chosenbylightning | You've gotta know when to hold 'em..

You've gotta know when to hold 'em..

Barry Allen's life hadn't exactly been on track since his mother's murder. After pleading with the police, social workers and anyone else who would listen to him for more than five minutes that his father was innocent, he realized it was a lost cause. Nobody believed him, and they sure as hell didn't believe his father.

So Henry went to prison and Barry went into the foster system.

He'd been out hustling cards the say the particle accelerator exploded, a bolt of lightning sending him into a coma for nearly a damn year.

Once he recovered, Barry fled Central City, fled the group of scientists that wanted to study him like some kind of lab rat. His speed took him to Starling and to Verdant, the best club in the city, owned by the Queen family.

Barry was damn good with cards, even before the lightning, he could make a decent living at Verdant and the job meant he wouldn't have to dodge the cops. It's boring work, but it keeps him in a decent apartment and plenty of beer.

He also keeps his eyes to himself which isn't easy considering the new manager is ridiculously attractive.

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He might keep an eye away from her, but Thea was keeping an eye on him. There was something funny going on with the infamous Mr. Allen, but she couldn't quite pin it down. For the last few months, behind her brother's back, she'd had another club behind the dance club. There were so many nooks and crannies in the club that she sometimes wondered whether Ollie had built it that way. Or at least had renovated it that way.

He was being smart, playing in games where he could fleece the other players and yet still give the house its due. But she could have sworn he was cheating and yet when she went to watch the video, she couldn't quite make anything out. There was sometimes a blur she attributed to a graphical glitch, but that was all. She'd have to make sure she had those cameras fixed.

In the meantime, she thought she'd see his moves in person. She left the front side of the club in the hands of a manager and picked a moment when there was an empty seat at the table Barry was using. "Deal me in," she said to the dealer, sliding a small stack of chips in front of herself. To the other players, she was just another woman, but she suspected that Barry knew exactly who she was.

Funny how she'd never noticed the spade on his neck before now. She knew the deftness of his hands, but she'd never noticed that.

Barry's table was normally full - he knew how to charm the players. It was a game he'd learned in foster care, tell people what they want to hear, flash a smile at the right moment. Manipulation. Keep everyone at arm's length. If they don't get close it doesn't hurt when they leave.

Because everyone leaves.

His sleeves are rolled up, tattoos just peeking beneath the edge of the fabric. Barry is joking with a server when the seat is suddenly filled. Thea Queen. His lips twitch. He calls for a fresh deck, shuffling the cards briskly. "You don't strike me as the gambling type."

"Then you obviously don't know me very well," she shot back, eyes never leaving his hands. She was determined to figure out what his game was. Maybe he wasn't cheating the house as he could have, but he was cheating and now it was a point of pride to figure out how. And maybe use it to her advantage. But first she had to figure out the trick.

She gestured around with a vague wave of her hand. "Would this be here if I weren't the gambling type?"

It wasn't as if this kind of thing was strictly legal. If she were caught, Laurel's dad would probably be very happy to put one of the Queen family away.

"But you seem like the type who needs proof, so why don't you play me and find out?"

Okay, two can play at this game. Barry gives her an easy smile as he starts working the deck. The pit bosses watched him close every time there was an allegation that he was skimming or fleecing the customers out of just a little too much and they hadn't caught him yet. "I just work here," an easy roll of his shoulder. "I don't make a point of getting to know anyone too well."

Especially the super-wealthy types that absolutely don't run in the same circles that he does. Thea may pride herself on living a little dangerously in running a gambling racket but she'd never make it in the Glades.

Deal and hit. Bet. Discard and draw. The flow of the game is quick and easy and Barry keeps his banter with the table up as the drinks are poured down the necks of his marks. He's a little more discreet this time, switching out cards, making sure an extra chip or two is added to his overall "tip" pile.

What the house doesn't know certainly makes sure that he can keep a roof over his head and food in his stomach.

They watched his hands, yes. And so had she, which was when she'd figured out that, while there was something going on, that wasn't the best place to look. No, Barry Allen was arrogant in his cheating. He might have been counting cards and figuring out which were the bests hands to bet on or - and she couldn't figure out how because she'd watched his hands until it was bordering on obsession - he could have been cheating by stacking the deck. But there was another way.

She played as normal, chatting with the table and not appearing to pay particular attention to Barry. But while she never looked directly at him, neither did she look directly away. He was always in her periphery. And that was how he caught him.

"A hundred and fifty," she said after a while. She reached over to his pile and deliberately pulled the chips that had been 'added' to it. Stacking them up in a pile next to the tip pile, she finally lifted her eyes to his. Idly, her finger stroked along the top of the stack.

"Not bad, but if your hands are this good, what are they doing cheating me at cards?"

And more importantly, how was he doing what he was doing? She'd seen the change of the stack, but never quite when he'd put the chips in. There was definitely something special about him.

Figures. She might have the chips but she also had no way to prove he was doing something a little off-book. "Everybody cheats, it's just a matter of with what and how."

A crooked grin. "A guy's gotta eat after all. I figured with all the money I rake in for this place the house isn't gonna miss a little extra here and there."

Edited 2017-05-23 13:18 (UTC)

She left both stacks in front of him. It wasn't about the money. It had started out that way and it would eventually get back to that, but first she wanted to know the how. And she wouldn't find out the how if she alienated him completely by taking the money that he'd 'earned'.

"Depends. The House might be more interested in using your talents for good, not evil. Ever think you could do more than cheat?" She flashed him a grin and then nodded at the dealer to start back up. "And don't worry. I'm not suggesting you because my personal masseuse."

She probably shouldn't have added that because now she was thinking it. She had always liked the bad boys. Well, maybe she could bring it up another time. That was pleasure and tonight was business.

"But if you're keen on making a buck your way, I can't stop you. But I can ban you. We may not be the only business in town, but we are the only one not likely to use the eye for an eye - or in this case, hand for a hand - mentality. I don't think you want to try what you're doing on one of the places run by the Triad."

The smile stays in place, but something behind his eyes shutters at the veiled threat. Barry continues to deal, to take hits and deal out cards. "See, that's the thing isn't it? Using me. Using what I can do. Kinda been the story of my life Ms. Queen." His lips set in a hard line. "Good and evil don't matter. Not after you spent enough years in the system. After a while it's all about survival."

There's a sudden burst of wind and by the time the cards, money and general chaos settles, Barry Allen is gone.

But there's a very good chance that one determined Thea Queen can find his cheap house down in the Glades before he leaves town.

She was out the door just as soon as her wits came back. She'd never seen anything like him and she wasn't exactly used to having novel experiences anymore. She already knew where he was saying and it was no effort at all to follow him, even if it did take her longer than it probably would have taken him. If he could keep it up as long as someone might normally run.

She could have knocked on the door, but she didn't want him running before she'd had a chance to have her say, so she bent down when she got to his door and very quietly picked the lock. She opened the door and eased inside, hearing vague noises in the bedroom that meant she'd caught him before he'd run out of town. She locked the door again and made her way through his apartment.

Barry was tossing clothes into a suitcase and she hid a smile.

"Mr. Allen. I'm afraid you made me into the bad guy back at the club. I was offering you a job, not a prison term."

Damn. He should have been faster, but he couldn't afford to use too much of his speed and wind up passed out somewhere. Barry is tearing into another protein bar as he flings his clothes into a bag. He has to go. He won't let himself be used and he can't stay, not if someone has figured out his secret.

Run. Don't get attached.

He turns with a frown, chewing and swallowing before shaking his head at her. "Most people are bad guys. What kind of job?"

"You have a really pessimistic view of humanity, don't you?" She glanced around and, for a moment, her expression softened and her heart hurt. This place reminded her of Roy's. Barry didn't, not exactly, but this place? It brought back all the wrong sorts of memories, too fond and too painful.

"Well, I was going to suggest you come work for me as a dealer. Who better to spot a con artist than one who's done a little conning in his time. But now...?" Now she wasn't sure what to suggest. Dealing cards would be a waste with what he could do. How could he even do what he did? She'd seen a lot over the last couple of years, but she'd never seen something like this.

Incredible. And frustrating. Those two words pretty much summed up one Barry Allen.

Instead of admitting that she wasn't sure what to do with him now, she continued, "Now it looks like you're running away. I don't work with cowards."

"Well not everybody gets to grow up like you," he bites out. "My Dad is in prison for killing my mom even though he's innocent. The one person who promised he'd come for me never did. So I got thrown into the foster system. You know what that's like in Central?" He rakes a hand through his hair, lost and upset and pissed at himself because no one should see him like this.

"They chew you up and spit you out. So yeah, I got a dim view of humanity because that's all there is out there."

"And I was working for you as a dealer, remember?"

"And my father and brother went and got themselves killed, never mind that Ollie took along his girlfriend's sister for the ride. Maybe he's back, but I spent five years thinking they were dead and being the sister of the dead, cheating playboy. And now that he's back, I found out that mom was conspiring with the man who tried to blow up the Glades. So, yeah. Go ahead and tell me that I grew up with a silver spoon, but don't assume my life was easy."

She folded her arms across her chest. She didn't want to play 'who had the worst life', but she hated when people assumed that she'd had everything handed to her. Maybe if her brother and father had never left on that yacht or maybe if her mother had never worked with Merlyn. But they had and she was just self-aware enough to know how screwed up it had made her and not enough to do anything about it.

"I mean a real job, not one where you think you have to steal from me to get enough money."

Barry's expression is decidedly unimpressed at her ranting about her life. Poor little rich girl, right? Not falling for it. There's a difference between dodging sketchy fosters and scrounging just to get by, stealing because you had to eat.

"It's not a question of enough money, it's a question of what you're wanting me to do." He had to steal to keep up with his spiraling food budget, never mind keeping up his charming little dump in the Glades.

She looked him up and down, purposefully making it seem as if she were studying a side of beef. She understood a lack of trust, but just what kind of person did he think she was? Here she was, trying to give him an opportunity, and he was suspecting her of...what? She wasn't even sure.

"You figured me out," she replied deadpan. "I'm running a brothel in addition to an illicit casino and I want you as my star attraction."

It was utter crap, of course, but she was half-expecting him to believe it and respond accordingly.

"Okay, we're done here." Barry shoves the last of his things into a bag, pausing to take a well worn paperback from the bed and tuck it into his pocket. "I don't blindly say yes to anything." Not anymore.

He shoulders past her, taking a picture from the kitchen. "Be sure to lock up. Or don't. Nobody will notice anyway."

"You've got to be kidding me." She watched him dubiously. He hadn't really taken her seriously, had he? "That was a joke in case you hadn't already figured it out. But I guess you don't have a sense of humor." She grabbed his arm. Now it had turned from interest into a matter of principle.

"Have I asked you to sign on any dotted line, yet? Am I threatening to blackmail you over what I know? Calling the cops? Or maybe you think the Arrow's a better choice. By all rights, I should have had you thrown out of the place as soon as I noticed you were skimming off the top. But you were the one who ran. I'm not suggesting you do something nefarious. It's not like I'm trying to abduct you so I can dissect you or something. I didn't even know what you could do before an hour ago."

She shrugged. "I still don't know how. And I'll admit I'm curious, but who wouldn't be? You want to know what I was offering? A permanent position instead of a pay-as-you-go kind of thing. If you want to be specific, I was thinking of something with security. Who better to weed out the con mans than a con man?"

She let go of his arm. "But if you want to keep running for the rest of your life..."

She's right. But Barry has spent most of his life on the run, even before the lightning and before losing nine months of his life to a coma. "Look. I've been in and out of the system since I was eleven, when my Dad was taken away for killing my Mom. I'm used to people calling the cops or finding other ways to get rid of me rather than deal with the problem."

A full time paying job. Something stable.
Barry can't remember the last time he'd been offered something like that.

He holds up his hand, vibrating it fast enough that it becomes a blur before her eyes. "It happened about a year ago. After the particle accelerator in Central blew."

Thea almost automatically reached out to touch the hand but pulled back at the last minute. It almost looked like she'd be able to put her hand through his when he did that and she wasn't sure she wanted to know what that felt like. She imagined it'd be like what movies said ghosts felt like: cold.

"I know a little something about losing a parent," she reminded him gently. Spoiled and rich she might have been, but her life wasn't free of its share of tragedy. Probably better that she didn't remind him of the other part of her parentage or let him in on the hidden part. The part she didn't admit to polite society because polite society thought him dead.

"Look, let's start again. All I thought when I noticed that stacks of chips were going missing was that you were conning me. And that I could use that talent against other people who tried to do that at my table." Her lips twisted into a wry grin. "I thought that talent was up here." She tapped her temple.

"I didn't guess about the..." She wiggled her fingers. "But can you really blame me for wanting to kill two birds with one stone? Stop losing money from your antics and stop losing money from other people doing what I thought was the same thing." Surely there weren't two people who could do...whatever he was doing.

Barry pulls his hand back when Thea's hand moves towards his and the vibrations stop. That sort of touching is dangerous as hell and while they didn't get off on the right foot, the last thing he wants to do is hurt her (or anyone) with his speed.

A shrug. "It's both," he defends. "I've been running cards since I got out of juvie."

A decent job. No more gaming the tables. "So, what, you'd want me to be a pit boss? Watch the tables?"

"You know more about what to look for than I do." Not quite true. She'd caught on that there was something about him that was off, after all, but there was catching one person once on mostly luck and knowing the ins and outs of the system and being able to sense general trends and what to watch out for. She didn't want to have to be stuck behind a monitor or even out on the floor. She had the rest of the club to run, after all, and it wouldn't look good if she spent all her time at the tables.

Especially since she was reasonably sure that Ollie hadn't caught on to what was going on in his back rooms.

The corner of her mouth lifted. "You sound like you got into as much trouble as I did." And her mother had always paid to get her out of it, just like she had when Ollie had gotten into trouble back in the day.

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You've gotta know when to hold 'em..

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