Bet

Tension filled the air between them. Four virtues and three souls in the plot. If Blaze folded now, she would lose everything. Yet if she wasn't bluffing... Lois felt the sweat run down her skin, and knew Blaze could see it. The reporter was betting everything on a pair of eights.

Almost everything.

Blaze slid a chip forward that Lois hadn't seen before. It was like red gold, scarlet metal the same color of the devil's own skin. Lois raised an eyebrow in a question.

"I bet my soul," she said.

Lois swallowed. Her hand hovered over her own chips...not sure what she could offer to match the demon.

"Your soul will equal it," the demon said. Her pure white eyes were steady, giving away absolutely nothing.

The reporter felt a chip under her fingers. She stared down a disc of pure silver. She could see her own face in the mirror-like finish.

"Last chance," Blaze told her. "We trade...or you match my bet and we show our cards. What do you think the odds are?"

Her poise was perfect. Even the tip of her cock, hovering just above the level of the table, was absolutely still. Lois stared into a face that could have been carved from stone, no tell whatsoever.

But then if Blaze is so confident in herself...why was she putting her own soul on the line? Lois thought. Is it all an effort to get me to lose her soul in one fell swoop? Or is the demon really trying to out-bluff me.

A thought came to the reporter...and with the thought, action. She tossed the token representing her soul into the pile...and then with both hands shoved the rest of her chips into the middle of the table.

"I see you...and raise."

Whatever else anyone could ever say about Blaze, the devil did not even blink.

"You realize if you lose," she said. "Then I will own not only your body, but your soul? And that of all four of the missing women? You will have lost everything?"

"The way I see it," Lois said. "I stand to win everything. Will you put your body and soul on the line?"

Just then...the tiniest curl at the corners of the demon's mouth. It was like watching a statue smile, the immutable marble moving and then setting as if carved that way. Lois Lane's heart thumped against her chest, suddenly aware of how hard her nipples were. The pure white eyes seemed to stare straight through and into her, and the reporter had the sinking feeling that she was completely transparent, that the demon knew exactly what she was doing in pushing the reporter into this position. That somehow, regardless of the outcome of this hand, the devil had gotten exactly what she wanted.

"You are a rare opponent," Blaze pushed the chips forward. "However this ends, Lois, know that I have enjoyed playing with you."