The Poker King Returns novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: Heads Up, Again

The break was ten minutes, and Cade went through the kitchen doors.

I followed him.

He stood in the walk-in cooler with his forehead against the steel wall, breathing through his teeth.

The compressor hummed.

His hands were shaking, and he pressed them flat to the metal to stop them.

"I saw his face," he said. "When the ten came."

"I know."

"I was in the courtroom again. The one I didn't go to."

"You weren't."

"I was sitting in the empty chair I should have filled, and he was smiling at me."

I took his hands off the wall and held them.

They were cold as the steel.

"Look at me," I said.

He looked.

"You played for an hour like you wanted him comfortable. It worked. The woman from the Board is standing in my poker room.

"Then he smiled, and you stopped playing for us, and you started playing for you."

"Yes."

"Don't. Play for the room."

His throat moved.

"I can't see him anymore," he said. "I only see what he did."

"Then don't look at him," I said. "Look at his wrist."

He blinked.

"You saw it move before he raised."

"I saw it."

"When it moves, he knows what's coming. He's sure. When it doesn't, he's guessing, and a guessing Kray is just a man in a suit."

Cade stared at me.

The shaking in his hands slowed down.

"I'll be at the rail," I said. "When his wrist moves, I'll touch my ring.

"You fold. Every time. Let him have the little ones.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Poker King Returns from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.