Technomancer (Unspeakable Things: Book One)

instance, that the moment the pit boss showed up, every camera in the place was recording our every move.
    With the pit boss watching, the bride pushed forward fifteen hundred dollars in chips. I wasn’t good at reading women, but I knew this one was angry. Her mouth was small and tight and her eyes were staring at the two men, daring them to reject her bet and close down the table. After a glance of approval, the dealer took the bet and dealt himself a twenty-one right off. The house took her chips, and the dealer looked relieved.
    The pit boss wandered off, and I took the opportunity to say a quiet word to the bride. “You know,” I said, “gambling in an emotional moment isn’t always the best way to win.”
    “Emotions are all I have left,” she replied without looking at me.
    I turned my attention to the dealer next. “Can I side bet on her?” I asked.
    He nodded to an area of the table outlined in lime green. I pushed three hundred into the box and the dealer stared at those chips for a second. Resignedly, he dealt out the cards.
    The bride and I won, but I was the only one there who was smiling. I lost my own hand, but I’d put only theminimum on that. I did the same play on the next hand, and the next. I had all my money back by that time and a little bit more.
    The pit boss came back after a couple more hands and closed the table. I was up by about a thousand bucks by then, so I didn’t care. The bride got a bucket for her chips and headed for the cash-out window. I followed.
    “Thanks for letting me ride your luck,” I said.
    “It wasn’t luck,” she replied in a wooden voice.
    “I know.”
    She looked at me then, for the first time. “You work for the casinos, don’t you? You’re the first security man. The pit boss was the second.”
    I shook my head. “No. I’m Quentin Draith.”
    I held out my hand, but she ignored it. “Jenna Townsend,” she said.
    “I don’t work here, and I doubt I ever will now. They hate me too, because I took their money.”
    Jenna cashed out her chips. I did the same, but I bought a small bucket of silver dollars. She turned away, but I called to her.
    “Mrs. Townsend? You want to mess with this casino in a new way?”
    She froze, then turned back toward me, staring.
    “I don’t know what problem you have with them, or how you did what you did, but I can add some pain for them tonight.”
    “How?” she asked. Her eyes were intense, hungry.
    I rattled my paper bucket of silver. It jingled and thudded. “Come with me to the dollar slots.”
    She followed me, as did a dozen cameras and sets of eyes, I suspected. I felt a bit nervous pulling this, like I’d stumbled onto part of the late-night terrors going on in thiscity, but I wasn’t even sure of that. Maybe she was just angry because the hotel dry cleaners had put a burn mark in her expensive dress.
    I had a hunch it was more than that, however, so I took a chance. I went to the biggest, gaudiest dollar-slot machine in the place and put five coins into it. Then I reached into my breast pocket and drew out Tony Montoro’s sunglasses. I put them on my face.
    Jenna frowned at me. “What are you doing?”
    “Pull the handle,” I said. “Now.”
    She licked her lips, looking around briefly. Then she did it.
    There was a strange sound. It wasn’t right—anyone who heard it would have known that. The handle snapped down, but instead of stopping at the usual spot, at about a forty-five degree angle, it kept going. It came down to a ninety, then past that so it aimed at the carpet. It didn’t go back up again.
    I sucked in air through my teeth. I half expected coins to come gushing out, but they didn’t. What happened was worse. The dials on the face of the machine spun, showing fruit—
why was it always fruit?
Bananas, cherries, bells, and WIN signs flashed by. But they spun on and on too long, and before they were done, the rightmost dial came off its tracks like a wheel coming off a bike. A quick, sharp shrieking sound came out of the machine once, then it quit moving altogether.
    I tucked away my sunglasses and stepped away from the machine. Jenna Townsend, her mouth hanging open, stepped after me. The slot machine gave a death rattle that sounded like gears grinding in an old stick-shift truck. A few defeated coins pissed out into the silver tray underneath the monster.
    “What the hell did you do?” she asked in an excited whisper.
    “Probably ten grand in damage,” I said.
    “How did