Page 89 of Holiday Home 3

“She’s entirely unfamiliar with that word,” Victoria said, glancing at the cards Avril dealt as their next round began.

Off-suited or not, Liam was more than willing to play aggressively with the ace and queen he peered at. There were only so many more papercuts Victoria’s dwindling supply of chips could handle before it collapsed from blood loss. Everyone at the table knew that, though only one of them knew that this might be the game's final round.

She made sure they all realized it sooner than later.

“Raise,” Victoria said, adding almost half of her remaining chips to the pot.

He wasted only a few seconds mulling things over before he pulled a handful of red chips off one of the now three stacks he possessed and tossed them into the pile. After burning the top card, Avril turned over the flop.

A Four of Diamonds, a Nine of Hearts, and… an Ace of Spades. From the outset, even if her mind remained as difficult to get into as Fort Knox, he’d had a sneaking suspicion that he hadn’t been the only one of them to see an Ace in their opening hand. Any real doubt about that vanished as Victoria calmly placed her hands behind her small stack of remaining chips and shoved them toward the middle of the table.

“All-in.”

The eyes of every other woman at the table, Avril included, widened. Just like that, only one person had any chips left in front of them. It could all end here. However, while everyone else reacted to Victoria’s gambit, Liam considered the possibilities.

It could have been a bluff, of course. Compared to the two women who had already been vanquished, he thought she’d already stretched an inch of yarn into a mile a couple of times, especially against Tess, who seemed as wary of her colleague as she was of him. If one thing had hobbled her more than anything else this round, it was her hesitance to swim with the sharks. Victoria had taken advantage of that fact a few times, he suspected. He knew he had.

But no, it was an ace. He was sure of it. There were fifty-two cards to a deck, and seven of them were currently in play. Three of those were aces. There was also that tiny chance she’d landed a pair of aces from the outset. If that ended up being the case, he’d wince at his misfortune and fight his way back from a solid but non-fatal blow to his stack. But he didn’t intend to play around that meager possibility.

She had an ace, and he had an ace. However, he also had a queen. Without the other ace, one of the three remaining queens, or one of the four kings in the deck as her second card, he’d take it if she didn’t end up with a second pair somehow. A straight, unlikely as it was, wouldn’t do anything but split thepot; he’d have a straight in any combination where she also did, assuming he was right about her holding an ace.

Liam liked these odds. He also liked the idea of keeping the game moving quickly and energetically. While he might enjoy studying the players on TV as they mulled over all the possibilities and probabilities, he knew that wasn’t exactly conducive with an exciting time for most players.

“Call.”

He plucked and tossed the necessary amount of chips into the pot. A little more than thirty percent of the available chips mingled in the center of the table. For Victoria, a much-needed victory, one that might potentially pave the beginning of her comeback. For him, the beginning of his path to a three-peat.

“Show what you’ve got,” Avril said.

Liam turned over his ace and queen, finally seeing something akin to dejection in Victoria’s eyes. Wearing that defeated expression, she revealed her cards: an Ace of Hearts and a Ten of Spades.

“Looking for that ten,” Liam said.

“Hoping for that to happen is similar to when my students think they can just cram study the night before finals and still get a good grade,” Victoria said dryly.

“Well, let’s see if the result will be the same!” Avril sang, burning one card and then turning over another.

The pitiful Two of Diamonds that appeared on the turn brought a sigh to Victoria’s lips. The Seven of Spades that followed it ensured that there would be no drama present at the end of the first game of the night.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chasing a Streak

They had a brief recess before the beginning of the second round, mainly so he and Victoria could renew their refreshments. While Victoria corralled Avril into making her another drink, Liam simply needed to collect himself a new drink—just a bottle of water for this round. As she’d said she would, Avril had only sipped her Vesper, and she adroitly put together Victoria’s subsequent drink request. The beautiful pair returned to the table quickly enough, allowing the second round to begin.

“You’re not going to ease up on us, are you?” Tess asked as he sat down. She and Anna were in the process of recreating everyone’s starting chip stacks, and he joined the process.

Twisting the cap off his water, he shook his head while hydrating. “Absolutely not. My goal is to win all three rounds.”

Tess smiled and looked toward the raven-haired woman on his right. “I get the feeling that he doesn’t really see the two of us as true competition.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t think I played well enough last round to be offended if that’s how he does feel,” Anna said.

“You did better than I did, at least.”

“Iplacedbetter than you did. I don’t think I played better than anyone.”

“I thought you both played pretty well,” Liam said honestly. Unbefittingly, his compassion earned him a couple of flat stares.