The Perfect Setup

The third card was a six for Charlie, a deuce for Donna, a jack for Lari, a nine for Barbara's dead hand, and a ten for me. Jack-ten was higher than jack-four, so it was my bid. I decided to cut back and pushed five into the pot. Charlie and Lari immediately called and to my amazement, Donna also pushed five into the center.

I added another five on my hole card. Again everyone matched except Barbara, who had already folded. The final card for Charlie was a nine; Donna was a seven; Lari got another four; Barb a king; and I got another jack.

I now had two jacks and a ten showing. Without my slider joker as a hole card, I would have had two pair, jacks and tens. With it, I had a full house. Barbara had a ten and two nines in her hand. Lari had another jack showing in hers, as well as two fours. Charlie had basically nothing, but she did have both a four and a ten showing. I was fairly sure that the only way I could be in trouble was if Lari had both a four and a joker in the hole. That was highly unlikely, but so was me having a joker and a ten. I would have to risk a little to find out what was what.

"One Hundred," I said firmly and pushed a stack of chips into the center.

Charlie and Barbara immediately folded, but Lari pushed a stack of chips into the center and said, "Double it."

I looked at the stack of chips in front of each of the girls. Charlie had the biggest pile. Lari had what looked like about 175 still in front of her.

"And another hundred," I said as I pushed a stack into the center.

"Call" she answered. I could now easily count what she had left, seventy-one in chips.

I turned over the joker and the ten and Lari loudly said, "Damn! That's fuckin' unbelievable."

She then turned over a joker and a jack. She had a jacks over fours full house, which lost to my jacks over tens.

Charlie had the next deal. The hands weren't spectacular. Donna had a pair of tens and a six showing and took the bet up to thirty. Charlie had a pair of sixes and a jack showing. Both Barbara and I had jacks showing and Lari had one of the jokers, but none of us had anything, so we all folded. The best Charlie could have was a jack high full house if she had a jack and a joker in the hole, which wasn't real likely.

Charlie raised by ten and Donna sigh deeply. "I only have nine left," she said. "Can I call you short one and owe it if I lose?"

"Not on your ass," answered Charlie. "I'll let you call, but if you lose, your ass is mine for the rest of the weekend."

"Excuse me," I said, probably looking and sounding as surprised as I actually was. "Are you saying that if she loses, she's your slave for the rest of the weekend?"

"Damn right," Charlie answered. "Do you have a problem with that?"

"No," I said, trying to sound nonchalant. "Just clarifying the terms of the bet."

Donna bit her lower lip and pushed the rest of her chips into the center. "Call," she said.

When Charlie turned over a nine, Donna gave a sigh of relief. That was premature, however, because Charlie then turned over a Jack.

"No!" she cried as she turned over a ten and a nine. Both had two pair, but Charlie had jacks over sixes and Donna only had tens over sixes.

"Slave," Charlie said, "get us all some drinks."

Donna gathered up the glasses from the table and scurried over to the table by the fireplace to refill them.

"Isn't it her deal?" asked Barb.

"She's out from here on," said Lari. "No money, no deal. Give me the deck."

END OF CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

I decided to ride out the next couple of hands and folded with what could have been winners, but I was interested in the setup, not any individual pot. Lari won the next several hands, and surprisingly, or perhaps not so surprisingly, on the third hand later, Barb ended up short in a run up against Lari. "Can I call you three short and owe it to you if I lose?" she asked hopefully.

Lari just laughed and said "Same deal as Donna got. I'll accept the call, but if you go down, your ass is mine for a month."

"That's not the same deal Charlie gave Donna," Barb whined.

Lari answered, "Donna was only down one. You're down three." She gave a short laugh that sounded more like a snort and said, "Take it or leave it."

"I'll take it," answered Barb.

A moment later, she gave a slight shriek and a sigh as Lari turned over her hole cards showing a straight flush which beat Barbara's full house.

Now two of the women were out of the game. Charlie had about a grand. Lori had several hundred, and I had a little short of twelve hundred. It was time to set the hook on the setup.

"Barbara cried all over these cards," I said as I gathered them in to deal. "Anyone object to a new deck?"

"Go ahead," said Charlie and Lari in unison. I glanced at the price tags and selected the proper deck for three players. It was time to go for the kill.

I made a big show of shuffling and reshuffling deck, but as Maury had taught me, I was false shuffling and the deck remained in the needed order. I passed the deck to Lari, since Barb was a dummy, and she split the deck into two piles in front of me. I scooped the two halves into my hand and did the one-hand flip that put the bottom back on top. I now had the stacked deck ready to deal.

"Stakes are getting pretty high, and I'm ahead," I said as I held the deck ready to deal. "Maybe I should have Barb deal so you know that I'm not cheating."

"Barb's out of the game," Lari said angrily. "I'll deal for you."

I was sure that I could tell Barb to deal Charlie first as though I was dealing, but I wasn't sure about Lari. I was afraid that my plan might be totally screwed at the last minute, but she dealt the first card to my left as though I were dealing.

Charlie got an Ace, Lari a Queen, and I got a King.

Charlie bid ten. Lari called. I said, "Let's take it up five, just for fun."

Charlie and Lari called.

The second card was a hole card, and Charlie bid twenty-five. Lari and I called.

The third card was another Ace for Charlie, a Queen for Lari, and an Ace for me.

Charlie again bid twenty-five. Lari again called. This time, I raised her twenty-five and both she and Lari called.

Another hole card and another bid of twenty-five with two immediate calls. Then Charlie received a third Ace. Lari another Queen, and I got a jack. Now it was time to get down to some serious bidding. I knew that Charlie had two Kings in the hole for an Ace high full house. Lari had two Jacks for a Queen high full house. I had an Ace and a Ten for a Royal Flush.

Both Charlie and Lari would think they had a winning hand, especially against me. Charlie bid twenty. Lari called. I raised twenty-five, hoping that Charlie wouldn't call.

She didn't. "I'll raise that another fifty," she said as she pushed seventy-five chips into the center.

Lari's eyes widened fully as she realized that she would be five short of calling. She looked over at Charlie.

"Same deal you gave Barbara," said Charlie, "but for a year."

Lari drew a deep breath as she thought about it and then said quietly, "Call."

"I assume that transfers to me if I win?" I said, looking back and forth between the two of them.

"Of course," answered Charlie. "And since a slave can't have a slave, Barb would be part of the deal."

I hadn't expected that, but I hid my surprise and tried to say cheerfully, "Of course." Then I said, "But there may be more to it than that."

I said, "I raise 985," as I pushed all of my chips into the center. "That means I'm all in, but since the pot is now at $1525, you must only have 975 left, so you can't raise." I laughed slightly and added, "In fact, you can't even call."

I sat there and calmly looked her in the eyes.

Charlie laughed slightly. "I'll bet you want to make the same deal with me as I made with Lari, don't you?"

"Not exactly," I said quietly. "One year as my slave, plus your signature on the divorce papers as MY lawyer draws them up."

Charlie made a big show of checking her hole cards. "I'll see that and raise you," she answered.

"How?" I asked. "You're out of money."

"I put myself up as your slave for ten years," she said, looking me straight in the eyes, "against your balls and you being my slave for the same period."

I don't know that I would have risked my next move if there was any way that I could lose. "I raise you back," I said. "I'll put my prick in the pot against you as slave for life, and her..." pointing to Lari, " as my slave for a year."

"That would mean you would be my slave for life if I win?" she asked.

I nodded. Charlie smiled and said, "Call."

Lari suddenly said, "Wait! Before either of you turn over your cards, shouldn't we have that bet in writing? ... And we should have a video of you turning over your cards." She looked over at each of us, "That way the loser can't back out if things don't go his– or her– way."

"Good idea," said Charlie. "I have a contract writer on my tablet and there's a wireless printer over there on the desk."

I didn't think it was possible to type that fast on a tablet, but in moments Charlie had the document ready. "A lot of it is boiler plate," she said in a business-like tone as she pressed the print button.

"Go get the stuff out of the printer," she ordered Donna, and the naked girl scampered over to the desk and returned with two sheets of paper. Everything was there, including the slavery versus castration stakes. Actually, the wording in the contract was that I would be "surgically transformed into a eunuch." It was hard signing it after reading those words, but I wasn't really risking anything because I couldn't lose.

Lari handed her cellphone to Barbara and said, "The video is already running. Just don't fuck this up, or you will regret it."

I turned over my Royal Flush and smiled at Charlie, "Highest hand in the deck," I said. "I win."

"That would be true in standard poker," Charlie said starting to smile deeply herself. "But we are playing jokers wild." She then turned over her hole cards. Rather than the two kings I had set up in the stacked deck, she turned over two Jokers.

That wasn't possible! Both of those jokers should have been together at the bottom of the deck. Somehow Charlie was cheating! I know she was cheating! But how could I say that without admitting that I, myself, was also cheating?

"Five Aces beats a Royal Flush." Charlie said with an evil grin on her face.

I felt something sting me in the arm and looked over toward Barbara who was suddenly wide awake and sober. As I was fading out, I heard Charlie say, "Barb is a world class anesthesiologist. You're in good hands."

I woke up later in a hospital-style bed in the basement of the cabin. Donna was there wearing scrubs and a nurse's cap. There was an IV in my arm. I felt totally out of it, like I was on some heavy-duty pain pills.

"The third day will be the hardest," Donna said, "because the swelling might close the ureter where it comes through the skin."

When I heard that, I tried to reach between my legs to feel what was– or wasn't– there, but my hands were attached to the sides of the bed with surgical restraints.

"Can't have you pulling out an IV or any of the stitches before they heal," said Donna. "We'll release you in five days when everything is starting to heal up. But for now it's time for you to go back to sleep."

I saw her lean over the IV with something in her hands and I once again faded out.

END CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

Charlie didn't divorce me... She had me declared dead.

After the girls returned from the Christmas Club at their cabin– yes, Charlie and Lari actually owned the cabin– they reported me missing. They said that I had insisted on leaving the day of the blizzard even though they had all urged me to wait out the storm with them.

My SUV was found at the bottom of a canyon in the spring. It had burned after it rolled the thousand or so feet down the side of the mountain and crashed into the granite at the bottom of the ravine. My body was never found, but there was just enough DNA material left in the car to indicate that I must have been in it when it crashed and burned.

It was assumed that the animals had dragged away what little had been left of me during the spring thaw. The verdict was accidental death. The only real question the coroner's jury had was why I had decided to take the twisting path down the mountain from the back of the cabin rather than the highway which ran in front. The highway was cleared the day after the storm. The dirt road wasn't cleared until spring.

At first, Charlie kept me hidden away in the basement at our house. I thought of trying to escape, but where would I go and what would I do? Besides, I would rather be thought dead than have anyone know what I now was.

Doctor Sapperstein did a little more surgery– this time on my face, and once the hormone treatments had caused my beard to disappear and breasts to grow, Charlie introduced me as her new live-in, maid.

"Somebody has to do the cooking and cleaning," she would say to her friends, "and I was never any good at that sort of thing." She would then laugh and add, "Sometimes I think that was the only reason I married him in the first place."

Donna lives at the house with us now. She is a nurse at the hospital where Lari works. She has been Charlie's slave and lover since college. Mistress Charlie– as she insists her slaves call her– keeps her naked most of the time when no one is around. She also keeps me naked. Most nights, I end up having to service them both with my tongue... I don't have anything else. Charlie also likes to use a strap-on with Donna... or me... on a regular basis.

Lari and her slave Barbara come over to visit a lot. Often the four of them will play cards of one sort or another while I act as their naked waitress. Even without feminine clothing, with the hormone treatments and nothing to stick out from my pubic hair, even naked, it is difficult to tell that I am not a woman.

Charlie likes to host card parties for her friends and business acquaintances. Usually Lari is also there. I particularly remember one night when there were a dozen or so women over for the evening. Lari started the evening impressing them with card tricks. She would pull a card from the deck, put it in the middle and then flip it over on the top of the deck a moment later. She would also show her skill at shuffling and dealing– both properly and in slow motion to show how she could be cheating.

When they were properly impressed by her false shuffles and bottom deals, she explained, "I learned a lot of this while I worked my way through college and med school as a dealer at an underground casino. But most of it I learned from my father. He not only taught me how to deal from the bottom of the deck, but also how to slide cards off the top that I didn't want to deal."

She laughed, "That's a lot harder because you have to palm the card and hide it away for later." She looked over at me in my rather short maid's outfit as I served drinks and gave me a wide smile. She then turned back to the other ladies and said, "But I would never have the gazuubahs to do that to my friends."

I nearly dropped the serving tray when she said that. I suddenly realized who her father was. I also realized that it had indeed been the perfect setup from the very start. They had to have planned it for months, perhaps even years. And Maury was in on it from the very beginning. They worked their plan carefully and slowly maneuvered me into everything that happened. I did exactly as they expected, even down to having Lari, the well-trained card sharp, deal that final hand.

With the skill of a surgeon's hands, Lari had pulled the jokers from the bottom as she dealt and palmed the kings she should have given Charlie. I thought that there was no way that I could lose, but all along, there was no way that I could win. I wasn't the one pulling the strings. I was the sucker who had been set up to loose his gazuubahs.

As I look back on things, I have to admit that it truly was a perfect setup. And it went exactly as they had planned it. My gazuubahs are now gone. And I am the one who is literally getting it in the ass.

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END OF STORY

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