Chapter Text
I’m going to get fired.
The casino is noisy and smoky and crowded around me—big band hits from the twenties, oily Cuban cigars, raucous laughter from tables where the minimum bet is more money than I survive on in a year. I feel like an imposter, wearing a shoddily constructed disguise of white button-up and black dress pants amidst people dripping in jewels and velvet and silk.
I’m supposed to be wading through this sea of high rollers, taking drink orders and flashing little smiles and working them for tips. God, the tips—enough to get a motel for me and my mom tonight, enough to get us a dinner that doesn’t come from a food bank or vending machine, enough to keep her from going into withdrawal, enough to afford a load at the laundromat so I come in tomorrow with my uniform in presentable condition.
Assuming I get a tomorrow, which right now, I probably won’t. I already spilled a cocktail on some man in a very expensive looking suit, and while I know I’m supposed to sidle up to little clusters of people and insert myself to ask them what they want to drink, I’m afraid to as well—the last time I did, a man put his hand in the small of my back and smiled at me lecherously, letting his fingers drift down to the top of my butt before I fled. I didn’t get a single order.
It doesn’t help that I have no belt—it’s part of the uniform, but they don’t provide it, instead giving us a list of three approved shops to buy it from. Considering my net worth is hovering just under five dollars at the moment, I’m belt-less, already breaking the rules on night fucking one.
I need this job. I need these tips. I need to check on my mom—I brought her tonight, against my better judgment, but she’s out on the floor playing penny slots while I’m socked away in the high roller room. I don’t want her getting angry drunk or kicked out of the casino when I’m the idiot that brought her. I also don’t want to have to waste hours in the streets of Vegas once my shift ends trying to find her.
Vegas was my idea, though I’m already regretting it.
We’ve been here less than a week, and I knew there’d be trade-offs—we came from some middle-of-nowhere town in southern Utah, where we were staying with some trucker who picked Mom up when she was hooking outside of Duluth once. He was okay enough with me tagging along, so long as I stayed quiet and didn’t disrupt his ‘special’ times with my mom. She was getting paid, which meant she had enough for liquor, pills, and a few hands of cards. Turns out, those things are hard to come by in southern Utah, land of the Mormons. So are jobs. I’m the one who begged on corners until I’d scrounged enough for two tickets to Sin City, land of every single vice that could actually kill my mother, but also land of opportunity when it comes to work. Service jobs and, if you’re lucky enough, big tips.
I didn’t think I’d get this gig—I went to the job fair on Monday expecting to become a bus boy or dish washer, and I was fine with that. All the casinos were there, taking resumes from losers like me who feel lucky to get minimum wage. The sea of lowlifes was mixed with a few sharks though—men with shiny hair in suits who looked at you a little too long and made you feel a little too squirmy. That’s how Mr. Castillejo found me—I looked down at his shiny leather shoes and he gripped my arm and pulled me from the line I was waiting in, asking me how I’d like to make the big bucks rather than getting my “pretty little hands” all dirty.
I know why I got pulled. I have so little on this planet—a deadbeat mom, a backpack that holds all my worldly possessions, and not even a high school diploma to my name—that my looks are just about the only favor I think I could claim from a higher power. I don’t even think I look that good. Or at least, not good in the ways I’d like to. I have curly black hair, pale skin, and these big eyes that make me look eight rather than eighteen. I’m skinny and short—homelessness is the greatest diet plan—and I look gawky. Young.
Mr. Castillejo grabbed me to be eye candy. Something pretty for the perverts to look at while they stand next to their wives, who also look at me in a strangely predatory way. I got all of one day to train, cramming in my certifications and turning beet red while Mr. Castillejo drilled it into me and three other pretty boys that we are to accommodate our guest’s needs in whatever ways necessary.
He gave us a long look then, and we all traded glances, as though asking, you heard that too?
Yeah, I heard that.
Sure, I don’t have to wash dishes, and sure, the tips are amazing, but I’m supposed to let grimy old men grope me for the privilege.
I don’t even have the benefit of any of my training cohort being here tonight—they all get an extra day of training, but I was so eager to work so I could get the free meal that comes with my shift that I jumped in to cover somebody’s cancellation. Stupid move on my part—maybe I’d have actually learned enough to not be making a total dunce of myself.
“James!” I turn and find Amanda, another one of the servers, waving me over. I hurry to her, ducking my shoulders and trying to stay out of people’s way.
“What’s up?” I ask.
Amanda has been my godsend tonight—she tucked my shirt in, snuck me an extra meal when she heard my stomach grumble after I arrived, and she’s handed some of her orders to me so it looks like I’m actually working.
“Mr. Hobart has requested you specifically,” Amanda says to me, voice low as she nods at some man sitting at one of the poker tables. The minimum bid is $5,000. The man is big—like, huge. Some of it muscle, most of it fat. He’s laughing at something that the dealer said, and he has a mountain of chips in front of him. Resentment bubbles in my chest—I’ll be counting myself lucky if I can afford a $100 motel room, a $5 load of laundry, and a value combo from McDonald’s, and he’s sitting on enough to cover a hundred times that.
“Uhh, what do I do?” I ask.
“First, take his drink order. Flirt with him a bit, smile, act shy—you don’t need any help there,” Amanda chuckles. “He’ll want you to pull up a chair and sit next to him. Laugh at his jokes, pretend he’s funny, give him a little massage for good luck, whatever. It’s easily a two- or three-hundred-dollar tip you’re looking at, just need to make him feel a little special.”
I swallow nervously. “I dunno,” I hesitate, scanning the floor until I see Mr. Castillejo glaring at me. He had to offer a voucher for a free night at the hotel to the guy I spilled on earlier, and while he didn’t tell me it’ll come out of my pay, I’m fairly certain it’s only because he doesn’t plan on keeping me around long enough for me to even earn that much. God knows I don’t have it in savings.
“Look, if you’re pleasing a guest, Castillejo will stay off your ass. Easy way to ease into things. Here, take this tray, head over to him, introduce yourself, and you’re golden.” Amanda grips my shoulders, turns me so I’m facing Mr. Hobart, and gives me a little shove. I trip over my feet, stumbling a little, flushing scarlet as I recover and look around. People saw—of course they saw. I feel like an ugly duckling in a sea of swans.
I head over to Mr. Hobart, waiting until the dealer has passed him to bend near his ear. “Hi there, Mr. Hobart,” I try to make my voice sound a little seductive and only end up sounding like a fool. “Can I get you a refreshment?”
“Hello beautiful boy,” Mr. Hobart turns to me. His skin is ruddy, his dishwater blonde hair greased like so many others in the room. He smells of musky, nasty cologne, and the way his eyes drag over my body makes me feel dirty. “What’s your name?”
“James,” I answer politely.
“Well, you are very refreshing indeed. Why don’t you get me an old fashioned, Michter’s 25. Make it a double. And then bring your pretty little self over here—I need a good luck charm.”
I grit my teeth—I’m no stranger to the notion of ‘good luck’. My mom believes in the stuff with a foolhardy hope that makes me want to scream sometimes. She tries to be a good mom, all addictions aside, but if there’s one thing that can incense her enough to hit me, it’s when I accidentally mess with all the measures she takes for good luck. Matches crossed just so on the window sill, socks she can’t wash, cans of beer that aren’t allowed to be opened.
“Yes, Sir,” I say, trying to hide my reaction.
The bar is crowded and busy and I almost forget the bourbon he asked for—of course it’s one of the top-shelf bottles, the fanciest we’ve got in stock. I return to find he’s already arranged for a vacant seat next to him. He pats it when I set his drink down, then gives me a wink. I manage a frail smile and perch awkwardly.
His hand comes to the back of my neck and he squeezes. I hunch involuntarily, then try and force myself to relax into it—it’s just a squeeze, it doesn’t need to mean anything.
“Sit back,” he orders, dragging me backwards into the seat by his grip on my neck. I bite back my pitiful squeak, sitting fully in the chair. His hand drops from my neck, coming to rest on my knee. Inner thigh, really. “Pretty boy like yourself in this big casino,” Mr. Hobart mutters. “A good luck charm, walking around unclaimed. No more! Tonight, your good luck is all mine.” He shoots me a sleazy grin, and I can see one of his teeth is gold.
The deal goes around again, and he bets big, then loses.
“Because I didn’t rub for luck, right?” he murmurs conspiratorially in my ear. Then—like it’s no big deal—he drags his hand up my inner thigh, gripping my dick through my pants and squeezing. I squeak, slamming my thighs together and looking frantically around the table. “Come now,” he scolds gently, wrenching my knees apart. “Don’t be shy with me, James. I need all the luck I can get.”
He gives me one more squeeze—painful, mashing my balls together—and I shoot to my feet. “I have to use the restroom,” I say, voice shaky.
I don’t even make it halfway to the bathroom before Mr. Castillejo has my arm in a white-knuckled grip. “My office. Now.”
I have no choice but to obey—he’s crushing my bicep.
I think I’m going to cry—I’m barely two hours into my eight-hour shift, I’m willing to bet I won’t get paid a dime. If they demand the uniform back, all I have to change into are the soiled jeans and t-shirt I was at the job fair in. Mom ripped my only other shirt last week in a fit of rage after I recycled some empty bottles in the trucker’s apartment I wasn’t supposed to—she won a pull-tab for fifteen bucks while drinking them, apparently.
Mr. Castillejo drags me into the sterile white light of the employee-only hallways. His office is cramped and smells of cigarette smoke. Files are everywhere—I know they’re files on the high rollers we just left in the private lounge. The casino tracks everybody who spends money worth paying attention to.
I get slammed into a metal seat with bruising force, and then Mr. Castillejo is leaning against his desk in front of me. He isn’t a tall man, maybe five foot eight, but it’s still taller than my measly five two. I wonder sometimes, if I grew up able to eat any sort of regular meal whether I’d have ended up taller.
“Do you know who that man is?” Mr. Castillejo barks.
“Umm, M-Mr. Hobart?” I stutter. I will not cry in front of this man, I will not cry.
“Alfred Hobart, owner of Hobart Goods and Services, estimated net worth of four billion dollars, and tonight, he wants to shed some of that lovely cash in our casino. Do you know what your job is when we have a guest who wants to shed some of their billions of dollars in our casino, Justin?”
I don’t bother correcting him on my name—I’m literally wearing a nametag, two feet in front of him. He’s just making a shitty power play. The realization makes it a little easier to swallow my fear. “We serve them?” I ask, unsure if the edge in my voice is sarcasm or fear.
“Yes, we serve them. If they want you to take a seat, you sit. If they tell you to jump, you ask how high. Are you understanding me?”
I nod. “I’m sorry, Sir, he just, he touched me—”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass if he bends you over the table and starts fucking you right there!” Mr. Castillejo shouts. “It’s your job to fucking smile and take it!”
I blanche. I know why he picked me at the job fair—pretty face, skinny body, creepy old man’s wet dream, whatever. But the Vitale casino brand is a big one—I thought it would be reputable. Maybe not in private parties with the sheikhs and oil barons or whatever, but in the main rooms. Even the high roller ones. Clearly not.
“I’m sorry,” I mumble, not really sure if I mean it or not. These tips could be my ticket to a better life, sure, but I’m not sure that better life is worth selling my body for. I grew up watching my mom do it to keep us fed. The thought of doing it myself sickens me.
“’Sorry’ doesn’t bring in much cash,” Mr. Castillejo snorts. “If I send you back out there, are you capable of behaving?”
My stomach roils, coming dangerously close to upchucking the meal Amanda swiped for me.
Beggars can’t be choosers. The correct answer is yes. Yes, I will behave, yes, I will allow him to grope me, yes, I will shut up and know my place and not think my body is anything more than the commodity it was selected to be. I know the answer is yes, yet my throat closes on the word. Before I can force it out, a knock comes at the door.
“Busy!” Mr. Castillejo shouts.
The door cracks anyways, a mousy looking woman sticking her face in. “I’m so sorry, Sir, but the boss wants to speak to you.”
“Mr. Wright? Tell him he can wait.”
“No, er, the boss.”
Mr. Castillejo freezes. “Not Mr. Johnson?”
“Er, no.”
“Shit. Fuck. Fuck. Umm, ok, Justin, out of here, if I see you slip again, that’s it, ok?”
“Um,” the mousy lady cuts back in. “He wants to speak to both of you.”
Mr. Castillejo gives her a confused look.
She shrugs.
He shakes it off. “Of course. Of course. Does he want us in his suite, or—”
He doesn’t get a chance to finish his sentence before the mousy lady disappears and the door slams open, admitting a man who’s… different.
I thought that Mr. Castillejo had power, but with this new man in the room, I can see I was wrong. Where Castillejo is discount suits, cheap cologne, and beer-belly paunch, this man is silk and leather and wealth. His confidence is quiet, the entry slam of the door the loudest thing about him. He eats up the space, too big for it, even though he probably stands only an inch or two over six feet. When his gaze falls on me, I feel maybe two inches tall.
He's got dark brown hair, and it has none of the greasy combed-through gel that the posers in the high roller room had. It looks soft, with some salt and pepper around the temples. His eyes are hazel, narrowed under a deep-set brow. He looks like royalty.
We’re all silent for a moment before Mr. Castillejo jumps into action. “Mr. Carson! Sir! So lovely to see you! Apologies for the mess, as always, just busy ensuring a top-notch—”
“Enough.”
Castillejo shuts up. Behind Mr. Carson, I spot a hulking security guard. He’s in sunglasses. Indoors.
“What’s your name, boy?” Mr. Carson asks me.
Something inside me flips when he calls me boy, but I ignore it. This man is clearly very important, if he’s the boss of Mr. Castillejo’s boss’s boss, or whatever. “James, Sir,” I answer, ducking my head to avoid his gaze.
A long moment passes.
“Jamie.”
“Uh, just James, Sir.”
“Jamie.”
It isn’t a question. He didn’t misunderstand me. I’m Jamie now, I guess.
“How old are you, Jamie?”
“Eighteen, Sir. I have my license to serve liquor though, Sir.”
I swear I see him smirk a bit, but then it disappears.
“Where do you live, Jamie?”
I gulp. Saying I’m homeless feels like a one-way ticket to getting my ass fired. “I’m new in town,” I say softly. “We’re staying with a friend while we find a place.” It’s only a gentle stretch of the truth—mom can stay at the women’s shelter that’s only three bus stops from here, but I can’t. Sometimes I can crash in a fast-food joint if I look clean enough. In Vegas, things seem pretty 24/7, so I have high hopes that I won’t have to sleep outside often. The first few nights here, I found overpasses or alleyways. I’d prefer not to repeat those nights. The women’s shelter people are friendly enough—they give me little packets of soap and let me wash up in the restroom off the lobby area in the mornings when I pick mom up.
Mr. Carson narrows his eyes like he can tell I’m lying, but he doesn’t comment on it. “And who is ‘we’?”
“My mom and me,” I say.
“What does she do?”
“She’s been sick a lot. Once she’s better, she’s good at waitressing or cleaning and stuff,” I say. I feel bad—everything out of my mouth is lie after lie. Mom hasn’t held down a steady job since I was eight or nine. Since then it’s been hooking, gambling, stealing, or begging. I don’t know why Mr. Carson is asking these personal questions though, and I don’t plan on showing how pathetic my life is to some stranger who’ll forget about me in five minutes’ time.
“Did you finish high school?” he asks.
“Yes, Sir,” I lie easily. How would he check anyways? I dropped out after my sophomore year—I was already missing enough days as it was to take care of mom when she was hungover or in the middle of detoxing since she couldn’t afford her pills. No point bothering to pretend when it was easier just to get a job and try and keep us housed.
Mr. Carson smiles at me, something sharp in his eyes but soft in the set of his lips. “Tonight’s your first night working for me?” he asks.
I nod.
“Well, Jamie. I have confidence that you’ll learn the ropes quickly. I need to go make some hellos—get me a glass of Macallan 1937, then stay slightly behind me and to my right. Smile and greet those I introduce you to politely, but do not leave my side, and do not speak unless spoken to. Do you understand?”
“Sir, he’s very new,” Mr. Castillejo cuts in. I can’t be trusted to wait on this important man, clearly.
Mr. Carson levels Mr. Castillejo with a cold stare. “Thank you, Junior. Dismissed.”
Mr. Castillejo opens his mouth as though to protest, then slams it shut with an audible crack and shuffles out of the room. I look at Mr. Carson, eyes wide.
“I’d like that scotch now, Jamie.”
“Yes, Mr. Carson.” I leap to my feet, and he puts a hand on my shoulder. I shiver.
“’Sir’ will be fine for addressing me,” he corrects gently.
“Yes, Sir,” I gulp.
I get the glass of scotch and find him already on the floor in the high roller’s room. He accepts it and then gestures for me to fall behind him. I do, keeping my eyes on the floor. He talks to everybody, it feels like.
“And this is Jamie, our latest and greatest,” he introduces me a few times. I give polite smiles, shaking the occasional hand, not remembering a single name. Nobody pays much attention to me anyways—it feels like space clears around Mr. Carson as he traverses the room, everybody watching him. I’m in his orbit, but I might as well be invisible, a prop to the protagonist of the moment.
Amanda catches my eye at one point and mouths at me, “what the fuck?”, then looks pointedly at Mr. Carson. She clearly knows more about him than I do. I can only shrug.
“Alfred, old friend!” Mr. Carson booms out. I tense up as Mr. Hobart approaches us, sweating under the casino lights.
“Adam Carson! I see you’ve stolen my good luck charm,” Mr. Hobart’s eyes fix on me, and I cringe. I wish I could collapse in on myself entirely, be anywhere but here.
“Ah ah, Jamie here is all mine,” Mr. Carson’s hand comes to my neck, right where Mr. Hobart’s landed earlier. I freeze—it’s deliberate, I realize. He’s staking a claim on me. He knows this is where Hobart touched me, and he’s marking me as his instead. “There was a mix-up earlier on assignments, but he’ll be by my side from now on, isn’t that right, Jamie?”
“Y-yes, Sir,” I stutter. By his side?
“Lucky bastard,” Mr. Hobart chuckles. “You always do get the sexy little minxes.”
“Ah, such coarse language for such a special boy,” Mr. Carson chides. “Jamie is much more than his beautiful little body.”
I am?