Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 145803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Vienna met his bet and raised. Daniel shook his head, chiding a new student. The river card was the nine of hearts. Daniel eyed her stack of chips and then went all in. There was a gasp of horror from the camera crew. She pushed her chips all in, calling him.
“Very brave, but maybe a little foolhardy of you,” Daniel said. “The hubris of the young.” He disclosed the pair of kings he had in the hole.
“Perhaps,” Vienna said, “I could occasionally be guilty of that, but not this time.” She turned over her queen and ten of hearts, revealing she had a straight flush.
Daniel stared down at the cards for a good forty seconds before the knowledge hit that she’d defeated him. Adrenaline poured into his body and he leapt up, knocking over his chair, revealing he still had the moves of the athlete he’d been reputed to be. He paced around behind the table while she took a slow sip of water, watching him carefully.
He returned to the table, picking up the chair and placing it very close to her. Daniel indicated that he wanted privacy. He removed the microphone on his lapel and the one on hers and then signaled for security to remove the media. He also indicated for the dealer to leave the room.
Vienna felt very vulnerable as most of the others filed out and she was left with Daniel and his security team, none of whom she trusted. The security team moved to the back of the room. That didn’t make her feel much better. She judged the distance to the door. She was much faster than most people gave her credit for. She ran every day and was in excellent shape. Still, he had a team in the room. There was only one of her.
She turned her attention to Daniel, even though a part of her mind worked on how best to survive if she should be attacked.
“In my lifetime, I saw one other man who could defeat me when we played, Vienna. He was brilliant at cards. He had a gift. No one could touch him. Playing the way you do is dangerous. Playing the way I do is dangerous. I learned to only play when it was necessary to keep the casino alive. I created a mystique around my winning. You’re beautiful and a woman. That’s becoming far more accepted now, but it is still resented, as you saw with Charles. If you believe players like Art or Leo are your friends, you’re very naïve. They will turn on you in a heartbeat. Charles is much more honest. More to the point, the fact that you’ll always win will eventually bring far too much attention to you.”
“What makes you believe I’ll always win?” Vienna countered, just as quietly.
“I’ve been playing cards since I was thirteen years old. Even younger, but seriously at thirteen. I never lost. Not once, unless I wanted to.”
That didn’t exactly give her an explanation for his belief.
“You just told me there was one man with a gift, someone brilliant at playing cards who defeated you every time,” Vienna was compelled to point out. A part of her wanted to play the man who had managed to defeat Daniel. Had he realized Daniel used his voice to aid him in winning? Was he immune to the hypnotic suggestions as she was?
The owner of the hotel leaned even closer, his gentlemanly demeanor giving way to a much more ruthless expression as a dark mask seemed to descend on his face. “He was found in the desert after three weeks of searching, buried up to his neck in the sand. He’d been tortured and then shot, both eyes gone. In his mouth were cards, the exact hand he managed to beat me with the last game we played.”
There was a hiss of malice in his voice. Venom. Vienna drew back to fix her gaze on him, trying to read him. He was very good at masking his expression, but that deep, bitter well of venom spewed like a volcano exploding out of him in spite of his discipline.
“Three aces and two jacks. I had three kings and two queens,” Daniel murmured, as if it mattered what the last hand had been.
“Naturally, the police investigated. They had to think you were involved,” Vienna stated. She would not be intimidated, even if what he said sounded like an outright threat.
“I had an ironclad alibi. The desert is full of dead bodies. That was nearly forty years ago. Corruption was still pretty rampant then. Not so much now.”
“And you aren’t threatening me in any way.”
“No, why would you think that? I’m trying to warn you. People kill for the kind of money you just won. If you prove to be a consistent winner, they start thinking you’re stealing the money from them. It was unfortunate that this event was televised. It wouldn’t have been had I thought for one moment that you could defeat me. You will have to be very, very careful when you play from here on out.”