A Well-Played Hand
by Jacob Graysol
Euphoria, finally,
at 4 a.m. After concealing all signs of emotion for seven hours, Warren ran
upstairs, turned on his wife’s nightstand lamp, and shook her.
“Wh—what?”
Angela sputtered.
“I won the Eastern
Online Pokerama, Queens and sevens against Jacks and sevens. That’s a free
buy-in to the Borgata Winter Open. Three-million-dollar pot.”
She sprang up in
bed. “You won three million dollars?”
He stroked her
cheek. “No, babe. I’m sorry. That’s the Borgata prize pool. But any top-ten finish
nets six figures, and now I don’t have to pay to enter.”
“The payoff’s
always later.”
“That’s the
tournament I wanted most. It’s right before our fifth anniversary. We can make a
week of it, in Atlantic City.”
“AC in winter?”
She flopped down under the blanket. “Push my alarm back fifteen minutes, and
we’ll talk about it after work.”
Warren kissed the
top of her head. Angela’s excitement when she thought he’d struck it rich, the
dimples and the brown eyes wide as quarters—all he really wanted was to get
that back in their lives. “I’ll hit it big,” he whispered. “You’ll see.”
#
At lunchtime, Angela
griped to her friends about Warren all the way to Awesome Wok. When they were
brought to a table, Angela sat and pushed the fourth place setting toward the hostess,
then waved her away. “We don’t need menus.”
Soon a young waiter
poured tea, and they each ordered a Combination Lunch from memory. “And a mai
tai for me,” Angela said. “Three cherries on the stick, not the sour fruit.”
She looked at the others, who held up their hands.
After the waiter
left, Angela continued her rant. “Whatever last night was supposed to be, for
me it was the last straw. He’s becoming a poker-addicted curmudgeon.”
Missy shook her
head. “That’s no relationship for you. No fun … no life.”
“Yeah.” Angela
bit
her lip. “Do you think it’s my fault? I went for nice; I thought I could make
him more adventurous, draw him out of his shell—”
“Grow him a pair?”
Diana grinned.
“I guess,” Angela
replied. “It’s hard because I think he loves me the same as always.”
The waiter returned
with Angela’s drink in an umbrellaed clear tumbler. She took a sip and eyed
four muscular men being seated across the restaurant.
“Too tart?”
Missy
asked. “Angela?”
Angela realized
she’d been staring at one of the men, dark and handsome in a burgundy
button-down shirt. “Oh, the drink’s fine. I’m done venting about Warren, though.”
“Good,” Diana
said, “because I’ve been bursting to throw shade about that birthday celebration
for Cindy. Worst office party ever!”
Angela ate mindlessly,
half-in on a conversation about bitter punch and tasteless cake, watching the alluring
man command the attention of his tablemates without seeming to try. Another of
their foursome mostly moped and downed three shots before their appetizers
arrived. When her Adonis cracked a playful smile and juggled his flatware to
get his despairing colleague to laugh, she knew it was time to undo a button
and make an introduction.
#
In the three
months since Warren secured his entry to the Borgata Open, he’d joined dozens
of online chats, gleaning insights into the patterns of the top players he
might face. He’d also quizzed everyone who’d competed there, learning which pit
bosses were sticklers with the anti-stalling rules, which dealers were lax
about side conversations, and where to get smoothies late into the night.
It became his obsession,
and surprisingly, Angela didn’t mind. “It frees me for meditation classes after
my workouts,” she’d told him.
Then his neighbor Chet
came by, gathering signatures on a poster-sized get well card. “For Spencer
Berman, down the street. Horrible, stroking out at Fit Jim’s last night.”
Angela hadn’t said
a word about it.
Warren couldn’t
stop his pen from shaking.
He found the story
online. The ambulance had arrived at Angela’s gym twenty minutes after she would
have. After. She’d been sneaking away.
He jumped up and
knocked their wedding photos off the bookshelf. One landed faceup, and he raised
his foot over it. Then he took a deep breath and brought it back down to the
carpet, remembering all the money he’d won letting novices believe he was
falling for their bluffs. He wouldn’t confront Angela, he’d uncover the details
of her affair himself, strengthen his hand, then set the terms for ending their
marriage.
Or maybe take
first at Borgata and win her back still.
#
For four months
after charming Gabriel at Awesome Wok, Angela burned through cash—always
cash—as they drank together at dive bars and slept together at no-tell motels,
where their trysts would remain secret from their spouses and middle-class friends.
One night, in bed, Gabriel said, “I hate that you’re paying for everything,
draining your emergency fund.” He shook his head. “So stupid, guaranteeing my
nephew’s lease.”
She ran her
fingers through his hair. “The last thing you are is stupid. You were being generous,
helping your family. I mean, I wish he hadn’t left you holding the bag …”
“It blew my
credit. And now Old Man Flannery says he’d sell me the store for two hundred
thousand. Now, when nobody would lend me half that. If I could inventory that
place the way I want, the net would be incredible. We could get the life we
want.”
Angela’s eyes
widened. “We? You’re ready to leave Jennifer?”
“I love you, Angela.
My heart does say we should run away now. But my parents, splitting up over
money.” He looked down. “It weighed on everything. I can’t risk our
relationship souring like that.” He looked back up. “We can still keep doing this.”
“I want to be yours
every day. Warren’s crushing me.”
“I know. But
getting out of debt should come first.”
“Playing by the
rules is how I ended up with Warren.”
“We’ll have
forever together”—he bit his lip and looked down again—“eventually.”
Angela gently
lifted his chin. “There’s another way. A quick way that’ll solve your money
problems, too. Just tell me that us being together is everything, no limits.
Like I feel about you.”
“I do love you, so
I guess—”
She put a finger
on his lips. “No guessing. Nothing uncertain you might regret later.” She moved
in for a long kiss.
#
Gabriel’s message
to Angela the following Tuesday ended, I’ll be waiting. He’d
never asked her to leave work early before.
Room 2F was unlocked.
Gabriel hugged her, then handed her a yellow envelope.
“I can’t keep
anything Warren might find.”
Gabriel smiled. “I
think you’ll remember it.”
She pulled out a
card, an elderly man extending a bouquet of roses to a beaming woman of similar
age, black-and-white except for the red petals. “Aww!”
On the blank
interior, he’d written No Limits inside a heart. She held back a
tear.
“What you asked
last week,” he said.
“I know.” She
swallowed hard. “I know.” She embraced him, then basked in his warmth.
They eventually
showered and dressed. Gabriel said, “I take it you’re not planning an amicable divorce.”
“You’ve overheard
those barflies, seen how problems get fixed at Lucky’s: gripers come in with bulging
envelopes, Shawn takes them to that back room, and they come out empty-handed and
content. Violent boyfriends, cheating business partners … troubles eliminated. For
me, it’ll be inheriting enough so you can buy out Flannery.”
“If Warren’s
that rich,
why not just go legal, get your half from the divorce court, then buy up another
store?”
“There’s nothing
tangible
to halve. He’s been dumping all our money into poker.”
“You said …
If
he’s blown everything that you’d inherit …”
“It’s not gone,
but it’s all buy-ins to tournaments, nonrefundable entry fees. Nonrefundable,
unless he dies.”
Gabriel rubbed his
chin. “He only plays because he wins more than he pays in, right? Half those
tournament stakes would go to you.”
“You think he’d
keep winning if I were taking fifty percent? He’s confided about throwing hands
to advance his friends and getting paid off later. He’d relish making deals to leave
me broke. Taking him out is the only way.”
Gabriel nodded.
“If you’re sure, I’m sure. But the problem-solver at Lucky’s won’t be
cheap.”
Angela grabbed her
phone and scrolled to a photo of herself in a red cocktail dress, then enlarged
the bust
and showed it to Gabriel. “I can take care of that on my
lunch break tomorrow.”
#
The next day was
overcast, with wind whipping cigarette butts over the curb in front of Harry’s
Pawn For Bucks. Angela walked in and spread the ruby necklace that had been Warren’s
mother’s on the counter. Harry said, “I’m a busy man.” He had a newspaper on
his lap, and nobody else was in the store.
“Pardon me?”
“A rock that big,
a sharp-dressed lady like you, you’re going to take my quote and shop around.
It’s not like I get uptown buyers in here, you know? I can’t pay more than I
can possibly get.”
Angela glanced
about. “You come highly recommended.”
“Recommended? By
who?”
“No one who’d
use
their real name.”
He stared at her
for ten seconds, then nodded. He stepped to the cash register and pulled out a
gun.
Angela ducked
behind her side of the counter, keeping her hands up. “Don’t shoot! Please!”
He plunked the
pistol on the glass. “It’s okay, lady, you can get up. Just making sure you’re
not a cop.”
She took two deep breaths
and looked up through the display to make certain the gun was down, then stood
up. “What’s the matter with you?” She scooped up the necklace, then pointed at him.
“And drawing a gun on an undercover would just get you shot!”
“I was pretty sure
about you, before I did it.”
Angela shook her
head.
“Read it however
you want,” Harry said. “You can Uber yourself uptown, or you can settle down
and do business with someone who doesn’t leave anything to chance, who blanks
out when actual cops ask questions.”
She scowled, and
thought. She laid the necklace back on the counter. “I know it’s worth twenty
thousand.”
Harry pinched the
chain so when he lifted his hand, the ruby dangled above his palm. He squinted,
then pulled out a jeweler’s loupe and studied the oval. He put the necklace down
and stared at her for another ten seconds. “You don’t know what I’m going to
say, do you?”
“No. What?”
“Fake.”
She flushed and
snatched it back. “That’s impossible! It’s insured for twenty thousand. With a
real company, Travelers or Allstate.”
He shook his head.
“Maybe some other ruby you showed them, but not that glass.”
#
Warren was preregistering
online for the eight-o’clock tournament when Angela came home from work. She
walked into the den, lips pursed, eyebrows drawn down. Her right fist was
balled.
He asked, “What’s
wrong?”
“My ruby
necklace—your Mom’s—the setting had worked loose, and when I took it in, they
told me it was fake.” She tossed it onto the coffee table.
Of course I switched
the ruby. Moved some money and changed my passwords, too. But no way it worked
loose in a month…. String her along. “That’s
impossible. We had it appraised for insurance.”
“Warren, be
honest. If it’s our finances, I need to know.”
She’s preaching
honesty?
“I’m
telling the truth.”
He gazed at the necklace, stalling, thinking. “It looks the same. Are you certain?”
“I did a scratch test
myself. But it does look the same. Someone planned this out, carefully.”
She shopped it to
someone who knows gemstones. Why would she need five figures? “I guess anyone with a picture
of it … of you wearing it … could’ve—”
“No, Warren.
Matching it so closely and switching it out. When I’m not wearing it,
it’s in our bedroom.”
She’s up to something
worse than adultery. But what? “I’m calling the cops.”
Angela’s jaw
dropped. “It—it wasn’t you? Desperate for cash? For gambling?”
“Desperate? I’m
running hot. Even players who hold their own against me online crumble when
they face icy stares at live games. That’s why I’m not just letting our money linger
in the bank, like I’ve explained before.”
She looked away for
a moment. “Is there a reason to get the police involved?”
“Of course!
You’ve—we’ve—been robbed. Maybe insurance will pay for this. It had to have happened
after the appraisal, when the coverage kicked in.”
“What if they charge
us to appraise all my jewelry?”
“Maybe we should
check the rest.”
“Your mom’s
ruby
is really the only piece worth anything. I don’t think—”
“I’m going to
call.”
#
Bluffing had been harder
over the phone, but Warren needed to get to the bottom of Angela’s lies, so he made
sure the police would question them together. We’ve been robbed. It was a family
heirloom. We never let strangers wander the house.
Detective Corey Esposito
settled in across the kitchen table from them. He whistled when Angela showed
him the fake. “I see why you’d call. But it’s been”—he scrolled his tablet—“five
years since it was authenticated. Unless there’s a particular
suspect, it’s probably gone for good.”
“Maybe it happened
recently,” Warren said.
“Is there anyone
new in your lives you don’t trust?”
“No, but we really
want the ruby back. It was my mother’s.”
“Yes, you’ve
said.”
The detective strummed his fingers on the table. “Do either of you remember
anything over those five years that seems suspicious, even if it didn’t at the
time? Maybe a hotel returned it after a stay?”
Angela said, “I’ve
never lost it.”
Warren held up his
hands. “I’d remember panicking if she’d ever lost it.”
The detective looked
at Angela. “Is it usually on, like a wedding ring?”
“It’s usually
in my
jewelry box. I don’t wear it around the house, or to work.”
He nodded. “Your jewelry
box is in the bedroom, like most?”
“On my bureau,”
Angela
said. “We hid it in my closet a few times, like when a plumber’s coming
upstairs.”
“And no one goes
into the bedroom? No cleaning service.”
Angela shook her
head. “Puh-leeze!”
“Friends getting a
tour?”
Warren and Angela glanced
at each other and shrugged. “No,” Warren said.
Esposito pointed
at each of them. “Quick … Two newest friends?”
“Five Aces and Derrick
Hobson,” Warren blurted out.
Angela glanced
down and right, her guilty tell. “Samantha Gold and Rita … I’ve forgotten her
last name.”
The detective raised
an eyebrow.
“She’s new at
work, in Accounting. Sam’s also from work. Neither would’ve seen my necklace.”
He nodded and turned
to Warren. “Aces? And the other one?”
“Five Aces, online
poker handle. We side-chat about opponents who overplay their favorite hands. Derrick’s
another flextime web designer. We’ve had lunch, but he’s never been to the
house.”
The detective extended
an index finger to keep Angela silent. He asked Warren, “What led your wife to notice
the gem was loose?”
“It was … I
don’t
know.”
He lowered his
hand and looked at Angela.
“I was moving it to
get another necklace, and felt a little give.”
“Hmm.” He leaned
back. “Anything either of you want to discuss with me alone?”
“No,” they said,
Warren
immediately and Angela right after.
“A thief wouldn’t
want you to notice the switch right away, so they wouldn’t have been sloppy
with the setting, letting it work loose quickly. I’m not hopeful this happened
recently enough for us to catch anyone.”
Warren frowned. “You
won’t try anything?”
“I’ll check
if
we’ve come across a ruby like yours, we arrest thieves and fences—middlemen who
traffic hot gems. But short of that … well, your insurance company will know
you reported it stolen.”
Angela cast an angry
glance at Warren, and he glowered back at her.
The detective handed
a card to each of them. “The report will be ready in two weeks. Call if you
think of anything else before then.” He stood and left.
“Were you lying to
him?” Warren asked, pretending not to know.
“Of course not,
I’m the victim.”
“He thought you
were Pinocchio, those times he cocked his head a bit left.”
Angela shook her
head. “Maybe he wasn’t playing poker, Warren.”
#
Detective
Esposito’s report was ready to be picked up when promised. Warren brought it
home, and when he heard Angela pull into the garage, he sat at the
kitchen table behind papers he’d arranged.
Angela came in and
sat across from him. “What’s that hideous Impala doing in the driveway? You can
make out that it used to be a cab.” She looked over his papers.
“I guess I’m
feeling generous, considering I hold all the cards.”
“You won that
piece of crap in a poker game?”
“Not poker. I’m
playing life.”
“Warren, you’re
not making sense.”
“You know I’ve
loved you. Trusted you, too, until Spencer Berman’s stroke at your gym. Everyone
who was really there knew about it, but you said nothing.”
She made a quick
glance to the right. “That must’ve been that night I got my period early. I
went for raspberry leaf tea, for the cramps.”
“Hmm. That lie
might’ve worked if I’d confronted you about it then. Good thing I tracked your
car afterward with an AirTag instead. How about we both stick to the truth?”
“Warren … it
happened fast. Your nonstop playing was wearing on me. Even when you got
excited about poker, it just felt like lost time to me … lost life. And then I
met …” She closed her eyes for a moment. “I should’ve told you.”
“Save the sham
apology. I also know that cheating on me was only the beginning. That ruby
wasn’t loose.”
“It was you
who switched it!”
“Of course, after
I discovered the affair. Then your dishonest rant about the jeweler … it wasn’t
hard to figure out you’d tried to hock it. I just couldn’t narrow down why, until
you flubbed Esposito’s questions. Lying to the police like that, you had to be planning
the worst. You wanted money to have me killed!”
“No, Warren. I was
going to hire a lawyer, that’s all.”
“Liar!”
“It’s true!”
Warren picked up a
lighter with his right hand and flipped over a wallet-sized card with his left,
revealing Gabriel’s name and address on the registration for a 2018 Mazda.
“Loverboy confessed … under extreme duress.”
“How did you get that?
What did you do?”
“Nothing worse
than you were plotting for me.”
“Gabriel!” She
pulled her hand over her mouth.
Warren set the registration
card aflame. “There goes the only evidence that I ever had contact with him.”
Angela jumped up, brows
furrowed, cheeks flushed.
Warren pulled a
gun from his belt and pointed it at her chest. Projecting confidence was harder
now than when he’d practiced aiming at her portrait, but his hand was steady,
and he was sure he looked capable of anything. “Grieve later. We have to settle
up.”
“Settle up?”
“You broke my
heart, I’ve broken yours. So emotionally, we’re even.”
“This isn’t
a
game!”
“You started the
murder plots. Had to have it all, right? So, it’s only fair that I get the same—everything.”
“You won’t get
away with shooting me!”
Warren smirked. “I
don’t have to.” He slid papers across the table. “You’ll declare you’ve been
abusing me for three years, and that to avoid the embarrassment of a trial,
you’ve agreed to an uncontested divorce, all marital assets going to me. I’ve
crammed your personal effects into that jalopy and put five hundred dollars in
the glovebox.”
“How about I call
the cops about your stunt, and you rot in jail before you rot in hell!”
Warren huffed. “The
last thing you want is cops. You’ve been discreet with Gabriel, no giveaways on
our credit card statements or phone bills, so if his body isn’t found, you
shouldn’t be a suspect. Or even if the police do link you to him, there won’t
be any proof you were involved in his death. I’ll even vouch for you then—keep
you in the clear, so you won’t get scared and smear me.
“But … if you
don’t sign these papers and drive at least two states away, Detective Esposito
gets a tip and finds Gabriel’s body, savaged like a betrayed lover would, and
they start flashing his picture at all the sleazy hotels. It’ll look like you
suspected him about the ruby and blew a gasket. Esposito already thinks you’re
a liar, and I timed Gabriel’s death for when you didn’t have an alibi. Even if
it boils down to your word against mine, you’re forever the notorious lying
adulterer, whether you’re imprisoned or not. I think you should leave.”
She stared at Warren
for a full minute. “Screw you.” She pulled the papers close and signed.
He scanned the
signatures, then held out a car key. “I only got the one.”
She snatched the
key, grabbed two beers from the refrigerator, and stomped out the door.
Warren put the gun
on the table, walked to the sink, and splashed cold water on his face. He’d
been sleeping poorly, struggling to devise a better plan, a fantasy where Angela
would love him as before. He shook his head, then counted her lies. Lies from
before. Lies from today. Finally, he saw her as ugly, cruel. There wasn’t
really a marriage to salvage after all.
He stepped to his
side of the table, aimed the gun where her heart had been, and pulled the
trigger, hammer clicking on an empty chamber. He smiled and did it again and
again.
Then he scraped up
the ashes of the registration card he’d painstakingly forged. Greatest bluff
ever.
END
