think about her but it was not like it was before, a mixture of hate and want.

Brenda had gone downstairs for a team meeting one morning, I was sitting there watching the news on TV when there was a knock.

I was surprised when I opened it to find Jennifer standing there. She swept by me into the room.

"What do you want?" I asked her.

"I came to apologize, say how sorry I am. I didn't treat you right, you always were good to me."

"Jen, I don't really want to talk to you." I told her.

"It's Jennifer!" She retorted automatically like she had so many times before.

"What do you really want,... JEN?" I asked her.

"I was thinking. Instead of us fighting about..everything, why don't we just get together and try again?" She smiled sweetly, taking a step towards me.

"I don't think that is a very good idea." I told her, taking a step backwards.

"It's better than you sitting here wasting our money on...THIS." She waved her arms around the room.

"It's not OUR money, it's MY money and I will waste if it I want to."

"You haven't even paid one dime of the support, nothing! You know I have that judgment so you have to."

"I'm not going to either, you took the house, the Mercedes, all of the bank accounts, everything. And you want me to pay you, too?"

"I told you, I am willing to share, you can have all of that back...and me, too." She actually batted her eyes.

Just then the door opened and Brenda walked in. She came to a stop, looked Jennifer and then at me.

"I'm sorry, Roy. Do you want me to come back later?" She asked.

"No, I want you here right now." I held out one arm, she stepped over and I put my arm around her waist.

"What in the hell is this?" Jennifer asked.

"My lady friend."

"You prefer this...this fat thing to me?" Jen asked bitterly.

"Honey, how would you like to lose some of your skinny hide?" Brenda told her.

"Who in the hell do you think you are?" Jennifer let out a yell, reaching for Brenda's hair.

Brenda shifted sideways slightly, then threw the prettiest left jab I ever saw in my life. Jen went backwards against the bed, recovered and charged, only to be met with another left jab and a right hook. She ended up on her hands and knees.

There was no fight left in her, she got up and circled warily until she got to the door.

"You will be hearing from me!" She yelled over her shoulder.

"Where did you learn that?" I asked Brenda, managing to keep from laughing.

"Three brothers." She grinned.

+++

Brenda sat there quietly while the case was heard, the team of attorneys I showed up with knew their job very well.

Very well, they made me pay them in advance.

It only took them a half hour of outlining everything that happened up to and including the divorce.

Had any of that been presented earlier things would have been different back then. The Judge was a no nonsense type, and he got the picture clearly.

Brenda and I walked out free, all I owed was the back spousal support but that was it, future support was discontinued. Yea, she still kept the house, the Mercedes, what the fuck can a man do about things like that?

Jen didn't even look at me as she got into a taxi. I wish she had, I was giving her the finger at the time.

"Fifty thousand dollars?" Brenda asked, shaking her head.

"Yea."

"Do you plan on paying it?" She grinned.

"Not really." I laughed.

"Want to just go? I will if you will." She grinned at me. I knew exactly what she meant.

"No ties, huh?" I asked her.

"Just to you." She answered.

"There are two seats in my Corvette." I told her.

"Let's go!" She grinned.

We went upstairs, I grabbed the case. Yep, Jen had that judgment. The judge had ordered Roy Hill to pay it.

Whoever that is.

"How much do you have in there?" Brenda asked me.

"I don't know for sure, enough. I hear Louisiana has some nice casinos." I told her.

"Yep, river boats, I hear those are neat. Works for me!" She tipped her head back and roared.

I started the engine, pulled out onto the highway, then up onto the freeway, headed east.

There was almost no traffic.

"Do you know how to get there?" I asked her, slipping the transmission into sixth gear, then easing up a bit.

"No, but we can ask directions. Just go!"

We hadn't even made it a mile before Brenda had my pants undone.

"Catch me if you can, Jen." I thought with a grin and put my foot down.