#but i do think i have PEM. maybe I should try really really hard anyways and see if it makes it worse or not :) haha!

[prairiesongserial]

3.12

Cody stared at Pem for a long moment, almost willing him to go back on what he’d said. Wondering if he’d misread the signal - but no, two taps on the side of the cup meant a bluff. Was Pem trying to tell him that he hadn’t been in control of his tells? Cody thought he’d kept his face carefully neutral, even relaxed, but maybe he’d been wrong. He couldn’t exactly see himself to know.

Maybe Pem was just calling him out first thing, so Jacquet and the others wouldn’t be able to imagine them collaborating in an elaborate cheating plan. That had to be it. He was taking Cody off guard so that Cody would actually look taken off guard, cementing the idea that they didn’t know each other, or have a way of communicating their rolls. He could even have been trying to get onto Nash and Cole’s good side, to form a sort of alliance with them against Cody.

Or maybe, a voice in Cody’s head that sounded too much like Ethan supplied, he’s stabbing you in the back.

“Well, go on then,” Cody said, raising an eyebrow at Pem. “Lift it up.”

Pem grinned even wider, and did so.

Cody didn’t have to look. He already knew what was under the cup. Cole and Nash didn’t, though, and he watched their expressions change from disbelief, to curious, to impressed. If Pem was trying to get them on his side, so to speak, he was doing a good job of it.

“Ms. Cole loses a life,” Jacquet announced, impartially. “Mr. Pemberly will re-roll the dice, and continue the round.”

Cole hummed, flipping her life die over so that the five faced upwards. She didn’t seem to mind being a casualty of Cody’s lie - though, Cody supposed, five lives still gave her a lot of chances to win. At least she wasn’t sour about it.

“Before the round continues, would any of the players like to increase their bet?” Jacquet asked, looking around at the rest of the table. Nash and Cole shared a look, Cody noticed, but neither of them moved to put down any more chips. Neither did Pem.

“I will,” Cody said suddenly, grabbing two chips out of his pocket and slapping them down onto the stack of three chips he’d already started into the pot. If Pem wanted to do surprises - well, Cody would show him surprises.

“Well, alright, then,” Nash said cheerfully, digging up two more chips of his own before anyone could protest. Cole smiled and did the same.

Pem blinked briefly, looking confused for only half a second before moving two chips into the center. His grin was strained around the edges. That was a look Cody knew well. It was the same look Ethan had when he sensed a plan was about to go off the rails. Hopefully Pem would get back on track after this. Cody wanted to stick to the plan, wanted to cheat La Salle, but he could only do it if Pem was on his side. And they couldn’t read each others’ minds, so there was no way for each of them to know for sure what the other was thinking. All they could do was stick to the signals they’d set up beforehand.

“Very well,” Jacquet said. “Mr. Pemberley, if you please?”

Pem nodded, and rolled the dice, lifting the cup to look at them.

“Thirty-two,” he said, putting the cup back down, and passing it to Nash.

Nash didn’t waste much time in re-rolling the dice. Maybe he didn’t trust Pem, or maybe he was hoping for something bigger than a thirty-two. Or maybe neither of those, because he didn’t look under the cup before he passed it on to Cody.

“Thirty-three,” he said, cheerfully, as though daring Cody to call his bluff. “If you don’t mind me askin’, since you asked about Miss Cole’s eye, how’d you lose the fingers, Mr. Allison? Those cuts look awful fresh.”

Cody wondered briefly how forthcoming he should be about being pursued by Ethan, barely even looking at the cup of dice. Cole and Nash were definitely strangers, or else they would’ve recognized him on sight, but there was always the chance that they worked with another gang that was friendly with the Dead-Eyes. Most gangs were, because of the big central group the Dead-Eyes had bought into. Hemisphere, or whatever it was called.

“I owed money to a gang, and didn’t pay ‘em quick enough,” he settled on, still trying to decide what to do about the dice. Nash let out a low whistle.

“How much money?”

“Ten thousand pieces of Oregon silver,” Cody said, his tone unchanging.

He could feel the rest of the table’s eyes on him, very suddenly, and ignored it, re-rolling the dice under the cup. He didn’t look at them. He was going to have to match Nash’s roll or go higher, anyway, so it was better not to know if he was lying. Unfortunately, since doubles were the highest rolls you could get in Mia, there were only so many rolls higher than a thirty-three.

“Forty-four,” he said, quickly passing the cup to Cole. Hopefully she’d reroll, and be forced to go higher, or just match his bluff.

“What’d you do, to owe a gang that much?” she asked, looking at him with something resembling sympathy. Cody looked down at the table instead, fidgeting with his life die.

“I just borrowed it,” he said.

“But why?” Cole asked.

“My sister was sick,” he said, glancing up to meet her eyes again. He could feel his cheeks burning - this hadn’t been what he wanted to talk about. But he hadn’t gotten the chance to talk about any of this, not even to John, and it felt apt to spill out of him anyway if he didn’t let it. Being able to put what had happened to him in words, after weeks of stumbling around in a haze of pain - it was almost a novelty. There was a sense of relief in knowing that he was alive to tell the story. Even if he was telling the story to strangers. Even if the strangers were people he was supposed to be hustling.

“It’s some family illness,” Cody went on. Cole’s question had practically begged for him to justify himself. He drummed his fingers on the table, unsure if the nerves were from the game, from telling this story, or both. “My dad had it, and he died from it. There’s nothin’ in Oregon that can help it, not for very long, so I had to get the money to send her to Canada. My friend’s the head of a gang, so I borrowed from him.”

Canada had better technology, better doctors - it was practically a hundred years in the future, compared to the States. Everyone knew that. Cole pursed her lips, some sort of understanding sparking in her eyes, and re-rolled the dice.

“Fifty-five,” she said, glancing under the cup. That was ballsy.

“Sounds like your friend ain’t really your friend anymore,” Pem commented, taking the cup from Cole. Like everyone else at the table, he looked interested in Cody’s story. Superficially, at least.

“I’ve never heard of a gang takin’ fingers on a first offense, even for that much money,” Nash said. He looked a little put off by the thought, but also a little fascinated. “It ain’t right. Especially if the boss is your friend, yeah?”

“I told him he could take my fingers, if I didn’t pay him back,” Cody said, with a dry laugh. He seemed to recall admitting that to John, too, but he’d been in and out of consciousness so often that it was hard to tell if the memory was real. “I guess he took it too seriously. He’s always been kinda dramatic.”

“Still,” Nash said, shaking his head ,“it ain’t right.”

He had a point, Cody realized, quite suddenly. What Ethan had done - it wasn’t right, even if Cody had been the one to suggest it in the first place. The idea was almost a novelty, maybe because no one had told him in such plain, certain words that what had been done to him was wrong.

“I guess,” he mumbled.

“Is that why you’re here?” Cole asked. “Getting the money to pay your debt?”

“It’s your turn, Mr. Pemberley,” Jacquet interjected, but the table largely ignored them.

“Hell, no,” Cody said. The idea was so far-flung that he almost laughed. “I’m on the run, now.”

He had to win John back before they could be properly on the run again, but Cole and Nash didn’t need to know that part. If they knew there was someone in the building Cody was trying to win back, if they knew how desperate he actually was, they’d use it against him. They may have been friendly, but everyone around the table was still playing the game.

“Where’ll you run to?” Cole asked.

It was a decent question, one Cody hadn’t thought about, nor one he’d talked about with John. He knew they were going to the Mississippi, but after that, it was anyone’s guess. Hopefully Ethan wouldn’t even bother chasing them that far. But Cody knew Ethan - when he wanted something, he was like a wolf with a dead animal locked in its jaws. He wasn’t apt to let go anytime soon.

“Out East,” he said, with a shrug. “Hopin’ a gang from Oregon won’t bother goin’ that far just for one guy who owes ‘em money. I guess we’ll see.”

“Well, good luck with your little road trip, Mr. Allison,” Nash said, apparently genuine. “I hope you don’t think we’re about to go easy on you, even so.”

“Never,” Cody said, managing a genuine grin at Nash.

“Mr. Pemberley,” Jacquet said, a little pleadingly, trying to get the game back on track. “Please make your move.”

“Oh, all right,” Pem said, with a theatrical sigh. He leveled a finger at Cole. “You know what I think? You’re bluffin’.”

“Again?” Cole asked, with feigned surprise. “I don’t see why you’d accuse me. I didn’t even rely on Mr. Allison’s roll this time. I rolled my own dice and everything.”

“I still think you’re a liar,” Pem said, and wasted no time in pulling the cup up from the table, to prove it.

Only, he didn’t. The dice on the table each showed a five, facing upwards - a fifty-five, just like Cole had said. The same trick Pem had beaten her with in the practice round. Cody watched her carefully, and saw a smile curling over her lips.

“I believe that’s what they call a taste of your own medicine, Mr. Pemberley,” she said, and Nash laughed.

3.11 || 3.13

#story