Alibi High

“Fine,” Jake said, turning to me. “If you get to play cop or investigator or whatever it is you're playing, then I get to gamble.”

A tiny, ethical knot took up residence in my stomach My pulse quickened and a knot formed in my stomach . I hated gambling on principal president and it was one of the reasons we avoided the casino. Thornton, my ex, had dumped a sizable amount of his time – and our money – into local casinos and the whole idea of gambling pretty much left a bad taste in my mouth. I thought it was wasteful, like throwing your money into the mouth of a volcano. Jake, however, thought gambling could be fun and had, in fact, spent many weekends in Las Vegas prior to our getting married. He'd tried to get me to go, but I'd steadfastly resisted. respected my desire to avoid them and here I was, b ringing him directly to the one place I despised.

“Alright,” I said, knowing I didn't have much choice.

He leaned closer to me. “ I'm going to get one So I can get a hundred dollars out of the ATM . ? ”

The knot punched me in the stomach grew bigger . “What? ? ”

“A hundred bucks,” he said, smiling. “I'm going to march into that giant lit-up castle over there, find an ATM machine that will charge me, like, eight bucks to make a withdraw a l, take out one hundred of our dollars and then gamble with it.” His smile grew. “Play some blackjack, maybe a little poker. Who knows?”

“Jake, we can't — ”

“I can do whatever I'd like,” he said, holding up an index finger to silence me. “You've brought me here under false pretenses. I am allowed to have a good time. And in order to have a good time, I will need to put our hard-earned money at risk in some of these games you despise so much.”

He was pushing all of my buttons. At once. He knew how much emphasis I placed on not wasting money and I'd always maintained that gambling was a huge waste of money. He was trying to torture me, make me feel bad for tricking him into the date night at the casino and also let me know he was irritated that I'd gotten myself further involved in the computer theft.

I hated payback.

“Maybe I'll win,” he said, then smiled again. “Or maybe I'll lose.”

“I should punch you,” I said.

He cackled. “This may turn out to be fun after all.”

Both Brenda and Johnny were turned around in their seats, watching us. Johnny seemed amused, but Brenda looked concerned.

“Fine,” I said. “Take out your money. I hope you lose it all.”

“Yeah?” Jake said. “Maybe I'll take out two hundred then.”

I started to say something, but he put up his index finger again. “No, no. False pretenses and all that. I can do whatever I'd like while we're here.” He leaned closer to me. “I hate investigating and you hate gambling. So if you're gonna play Jessica Fletcher, I'm gonna play Johnny Chan.”

“ Who the hell is Johnny Chan?”

“ On e of the greatest poker players and gamblers to ever live,” he said. “One time — ”

“ I don't care!” I said. “And you know how I feel about gambling. It's totally different than...whatever it is I'm doing.”

“ Totally diff erent?” he said, widening his eyes. “Oh, I'm sorry. Have I not said about seventy thousand times that I am not in favor of you continuing to act like some undercover cop? Have I not said it loud enough? Should I yell it right now?”

“ No, because I'll put my fist in your mouth as soon as you open it.”

“ I even told you the other day that if you were going to keep doing this stuff, that maybe you should at least get paid for it,” he continued. “But I'll take a huge guess and assume you aren't getting paid for this little expedition tonight?” He folded his arms across his chest. “Tell me I'm wrong and that you're getting paid and I won't go yank a bunch of cash out of the ATM right now.”

I didn't say anything.

He thrust his arms up in the air. “I win! Show me the money!”

I turned to Brenda. “You'll help me hide the body, right? After I kill him?”

“Oh, definitely,” she said, smiling. “I know all of the good places.”

“Good luck prying her away from the slots,” Johnny said.

She swatted him on the shoulder.

We got out and walked through the garage to the elevator. Jake tried to hold my hand in the elevator, but I yanked it away from him and made a face at him. He chuckled and shook his head.

I glared at him. “You are totally blowing it.”

He raised an eyebrow. “How's that?”

“Before you started threatening me with gambling, this was gonna be your lucky night,” I said.

“Lucky night?” he asked. “How do you figure?”

The elevator reached the main floor and the doors opened. I waited until Johnny and Brenda walked out ahead of us.

I looked at my husband. “I was gonna have lots of sex with you tonight when we got home. Now?” I held up my index finger and wagged it in his face just like he'd done. “You won't even get to touch my boobs.” a glimpse of what I was going to offer.”

I made a mental note to pu ll out my long-sleeve pajamas and to make sure I wore socks to bed that night.

Jake frowned at me. “But—”

“ No buts.” I frowned back at him. “Literally.”

I stomped out of the elevator, smiling, leaving him standing there to ponder that.

THIRTY SEVEN

The interior of River Star was an assault on all of my senses.

The space building seemed endless, with rows and rows of slot machines, all ringing and making cartoon like sounds, as people sat on stools and punched the buttons on them. Beyond the slots, I could see more rows of tables for card games. The purple and pink neon lights were everywhere, advertising everything from games to food to drinks. Waitresses dressed in skimpy purple and pink outfits flitted about with trays full of drinks. Shouts of joy and groans of disappointment rose above all of the machine noise every few moments. And there were throngs and throngs of people.

The River Star was thriving.

Brenda rubbed her hands together. “So, I think I'll just go wander and see where I end up.”

“Bet I know,” Johnny said.

“Be quiet,” Brenda said, then headed into the sea of slot machines.

“And I'm going to go find an ATM,” Jake said, grinning.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

He blew me a kiss.

Forget one night without sex.

He was now looking at a month.

“Nate said to meet him near All Kinds of Wall of Walleye,” Johnny said.

I tried to refocus. “What the heck is that?”

“Apparently a place to eat. That serves lots of walleye.” He pointed to the opposite side of the casino. “Says all food is that way.”

I nodded and we entered the giant mob that seemed to be moving in that way direction . I was struck by the different types of people that were in the casino. Couples, singles, seniors, college students, nicely dressed people, folks with barely any clothes on at all. Tall, short, big, small, blonde, brunette, long hair, bald. Everyone was there. Apparently, I was one of the few people in the state of Minnesota who didn't have any interest in gambling.

We moved slowly with the herd, people peeling off towards the games and others joining up as we trudged toward the large neon sign at the far end of the room that offered food. The smells of pizza and cold cuts fried chicken and popcorn wafted in the air. We passed a long bar , jammed with customers, elbow to elbow at a long wooden strip counter . I was trying to calculate the money that went through this place and couldn't even imagine. No wonder the state had wanted the casino.

A giant fish with large googly eyes loomed over us as we passed the bar , a sign positioned underneath that read and a sign in the shape of a fish below the giant googly eyed fish declared that we had reached All Kinds Wall of Walleye. It was a counter service place, where you stood in line, then pulled what you wanted from warmers as you walked toward the register. I didn't count them, but it looked to me like there were at least twent y y- five people in line, trying to decide which kind of fried walleye they wanted.