Axel is avoiding being alone with me. And it makes me feel like I did when Edith Piaf got run over. Wounded and abandoned. I like him even more than I realized and that bothers me. A lot.
The night, if the circumstances were different, would be really enjoyable. Frankie and Billy are a hoot together. They banter and bicker and challenge each other every five minutes. But they’re also incredibly handsy with each other and their chemistry radiates off them. Lucia and her boyfriend Nick are much the same. Only they’re a little less competitive with each other and they look at each other with a softness that feels like you’ve walked in on something intimate every time you notice it. It just makes me jealous. I’ve never shared a look like that with anyone.
And also, this whole thing makes me feel a little lonely. Because I know these couples hang out together all the time, and being this social is part of their working life. I’m always alone in my hotel room if I’m not partying with strangers in random bars. I don’t live like this during the season.
And a nagging part of my brain says they’re only here with me tonight because they’re Axel’s friends. I wouldn’t be invited otherwise. But still, it’s nice to hang out with them. We walk the strip, taking in the ridiculous sites and then we stop for dinner at Hell’s Kitchen. Lucia is obsessed with the raving lunatic of an English chef and her British boyfriend Nick rolls his eyes the whole time but indulges her.
The food is good. Axel sits across the long booth from me, so I can’t touch him, which annoys me. He seems perfectly fine—friendly and jovial. He engages me in conversation like nothing’s wrong, but somethingfeelsoff.
After dinner, we stop and play some slots at the casino in Caesars Palace, at Lucia's insistence. "Come on! When in Rome… get it?"
She twirls with her arms extended, referring to the Roman embellishments all around the casino hotel. Her boyfriend smirks at her. "You want to bankrupt yourself? These things are rigged."
“The whole casino is not rigged,” Billy replies. “But there’s a reason the world isn’t filled with blackjack millionaires or craps billionaires. Every casino game has a statistical probability against you winning.”
“Killjoy,” Frankie says and kisses his cheek before grabbing Lucia’s hand and traipsing through the loud machines and tables with the sharply dressed dealers.
Axel follows along before everyone else, and I get the distinct impression it's to keep his distance from me, not so much his excitement at gambling. Maybe I'm taking this all too personally but it's hard not to. I felt like we were… really liked each other the other night.
Billy stays back, walking beside me. He shakes his head at his girlfriend and his teammate Lucia. "Those two will probably win hundreds. They like to defy odds."
“Really?”
“Well, Lucia was the first female F1 driver in decades, before Sam,” Billy says and then winks at me. “And Frankie landed me, the hottest man in Australia who was sworn to a life of bachelorhood.”
I can’t help but laugh at that statement. I should have known it was coming with the wink he gave me. “What a lucky girl.”
"Yeah, I mean, you're pretty lucky to be snagging the second-hottest man in Australia," Billy counters.
“We both know that’s not exactly true,” I mutter as the girls settle in at two slot machines. One called Wheel of Fortune and the other called Speed Chaser, which features a car. Of course, Lucia plops herself down at that one.
“Slots, on average, have the worst winning ratio of all casino games,” Billy announces.
Lucia glares at Billy like he’s being super offensive but Frankie grabs the front of his shirt and pulls him in for a kiss as she says. “You’re much prettier when you’re quiet. Now give me a kiss for luck.”
Billy kisses her like she’s the only person on the planet. And he couldn’t be happier about it. I pull my eyes away before I puke rainbows or something. Their love is the kind that makes you lonely when you see it.
“You going to throw money down the toilet like my girl and her sister?” Nick asks as he comes to stand beside me.
“Nah. I was thinking maybe I would call it a night,” I reply casually. My eyes are purposely on Axel who is standing half a foot to the left of me, close enough that I can catch his body tense when I speak. He heard me.
“If gambling isn’t your thing, you’re welcome to grab a drink with me at the bar,” Nick offers.
Lucia hoots loudly, cutting into our conversation, and we all turn to see she's won a hundred dollars. She raises both arms in the air. "Yeah, bitches! Mama's buying new shoes."
What’s hysterical is that Lucia has a million-dollar contract and was born into money, so a hundred bucks is like ten to her but she’s clearly over the moon. Nick laughs at her and I turn to leave. I make it to the edge of the casino floor when a familiar touch lands on my shoulder.
“I don’t see the point in me being here, Axel,” I say without turning around. “You have fun with your friends. It’s cool. I will see you tomorrow.”
“Well, a pap followed us in here. He’s from the Daily Mail or The Guardian, maybe? Something British judging by the Marks and Spencer T-shirt,” Axel says and his mouth is so close to the shell of my ear that his breath tickles me. “He’ll wonder why you left and I stayed. And besides that, I wanted these people to be more than my friends. I wanted them to be yours, so why not stick around and see if that can happen?”
“I don’t need friends,” I mutter like a spiteful child.
“We all need friends, Gabe,” he whispers back.
He used Gabe. And he sounds so earnest. I am a sucker for authenticity. I close my eyes a beat and then turn around, heading back to the casino. I don't look at him, but I reach back, grab his hand, and take him with me to a slot machine a few feet from his friends. It's got a leprechaun on it and it's called Pot of Gold. I pull a crisp American fifty out of my wallet and push him down into the seat. As I feed the money into the machine I say, "You said you had no luck, prove it."
Axel laughs and tilts his head back to look up at me. His dark eyes dance and the smile on his face is breathtaking. My heart thumps a little harder in my chest. “You want to lose money, I can make that happen.”
