Wild Cards and Iron Horses by Sheryl Nantus

work with. He tucked the cards into his right hand, jamming them into formation between his fingers. Jon scowled as the cards shifted and fell to one side, exposing them. Without the little finger curling up, the rest of his hand had become unstable, unable to grip the cards as tightly as he needed to maintain control and keep them hidden. If there had been no brace, no exoskeleton pulling his finger back and forth, it wouldn’t have been an issue. He could waggle his pinky at the other players with a wink and a grin, drawling something in a thick London accent to annoy the Colonists.
    But because the wires and bars were so interconnected, so intimately woven together, it was impossible to have any one digit malfunction without the others suffering a lack of stability. It was a design flaw no one had ever anticipated, because no one had ever worried about playing professional poker and having a finger-brace malfunction.
    Spilling cards onto the table during a casual game didn’t usually matter. Polite eyes would dart to one side while the embarrassed player gathered them up. But at this level of competition any flaw, any mistake, could give the entire game away. It was one thing to draw attention because of a disability, another to shake like a child, unable to hold the cards out of sight. He reshuffled and dealt another five cards to the tabletop, studying them.
    Fifty-two cards to a deck. Four suits. Thirteen cards to a suit. Full house, straight, flush, one pair, two pairs, royal flush, four of a kind, three of a kind. Jon scooped the cards up and shuffled them again before putting them in the small wooden box and repacking it in the suitcase.
    He buttoned up his shirt and then picked up the gloves, pulling them back on over his bare hands. His stomach growled, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten anything since a sandwich bought on the train, and that hadn’t been all that edible. Hopefully Mrs. McGuire’s cooking was as good as she claimed. Pulling the waistcoat and jacket back on, he checked his hair. Relatively presentable, if he did say so. He’d had his fair share of coy glances from women, usually a wink and a giggle and a nod towards a shadowed doorway. But that was in the past, before he’d found a more important use of his time. He opened the door and headed downstairs, following the succulent aromas drifting up to him.
    A brief hour later Jon sat back in his chair, suppressing a satisfied moan. If a man could die from being too happy, then he was halfway there.
    Dinner consisted of roast chicken that melted in his mouth, the skin exploding with seasonings he’d never even heard of before. Mashed potatoes and peas completed a trio of delicious food. The meal ended with hot fresh apple pie, the succulent slice bubbling with sprinkled cinnamon on the top. Patting his bulging stomach, Jon smiled at the woman sitting at the head of the table.
    “A finer dinner I don’t think I’ve ever had, ma’am.” He looked around the table. No one else had shown up, leaving him and Mrs. McGuire as the sole diners. Either the other residents had better offers or, as Jon suspected, the house rules may have been too strict for the wilder visitors to Prosperity Ridge.
    “Thank you.” She tucked a white wisp of hair behind one ear. “I apologize for the lack of dinner conversation. People seem to be too busy these days to sit and eat a proper meal without rambling on about something or someone. I’d rather eat and then talk afterwards.”

    He dabbed at the edge of his mouth with the cloth napkin. “I understand completely.” A nearly stripped chicken bone sat in the middle of his plate, tempting him with one last long string of white meat.
    “The pace of technology has us all running to catch up, it seems.”
    “Yes.” She fumbled with her fork and knife. “If I may enquire, Mr. Handleston…”
    Jon waited. He had a pretty good bet on what she was about to ask.
    “Why gambling? A fine man like yourself must