Break My Fall (No Limits) (14 page)

I started walking toward the entrance to the restaurant, leaving him a step behind. “Let’s eat.”

We filled our plates, Drew grabbed a couple of containers of orange juice, and we found a table.

“I’m sorry I didn’t text you back,” he said at one point.

“Yeah, what’s up with that, anyway?”

He opened his OJ. “I went to see
some friends in Virginia Beach. Some guys I went to college with. I hadn’t seen any of them in over a year and one of them is getting married. So we had a bachelor party for him.”

“A nine day bachelor party…” I tried not to sound like I was prying
too much.

“No, just over the weekend. We went
deep-sea fishing for a couple of days. Stayed in one of the guy’s parents’ beach house. The wedding is in two weeks.”

“Are you going?”

He shrugged. “Maybe. I haven’t decided. So that was three days, and the other five and a half or so I spent taking my time on the way back. Ever been to the Outer Banks in North Carolina?”

“Nope. Sure haven’t.” I’d never heard of that, and didn’t care at the moment. “Why didn’t you just tell me? T
hen I wouldn’t have bothered—”

He cut me off. “You weren’t bothering me.”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. Can you be serious for a minute?”

He put his fork down, wiped his hands with the napkin,
then leaned his head over the table as he lowered his voice. “I’ll be serious. Sure. I can’t say I’m sorry enough for giving you the wrong impression when you told me what happened to you. I felt like shit. What I wanted, truthfully, was to find your ex and beat the shit out of him until he couldn’t remember his own name. I can’t relate to what happened to you and I’m not going to pretend to. But as much as it’s possible…I get it. I couldn’t have told you all of that after seeing how hurt you were by my first reaction. But now you know.”

I caught myself holding my breath, stunned by what he had just said. I let out a sigh, breathed in, and said, “Thank you. I appreciate that. I really do.” As I looked at him and processed his words, it occurred to me that I had nothing to lose by asking the question that was banging around in my mind
. “Do you always run away when there’s trouble?”

He had just jabbed a fork into a piece of watermelon and it was halfway to his mouth, but he froze and his eyes rose to meet mine. “Yes. But only when trouble involves something I can’t do anything about.
Or someone…”

“Gee,
who could you be talking about?”

He put the chunk of watermelon in his mouth and didn’t answer. Not t
hat my question needed one.

“
You know,” I said, “you could have texted me back and told me something, anything, Mr. Risk Taker.”

Drew smiled. “You’re feisty.”

I nodded. “I can be.”

“Good, I like that.”

I liked pushing him and I liked the way he pushed back. I could tell the fondness for our banter was mutual.

“So,” I said, “would you kick my ex’s ass for me?”

Drew made an exaggerated facial expression as if he were considering it. Then his face turned serious. “No.”

“You wouldn’t?”

He shook his head. “Not just for the hell of it. I like my freedom too much. I’m not going to commit a crime like that and risk going to jail. But if he came after you, yeah, I’d do it without thinking twice. Or if I ever saw him and he threw the first punch or even touched me—or you—in any way? Yeah, no question. I’d do it.”

One of t
he most interesting things to me about Drew was his free-spirit philosophy on life. He valued it above almost everything else, with the probable exception of his grandparents. What he just said made perfect sense to me. Kevin wasn’t worth the risk of getting in trouble with the law.

W
hile I was intrigued by his sense of adventure, I wasn’t so sure about this free continental breakfast scheme. I found myself nervously looking around while we were there. I wondered what would happen if someone got caught doing this. Surely Drew had calculated the risk.

I whispered, “You’ve never been caught doing this?”

He leaned over his plate and mocked me in a similar whisper, only louder. “No.”

I left it at that, fig
uring he knew what he was doing, and we got to know each other a little more.

Drew said he was a die-hard Chicago Bears fan, and when I asked if that was baseball or basketball, he told me it was football and we agreed
that because I didn’t know the difference, there was probably no good reason to explore that subject any further. I was an only child; Drew had two older brothers, both of whom had gone to college—one was an architect, the other a software designer. He theorized that maybe that’s why his parents were content to wait for him to come out of the phase. “Two out of three isn’t bad, right?” He smiled, but I could tell it was just a mask.

We were both from average middle-class backgrounds who had lived pretty normal lives
, never deprived of anything we needed and very little of what we wanted. Satisfying lives, up until we both had our life-changing experiences.

When we tal
ked about past relationships, he treaded carefully. Drew already knew the whole story about Kevin and me, so when I told him that was the only relationship I’d ever been in, there wasn’t much more to say.

He didn’t volunteer anything about his relationships, forcing me to ask.
“So tell me about your girlfriends.”

He finished chewing, wiped his mouth and reached for the OJ. “
Past ones or current ones?” He kept a straight face when he said it.

I wasn’t going to
give him the satisfaction of seeing me shocked. “Past, current, either one.”

“There’s not much to tell either way.”

I rolled my eyes, and decided to give him a hard time back. “Please. You probably have, what…two girlfriends right now? I mean, you’re handsome, charming, rich—”

“
I told you I wasn’t rich.”

“I saw how much you made in one night. I’d say that’s pretty rich.
”

He shook his head. “
Is that the only reason you’re hanging out with me? You thought I was rich?”

“Pretty much.”
I managed to keep a straight face that rivaled the one he’d given me a few moments ago.

“Well, then you’re out of luck. Between paying alimony to two ex-wives and child support for five kids, there’s not much left over.”

It was fun playing along with him, but if I kept it up I might not get him to answer my question.

“Okay, you win. B
ut seriously, tell me about your ex-girlfriends.”

He finished off the last bit
of scrambled eggs on his plate and took a few seconds to begin. He said he had been in two serious relationships. One in high school, which, looking back on it, wasn’t that serious at all. The other was in college.

“What happened with that one?”

“Nothing major,” he said, essentially blowing it off. “People grow apart sometimes.”

“But it was serious?”

He shrugged, then stood. “Depends. But it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m going to get more juice. Do you want some? Or anything else?”

“No, I’m good.”

It was obvious to me that the juice run wasn’t all that important. He didn’t want to talk about his last relationship, for some reason. The buffet wasn’t far from our table, but it was a far away enough destination for him to run away to.

He came back to the table empty-handed. “Ready to go?”

“Changed your mind about the juice?”

He pulled his wallet from
the back pocket. “Yeah.” He put three ten-dollar bills on the table. “And you probably need to get ready for work, anyway.”

I looked at the time on my phone and saw that he was right.

We left, and on the drive back to the marina, he asked me if I had any consecutive days off coming up.

Based on the last time he’d asked me that, I knew what it meant. “Tomorrow and Thursday.”

“Are you ready for another trip?”

I didn’t hesitate.
“Definitely.”

Despite my growing curiosity,
I decided not to raise the topic of his last serious relationship. He obviously didn’t want to talk about it, and I was pretty certain it would come up again at some point. For now, having made plans to return to Vegas with him, I wanted to leave things on a good note.

Bac
k at the marina, he walked me to my car and gave me a slow, easy kiss before I left.

As I climbed into the car he said, “By the way, I found that six grand in my glove compartment.”

I smiled, closed the door, and pulled away through the crunch of the crushed oyster shell parking lot.

Chapter Fourteen

My parents called that evening after I got home from work. I was in the process of picking out what I was going to bring to Vegas. I hadn’t been prepared on the last trip, so this time I was bringing a better variety of clothes, including the black dress that Drew liked so much.

After catching up on how my week had been, they filled me in on what they’d been up to, and then mentioned that a large envelope from the University of South Florida had arrived.

I had been fairly successful in not facing the fact that I would have to return to school soon, but now that it was August I would have to start planning.

“Want me to open it?” Dad asked.

“Yeah, go ahead.”

“You don’t sound very thrilled,” Mom said, “and we understand why. But this
is your last year. You can live with us, concentrate on your classes, and it’ll be over before you know it.”

There was no way I was going to stay at their house, no matter how much cheaper and convenient it might be. Having been out of the house for several years, and having come all the way to a new city where I didn’t know anyone, I had developed a pretty stubborn sense of independence.

They had brought this up before, on each of their two trips to Charleston when they came to see me over the summer. I didn’t want to have that discussion again, so I just gave in for the time being. “Maybe. We’ll see.”

Dad got the envelope open. “
It’s the bill for the fall semester.” He told me how much it was, then asked if I wanted him to go ahead and pay it.

“No, i
t’s not due until August thirtieth. Classes start on the twenty-fifth, so I’ll be back in time to get it paid. I’ll probably do it when I register for classes.”

God, I dr
eaded the thought of it. I’d have to be back there in a little less than three weeks. This reminded me that I needed to call Liz so she could send me the new lease to sign.

I got a little down thinking about this summer coming to a close. Not just because I’d be back in Tampa and around everyone and everything I wanted to be away from, but also because
it meant my time with Drew would be over.

When I got off the phone with my parents, I pushed it out of my mind, focusing instead on looking
forward to spending the next forty-eight hours with him.

.  .  .  .  .

“I don’t think you have what it takes.”

My eyes widened and I turned in my seat to stare him down. “Oh, really? What makes you say that?”

Drew looked at me out of the corner of his eye. “I’m kidding. I just wanted to see that feisty side of you again, and I knew you’d rise to the challenge.”

“Enough with the psychological experiments. Now
give me another lesson.” I dropped the seatback tray down in front of him and slammed the deck of cards on it.

“Didn’t you hear the flight attendant? Our trays are supposed to remain in the upright and locked position until we’re at our cruising altitude.”

I lowered mine, too, without taking my eyes off him.

Drew laughed as he shuffled the deck.

It was late, just after eleven p.m., and we had just lifted off for Vegas.

I was insisting that he teach me
more about how to play blackjack. I hadn’t asked him to give me a lesson in card counting. I wanted to know how to play the actual game. Last time was fun and interesting, but this time I didn’t want to stand behind his chair all night watching the action.

For the next two hours
, I sipped Cokes while Drew downed a couple of containers of pineapple juice, and he showed me the essential rules of blackjack.

“
Okay, so let’s go over the basics again. The object is to get 21 or as close to it without going over. If you go over, it’s a bust. You automatically lose. If the dealer gets 21 or anything below that, they win. And the opposite is true. When you watched last time, did you notice that plastic thing holding all the cards?”

“Yeah. He dealt from it.”

“That’s called a ‘shoe.’ They put multiple decks in it to try to prevent counting and increase the house edge. But it only works on people who are bad at counting.”

Drew selected two hands of cards to begin the lesson—one over 21, the other below
.

“
Remember you’re using signals to tell the dealer if you want another card or if you’re staying with what you have.” He showed me the signal for hit, which was tapping the table, and the one for stay, a quick horizontal wave of the hand.

“Why can’t you just tell the dealer?”

He shrugged. “Tradition? Etiquette? Hell if I know.”

“Whoa,” I said sarcastically. “Something about blackjack you don’t know.”

“I know what I need to know.” He turned to face me. I had been leaning over, practically halfway into his chair.

“So serious.” I mocked his expression—the furrowed brow, pursed lips, and all.

“I have to take this seriously,” he said. “If I didn’t, I’d have to get a real job.”

“And you don’t want that. I mean, ever?”

He shook his head. “I can’t see myself going that direction. Is there a chance? Yeah, but it’s slim.”

“Sounds like a hazardous life.”

“I’d say more like adventurous. But yeah, a little danger can’t hurt.” He turned his attention back to the cards and I looked down at him shuffling them, his strong hands holding the cards delicately as they fluttered under his fingers and thumbs. “It’s all about probability, though. It’s not guaranteed. The more you do it, the better your chances of getting what you want.”

I watched him shuffling the
cards, wondering if he was talking only about blackjack or if that was some metaphor for life.

Drew looked up from the deck. “Have you taken any statistics classes?”

“Just one. I needed it to graduate, and I barely made it through. I’m a good student, though. All my other grades have been As or Bs.”

Drew smiled. “Statistics is hard. Same with logic classes.”

“I never took a logic class.”

He shifted his weight, turning a little to face me. “You’re about to take one right now.”

“Oh, here we go. Let me have it.”

“Answer this,” he said. “Someone puts three envelopes in front of you, numbered one, two and three,
and tells you there’s a hundred-dollar bill in one of them. Pick one.”

“Three.”

“Okay,” he said. “The person opens envelope number two, showing you that it’s empty. So the hundred-dollar bill could be in number three—the one you picked—or it could be in envelope number one. Now, the person gives you the opportunity to switch your choice. Do you stay with number three or change to number one?”

I thought about it for a moment, not really caring because there were no envelopes and there was no
hundred-dollar bill, but Drew had me intrigued and I wanted to give the right answer. I looked past Drew and saw that the passenger across the aisle was paying close attention to us, possibly making mental notes for when he got to whatever casino he was going to. The guy saw me looking at him and his eyes darted forward.

I returned my attention to Drew’s question.
“Stay with envelope three.”

“Why?”

I shrugged. “Why not? It’s either in number three or number one, and I have a fifty-fifty shot at getting it right, so…it kind of doesn’t matter and I’ll stick with my first instinct.”

Drew locked eyes with m
ine, his facial expression not changing. It was as though he was waiting to see if I’d doubt myself. He was testing me, and I wanted to show resolve, that I wouldn’t waver, so I remained silent.

Then he shook his head a little, along with giving me a
slight smile. “Wrong choice, and wrong logic. Actually, wrong
instinct
, which you should never trust when you’re making a choice like that. It’s too close to emotion.”

“Why is it the wrong choice?”

“This isn’t going to sound like it makes sense, but trust me, it does.” He paused, then explained. “When you picked one of the envelopes, there was a sixty-six percent chance you were wrong. In other words, either of those two envelopes you didn’t pick could have had the money. So after the person shows you one of them doesn’t hold the hundred-dollar bill, you have to figure that the guy knew which one didn’t, and that’s why he chose to show you envelope number two. The fact that he knows which envelope holds the money is the factor in all of this. He intentionally shows you an empty one and when he does, that sixty-six percent doesn’t change. Instead of that applying to two envelopes, it applies to only one now. The one he didn’t open. So…you switch.”

“You’re right,” I said.
“That doesn’t make sense.”

Drew chuckled. “It doesn’t sound like it does, but it does. It’s called the Monty Hall Problem. Look it up sometime. Some people say it’s wrong, but it’s not.
Anyway, enough of that. You’re not going to be counting cards anyway, so forget about probability. Let’s play a few hands. I’ll be the dealer, you’re the player.” He dealt out my two cards, then his, and we went on with it for a while, with me losing over half the time.

I handed the last of the cards to him. “So I would have lost money if we’d been playing for real.”

“Not necessarily. It depends on how much you bet.” He went on to explain betting strategies to me, and I began to have second thoughts about playing.

“Maybe I’ll just watch. Maybe you were right and I don’t have what it takes.”

“You’re not backing out now,” he said, putting his hand on my thigh.

.  .  .  .  .

Sticking to Drew’s protocol, we stayed at a different hotel and casino than the last trip. This time we were at the Tropicana.

As the shuttle made its way down the strip, I looked out the window at Las Vegas in all its excessive flashing lights, overblown architecture, and glitzy
, superficial allure. In this town, those are all compliments. I didn’t know how many times I would come here, but I was sure I’d never get bored with it.

We ar
rived shortly before one a.m. local time, checked in, had our bags sent up to our room, and immediately hit the blackjack tables.

Walking in, I said,
“If you never go to the same casino twice, don’t you run out of places to go?”

“I’ll play the same one more than once. I just spread it out.”

I watched him play for the first hour, and by then he was up three thousand dollars. He had told me not to talk about the game while we were playing, so I had no idea if he was on pace to meet his goal, if he even had one, but at least he wasn’t in the negative.

We took a short break, during which Drew handed me a thousand dollars
in chips. “Go nuts with it.”

I looked at the chips in my hand. “I’m not playing with your money.”

“Yeah, you are. I won that for you. Starter money. Do whatever you want with it. Just play at a different table.”

“By myself? You’re not going to coach me?”

He shook his head. “Nope. It’s better if you’re under pressure. Plus, you’re not counting cards so you have nothing to worry about.” Drew wrapped one arm around me, putting his hand on the small of my back, leaning in to kiss me. When he pulled away he said, “Good luck,” and headed back to the table.

I was tired
. It was two a.m. local time, but my body thought it was five a.m., and if I was going to stay awake for a few hours, I needed some fuel. I got on the escalator and made my way up to the mezzanine level, went to the twenty-four-hour Starbucks, got a latte with a double shot of espresso, and went back down to the casino.

It’s a good thing I bought that coffee. The excitement of winning wouldn’t have kept me awake be
cause I wasn’t winning. I lost big, and I lost fast. I was astonished at how addictive it was—plunking down chip after chip, determined to beat the house the next time, get revenge for the last losing hand, the one before that, and the one before that. I had a few winning hands along the way, but those only enticed me more to keep going.

Forty-five minutes later, I found Drew at one of the other tables. I knew he would be winning and his stack of chips confirmed that. I had no idea how much he was up, but it was way more than he’d been able to hold in his pockets barely an hour ago.

I stood behind him, watching him laying down chips, folding up the corner of his cards on the table to take a peek, tapping his finger on the felt tabletop to be hit with a new card, waving his hand over the cards palm-down to indicate he was staying with his cards….

Hand after hand, I watched with more fascination than I had during the first trip. At the time, I was amazed to find out what he did for a living, and I didn’t know exactly what he was doing, so I didn’t notice the fine details of his playing. Now, armed with more information, I found myself in a near
trance as he won more and more.

I
t fed my own desire to win. Something. Anything. I didn’t care how much. I just didn’t want to walk away a loser.