Heaven Painted as a Poker Chip Read online

  Of course, she had never been dead before, but she didn’t think that had much to do with how she was feeling about Tommy at all.

  The sun was slowly starting to sink below the hills to the west, painting everything in the city and surrounding desert with shades of red and pink.

  The lights of the city were coming up. She was surprised at how really beautiful Las Vegas was. She had seen pictures of the lights, just never expected the beauty of it all.

  “I wonder what the view’s like up there,” Tommy said, pointing to the floating office. “With this sunset, it would be really something.”

  “Maybe someday we’ll find out,” Jewel said, “but it’s not bad right here.”

  He looked down at her and smiled. “Not bad at all.”

  And with that, she just had to kiss him.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TOMMY COULDN’T REMEMBER an evening he enjoyed as much. They had walked down a few flights of stairs to find someone waiting for the elevator, then rode down with them.

  Instead of hitchhiking inside a live person, they stayed along the edge of the hallway after leaving the elevator area and made it into a wonderfully smelling steak restaurant off to one side of the casino. There was nothing like the smell of steaks sizzling on an open grill mixed with the smell of freshly baked bread.

  He couldn’t believe how hungry he was and when they moved inside the restaurant and the smell hit Jewel, she said she was so hungry, she could eat a chair leg.

  “I think the steaks will be better,” he said. “Let me get us a table.”

  He moved over and touched the shoulder of one of the greeters named Tami who was seating people and marking off tables that were occupied on a big chart.

  He could see in her mind that she was a young woman working her way through college. She had a test in physics she really needed to study for tomorrow, so she hoped she would get off early tonight, even though she could use the money. And at the moment, she was mad at her boyfriend for not remembering their third month anniversary.

  Tommy planted the idea in her mind that a special table needed to be reserved for a few hours in case a special guest decided to show up.

  She moved over to the reservation board and crossed off a table Tommy could tell was off in the back, out of sight from the front area.

  Tommy nodded and moved back over to where Jewel waited, out of the traffic pattern.

  “Around the corner in the back,” he said.

  Then as a waiter set a bottle of white wine on a table nearby and opened it, Tommy took the ghost version of the bottle and they set off toward their table.

  Tommy set the bottle down on the cloth-covered table and they both turned to go back to the exit from the kitchen.

  The first waiter coming out had a tray of Caeser salads in large bowls, already mixed.

  Tommy pointed and Jewel nodded, so they both grabbed a ghost salad and headed back to the table.

  “This feels like a buffet,” Tommy said, sitting down and grabbing a fork and digging in.

  “It kind of does,” Jewel said, laughing, as she also dug in.

  About halfway through the fantastic salad, he looked up. “K.J. said the food would taste better, but this is crazy good.”

  “Better than that,” she said.

  They just ate, then went back to the exit from the kitchen and waited for a waiter carrying a tray of plates with steaks on them.

  They both grabbed a plate as he went by and went back to the table. Tommy grabbed a basket of fresh soft rolls from a table near his and Jewel scored them two glasses of water.

  For Tommy, the steak tasted so good, he didn’t want to stop eating long enough to even talk. And clearly Jewel felt the same way. Granted, it had been a long time since that breakfast in her cabin in Montana. But not that long, not long enough to make this medium-rare top sirloin and asparagus spears in butter taste so good.

  He cleaned his plate completely just a moment before Jewel did.

  “Think ghosts can get fat?” she asked.

  “With this incredible-tasting food,” he said, “I’d like to try.”

  “I’m going to have to go out for a run in the morning to work this off. I don’t ever remember eating like that.”

  “I sure don’t remember a steak tasting that good before.”

  They sat and sipped their wine, watching the people around them, and talking. Tommy was amazed at how easy it was for them to just talk about everything. They had only known each other for two days. Two very traumatic days, true, but he felt like he had already known her for years.

  After dinner, Tommy grabbed a basket of rolls and another bottle of open wine from a table they passed, then headed back to the elevators, again staying to the edge of the wall to avoid contact.

  Jewel got a blonde woman with a short skirt in the elevator to punch their floor, then when Jewel pulled back, she smiled at Tommy. “She’s a high-priced escort headed for a date with a regular customer and his wife. She likes them a lot.”

  Tommy just shook his head. “We’re not in Buffalo Jump, Montana, anymore, that’s for sure.”

  “Are you saying that kind of thing wouldn’t happen in Montana?” she asked, laughing.

  “Oh, I’m sure it does,” he said, “but not with someone who looks like that.”

  “From what I saw,” Jewel said, smiling, “the couple she is meeting are very attractive people as well.”

  He turned to her and held up the wine. “Are you saying we should go watch? Maybe even ride along with one of them in the process?”

  He laughed when she blushed and shook her head a little too quickly.

  It looked as if he had just found an area just a little beyond Jewel’s range of desires. If she asked him, he would have to admit, it was just outside his as well. But now that they were ghosts, it looked like they could sure watch others have sex if they wanted.

  And for some reason, sex was sure a lot more open now that he was a ghost and could see people’s thoughts. Amazing how many people thought about sex or had different sexual desires than they showed on the outside.

  And with Jewel, sex was a lot more fun as well.

  And over the next two hours, both in the big tub and in the bed, he had more fun with sex than he could remember ever having.

  Wow, what a first night in Las Vegas.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  THE NEXT MORNING, Jewel let Tommy sleep and showered and got dressed before waking him up with a long kiss. She loved how he felt, how he smelled, and how he kissed.

  “That was nice,” he said after she pulled back. “What time is it?”

  “About nine-thirty,” she said.

  “Wow, haven’t slept this late in a long time.”

  She laughed. “The life of a ghost isn’t bad, is it?”

  “Not at all,” he said, smiling and motioning for her to come back and join him in bed.

  “If I do that,” she said, we won’t get out of the room for hours.”

  “And that’s bad how?” he asked, smiling.

  She wanted to crawl back in bed with him, but she was also hungry and desperately needed to go for a run to clear her thoughts.

  “I’m going for a short run around some back streets,” she said. “How about I meet you in the buffet in thirty minutes. They will serve breakfast for another hour.”

  “Deal,” he said.

  She bent over and kissed him again, then pulled away, even though she didn’t want to, and headed for the door. The wine bottle and basket of rolls they had brought with them from the restaurant last night were gone from the coffee table in front of the couch. Clearly K.J. was right, if they didn’t touch something in a number of hours, it vanished.

  That meant never having to do dishes again. She was really starting to like this ghost living.

  She ran down four flights of stairs, going slow to get loosened up, checking at each floor to see if anyone was waiting for the elevator, but no one was until the fifth floor down. Somehow, in the small con
fines of the elevator, she managed to not touch the elderly couple who got on.

  There was an emergency exit near the elevators on the main floor and she went through that and out into the warm morning sun near some restaurant supply doors and dumpsters tucked in behind the building.

  The sun and warmth felt heavenly. She had been so cold all winter in Montana. Now this just felt perfect.

  And it was stunningly quiet. Inside the noise was a constant drumbeat from the casino and all the talking. But outside, even with the traffic sounds, it seemed almost silent.

  She headed down a side street lined with a construction area and palm trees, moving slowly at first, then finally striding at her normal pace. It felt great, perfectly normal.

  There weren’t many people on the sidewalks of the back streets behind the MGM Grand, so she had no trouble doing a quick mile into a residential area and then back, going in through the emergency door of the MGM near the restaurant.

  Inside the sounds of the casino hit her solidly again. She wound her way through the crowds, mostly moving at the same speed as everyone, and managed to get to the ornate buffet while brushing only one person, a young woman who was hung over and wasn’t sure she could eat.

  The poor woman didn’t remember much about last night and had woken up naked and wrapped in a blanket on a couch, not something that usually happened to her.

  Jewel was glad to see that the buffet was huge and mostly empty, so she took a table near the back, not one that anyone would likely want to sit at. On the way to the table she took an orange juice from one table that the person hadn’t yet touched and a glass of water from another.

  There was no sign of Tommy, but that didn’t surprise her. More than likely he had fallen back asleep.

  As she sat sipping on the orange juice, enjoying watching the few people that were in the restaurant, a man with a hotel security uniform on came in and started toward her.

  She was fairly certain she couldn’t be seen, but since it had only been a few days, the confidence wasn’t high.

  The security guard, a guy with a slight gut and a blue uniform walked straight at her. Then he stopped a few feet short and said, “Young lady, you know that taking ghost food robs the human person of necessary ghost nutrients vital to their health in the afterlife?”

  She jerked back, stunned that the guard could see her.

  The guy was smiling.

  Then it dawned on her what was happening. “Tommy, let that poor guy go.”

  Tommy stepped from the security guard smiling and came over and kissed her.

  The poor security guard blinked twice, then looked around, muttered something about needing to get more sleep, and headed back for the entrance.

  “Is that poor guy going to be all right?” Jewel asked.

  “He needs to lose about thirty pounds,” Tommy said, “and stop playing the horses, but otherwise, yes. I thought I’d test the ride-along and it works great.”

  “I could see that,” she said. Then she stood and said simply, “Food.”

  They both headed for the buffet to start off their second full day of being dead.

  Dead in Las Vegas. Beats the hell out of Buffalo Jump, Montana.

  TWENTY-NINE

  TOMMY HAD BEEN stunned how easy it was to get inside the security guard and just give him suggestions as to what to do and say and where to walk and he did it. And he knew that the guard would have no way of knowing he had been directed, or even what he did while directed.

  The guy just thought he had daydreamed and ended up in a strange place. Tommy had done that a few times himself and now he wondered if some ghost had been directing him.

  But K. J. was right. Having that ability to direct someone and not be seen was a very powerful weapon.

  After breakfasts, once again some of the best-tasting buffet food he had ever eaten, they went back up to their suite and Jewel changed from her running clothes into something more suited for the warm day ahead. They were both excited about testing some of their new powers and seeing Las Vegas at the same time.

  They had decided that their best bet was to get downtown and explore the Golden Nugget first, check out the entire area, then take a look around the rest of the town and some of the hotels on the Strip as well.

  And one of the keys was learning how to get around town easily. It seemed everyone in Las Vegas took cabs, so they headed out to stand out of the way near the MGM taxi stand, listening as people talked about where they were going.

  But after fifteen minutes of no one going downtown, Tommy knew that they were going to have to take a person into control to just get there.

  “Let’s see if we can both be in the same person,” Jewel said.

  “Might as well try that right here,” Tommy said. “Let me get in and in control, then you join me.”

  Jewel nodded.

  He looked for the richest-looking guy he could find so that the extra cab fare wouldn’t bother him.

  There was a guy standing off to one side of the departure area, wearing a silk suit that had clearly been tailored for him. He had dark, perfectly cut hair and seemed bored. He looked like a model or a romance hero standing there with a briefcase and a small carry-on leather bag.

  Tommy pointed to him.

  Jewel nodded and said, “Yummy.”

  Tommy just shook his head and went over and merged with the guy. It turned out, the guy wasn’t a model or a romance hero. But he was rich, and ran his own corporation that dealt with internet gaming and had his jet waiting for him at the airport to take him back to the San Francisco area after meetings here the last two days. His name was Rocky Manning

  Tommy had the guy motion in Jewel’s direction that she should join him and Jewel came over and merged with the guy as well.

  It felt like he and Jewel were suddenly in a small old phone booth, or a tiny broom closet. Only they both could see out of the guy’s eyes, feel what he was feeling, hear everything going on around him, and read his thoughts.

  “This is cozy,” Jewel said, pressing up against Tommy.

  “Now don’t start that in here,” Tommy said, laughing as she pressed her crotch against him and rubbed. “We’ll get this guy arrested.”

  “Spoilsport. So get us a cab,” Jewel said, putting one arm around Tommy and clearly settling in just to let him do the driving. Tommy had no idea how the two of them could fit inside a guy smaller than Tommy, but they clearly did.

  The guy had been waiting patiently for a limo to arrive to take him to the airport. Tommy got him to go over to the bellman and slip him twenty dollars. “Changed my mind, I need a cab.”

  The bellman nodded and within two minutes, they were inside a cab, the guy’s briefcase and bag on the seat beside them, and headed toward the Golden Nugget downtown.

  “Should we stay in here or spread out?” Jewel asked.

  “Let’s see if we can do this for a period of time comfortably,” Tommy said. “I think we need to test just about everything we can test.”

  “Fine by me,” Jewel said, again rubbing her crotch against Tommy.

  “Now see what you have done,” Tommy said, indicating to Jewel that their poor ride now had an erection.

  “Now isn’t that interesting,” Jewel said.

  Tommy could feel Jewel moving around in the guy’s mind.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Just remembering parts of my medical school and what parts of the brain do what,” Jewel said. “Figured it might come in handy like that pain thing we did to those two.”

  “Very good idea,” Tommy said.

  The guy they were riding in suddenly moaned softly and then to Tommy’s horror, had an orgasm in his pants.

  “Found that control just fine,” Jewel said, laughing.

  “The poor guy,” Tommy said. “He’s going to be mortified when he realizes what happened.”

  “Just plant a really good dream about his assistant he was with last night and when we leave, he’ll think that caused it.”r />
  “It does look like they had a great time in that hot tub,” he said, laughing. “And this morning in the shower. No wonder he was so relaxed waiting for his limo.”

  “Hang on,” Jewel said and Tommy could sense her worry and sudden panic. “What happened to the assistant? Where did she go after their shower this morning? Why wasn’t she going to be with him on the plane back. Can you access that information in his mind? I don’t see it.”

  “Wow,” Tommy said. “I don’t either. Her name is Annie Small and she has worked for him for six months.”

  Tommy had the guy pull out his cell phone and look at the numbers. Annie Small’s number was there. But when he dug a little deeper into the guy’s thoughts, Tommy also got a sense that a man named Monte was to take care of her.

  “What does “take care of mean?” Jewel asked, seeing the same thought.

  “This guy honestly doesn’t know or seem to worry about it at all,” Tommy said. And for Tommy, that worried him a lot.

  Tommy had the guy call Annie’s number.

  A moment later Annie answered, “Yes, Mr. Manning.”

  “Checking to make sure all was going well,” Tommy had the man say.

  “Perfectly, sir,” she said, clearly all business when outside the hotel room shower. “We are about to take off for Dallas. I’ll report back after the first meeting, sir.”

  “Thank you,” Miss Small,” Tommy had the guy say. “Safe trip.”

  And then Tommy had the guy hang up and put his phone back in his pocket.

  “So no wonder we couldn’t see her,” Jewel said. “She left before he got dressed and he wasn’t worried about her at all, so he gave her no thought at all. Good lesson there.”

  “I’ll give him a really good dream,” Tommy said, “to explain the mess in his pants, and a feeling that he needs to treat her better and think of her more often.”

  “Perfect,” Jewel said as the cab driver pulled into the Golden Nugget arrival area and Tommy had the guy hand the driver a hundred and say, “Keep the change.”