Page 82 of Scattered Glitter

I watch from a distance, taking in his rhythm. He’s good, but I’ve seen better. He’s got a small crowd gathered, tourists eager to try their luck, and I can already tell he’s fleecing them without breaking a sweat. Edging toward the outskirts of the group, I keep my eyes on his hands.

The Three-Card Monte is one of the oldest scams in the book. It’s a classic street hustle where the dealer shuffles three cards—two black, one red—making you bet on finding the queen. It looks simple, but that’s the point. A game like this isn’t built on sleight of hand alone, though his fingers are quick. It’s built on psychological pressure.

The setup is almost as old as the trick itself. Theoperator works with a team, even if you don’t see them, bystanders who appear as random players, hyping up the game, pretending to win. It’s all about planting the seed, building your confidence, making you thinkyoucan win. Every toss at the start? It’s straight. The queen lands exactly where you think it is. You watch them win over and over, and FOMO kicks in hard.

And then comes the real trick. The moment you place your money on the table, convinced you’ve got it figured out, the sleight of hand happens. A flick of the wrist, a twitch of a finger, and the queen is no longer where she’s supposed to be. Even if you know what to watch for, you can’t win. They condition you, then crush you, and they know the Dunning-Kruger effect will do the rest. That little voice in your head telling you you’re smarter than the hustler? That’s how they get you.

“Who’s next? Who thinks they can find the queen?” the dealer calls out confidently. A few tourists step forward, money in hand, but I hang back, watching his ploy. I can see his arrogance. He’s been pulling this same tired con for years, and no one’s ever called him on it. But I see it, the flick of his wrist when he switches the queen. His movements are fast but not perfect. The way his hand hovers a fraction longer over the switched card gives him away.

The tourists don’t notice, too focused on the chaos of the shuffle. One man steps forward with a grin and places a crisp hundred-dollar bill on the queen. The operator’s grin widens like a snake sensing prey.

“Bad move,” I mutter under my breath.

When the volunteering tourist loses, as he inevitably does, I step forward, a big smile playing on my lips. “Can I try, please?”

He looks me up and down, his grin widening. “Surething, sweetheart. Think your eyes are as good as they are pretty?”

I shrug, pulling out a small bill and placing it on the table. “I guess we’ll see.”

He starts shuffling the cards again, the queen moving between the two others, his hands a practiced dance, and the cards little more than flashes of white, black, and red. I watch carefully and notice where he does the swap, but I choose wrong on purpose. I need to figure out where he keeps his deck of cards and how the fuck I’m going to get the ace of hearts from him.

I assume Mr. Unknown doesn’t want me to simply ask him for it.

But I can’t fan the guy while he’s sitting like that, and there’s a table between us, so I’ll have to figure it out by only watching him.

The con artist flips the card, showing it’s one of the decoys, and the crowd chuckles. I laugh it off, pulling out another bill and placing it on the first on the table. “One more try?” I pout, and he obliges, shuffling the cards again.

I lose two more times, all the while pretending to be flustered. The dealer takes my money easily, flashing that cocky grin of his as he keeps up his smooth banter with the crowd.

My focus is on his jacket, and when he turns, I mark the silhouette of the deck on the inside pocket.

Gotcha.

Now to get close enough to take it without him realizing.

Before I can settle on a plan, he grabs my money from the table and pockets it with a flourish. “All right folks, show’s over!” he calls out with a satisfied grin. The crowd thins, some of the tourists dispersing with disappointment written on their faces.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“No,” I protest. “I want to try again!”

He pauses, turning back to me, clearly amused. “I’ll be back tomorrow if you want to give it another go.” He shakes his head, but there’s a greedy glint in his eye that tells me he likes an easy mark.

He reaches into his jacket, pulling out the deck, and I watch as he disperses the three cards we were using with the others. As he starts to shuffle, I catch the red flash of the ace of hearts within the cards.

Here goes nothing.

“I need my money back.”

There are still some tourists hanging around, and a few of them chuckle, but he only laughs at me dismissively. “You shouldn’t bet money you need, pretty girl.” He cuts the deck, making another dramatic shuffle, the cards flying from one hand to the other. The crowdoohsandaahsin admiration. He’s purely showboating now, his ego inflated by their attention and my desperation.

I pull out a hundred-dollar bill and slam it on the table in front of him. “If I can do what you just did, I want my fifteen dollars back,” I declare. “If I can’t, you get the hundred too.”

He looks taken aback for a second but then smirks at me, and I can almost feel the crowd leaning in closer to hear his response. “You think you can do that, huh?” He snorts, then places my crumpled fifteen dollars from my earlier perceived failures on top of the hundred. “All right. Let’s see what you’ve got.” He hands me the deck, shaking his head as if he knows how this is going to go.

I haven’t played with cards for eight years now, but after spending six months with Ace, I could do what he did in my sleep.

I take the cards, my fingers fumbling deliberately as I arrange them.

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