The Poker King Returns novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: Pamela's Chair

Kray stopped halfway to the door and looked back at me.

"You don't play, Miss Guffey."

"I deal," I said. "I've dealt in this building since I was eighteen."

"Then you know a dealer isn't a player."

"I know a floor manager can sit wherever she likes in her own bar."

I laid both hands flat on the little table.

"My father owes you a note on the twenty-second," I said. "You'll get your answer across a table, from a Guffey."

"From him?" Kray nodded at Cade.

"From us."

The Meridian dealer reached for the deck, and I put my hand over his.

"Mine," I said.

He took his hand back.

Kray studied me for a moment longer than was polite.

"The Wren's floor manager at my table," he said. "How charming. Do try to keep up."

He left, and the tour director trailed after him with the envelope.

The Roost exploded behind me.

I didn't hear a word of it.

I stood up, and my knees finally gave out, and Bea caught my elbow.

"Kid, that was the stupidest thing I ever saw," she said.

"I know."

"I want it on a plaque."

At one in the morning the Wren was shut, and the poker room had gone dark except for the lamp over the old walnut oval.

I sat in the chair I had taken from Kray's table, which Bea had carried in for me.

Cade stood across from me with a laptop open on the felt.

He had not said a word since the Roost.

"I'm still angry," I said.

"I know."

"I'm going to be angry for a long time."

"I'll be here."

"Show me Kray," I said. "Everything."

He turned the laptop toward me.

It was a recording from the Meridian Club's last final, with Kray at the head of a long table and a crowd behind a rope.

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