Fish & Chips (Cut & Run 3)

Zane turned his head to nip at Ty"s neck. “Shower, then?”

“Mm hmm,” Ty responded, though he seemed to have no plan for moving.

“Sounds promising,” Zane mumbled, smiling against Ty"s collarbone.

“If we stay here all sticky, I may have to f**k you again,” Ty warned.

“Oh, the agony,” Zane drawled, pulling Ty closer to kiss him soundly.

Ty rolled him suddenly, putting himself on top of Zane with clearly every intention of continuing on in the same vein. But they were closer to the precarious edge of the round mattress than either of them realized, and when Ty put all his weight into Zane, both went tumbling off the edge of the round bed in an ungraceful heap of limbs, curses, and peals of laughter.

Chapter 11

THERE were twenty high rollers on board the Queen of the Mediterranean, give or take, and Zane had played poker with them all.

Most of them were above average players. They wouldn"t be in the private room of this exclusive pay-to-play lounge if they weren"t. A few were excellent players, whether by virtue of skill, intuition, or the ephemeral Lady Luck, it didn"t matter. And then there were the experts.

Zane hadn"t yet decided if he"d count himself one of those, simply because Vartan Armen and Lorenzo Bianchi weren’t, so Zane hadn"t pushed himself against the pros he knew well enough to be wary of.

Two of those Zane considered experts sat at the table now with him, Bianchi, and Armen, making a flexible table of five. Luckily, he was here to relax and schmooze, not to win. Considering what a roller coaster his day had been so far, he could use an uneventful night at the table. Zane shifted slightly, trying to ease the mild discomfort from his rather active afternoon. Thinking about leaving Ty all warm and soft and sated in their bed made Zane smile.

“Are you enjoying your evening, Mr. Porter?” Bianchi asked.

“Definitely, Signor Bianchi, definitely,” Zane drawled as the dealer approached the table with several new packs of cards.

Seeing the ship"s crew actually involved in the high-stakes gambling operation surprised Zane the first night. But it turned out the dealers were paid above and beyond their normal salary to work on their off hours for the players funding their own games in this private lounge. The ship kindly donated use of cards and chips of much higher denominations than any “normal” passenger would see in the game room proper.

Money really could buy more money.

Here in the private game, it was player"s choice as they went around the table. They played the old classics five-card draw and seven-card stud, the popular stars Texas Hold "em and Omaha Hi Lo, and occasionally variations like Crazy Pineapple and Follow the Bitch.

Crunching the numbers and figuring the percentages was in a way soothing for Zane. It was easy, it wasn"t life-threatening, and he didn"t even have to stress about the money. Granted, it was rather appalling to play $5,000 antes or $6,000 big blinds, but after a while the amount of money didn"t mean anything anymore.

It all came down to the chips.

Zane looked lazily around the table, cataloguing what he knew about his opponents. Expert Numero Uno played aggressively and liked to bet big and bet often, but he bowed out early if he didn"t have the cards. He preferred seven-card stud. The lobes of his ears flushed red when he got excited. Expert Numero Dos played evenly, always stayed in to see the bulk of the cards, and ran a decent bluff. She liked Texas Hold "em. But she had a bad habit of tapping one of her manicured fingernails on something when she had good cards. Armen was stoned-faced—big surprise—but just as stuck-up a card player as Zane figured him a businessman. He always chose five-card stud to force the other players to ante. Armen didn"t stay in long or risk much unless percentages were on his side. And Bianchi, he was as amenable a poker player as he was a person, laughing and smiling and talking, which was nearly as impossible to see through as Zane"s own emotionless mask.

Bianchi enjoyed the poker variations, something different every time.

But, as Ty had pointed out, he rubbed his cuff links when he was on to something.

Ty"s observation had really made Zane pause and think about what he was doing. Drinking aside, he knew he could outplay anyone here, if he put his mind to it. He knew the numbers, he was patient, and he literally had nothing to lose.

For the first hour and a half or so, Zane played conservatively, stuck to Evian over ice with a lemon twist, and kept an eye on the other players, confirming tells and, even more importantly, confirming mood.

Even the best player was more likely to betray himself if he was excited or upset or angry rather than content with the world. The cards didn"t matter, because a player brought mood with him to the table.

Zane also used the time to begin establishing a fake tell. It was a risk, but one that had paid off in the past, and it didn"t hurt anything to use it as long as he stayed consistent. Being the slick, confident Corbin Porter, Zane was sure the man would have a tell. He had too much of an ego not to. Zane chose something subtle: a brief caress for cards he was happy with. Otherwise his hands stayed on the table in clear view.

Then Zane got serious.

Fold if you don’t have a pair or better by the third card in five-card stud. In seven-card stud, more hands are won by the highest two pair—or even single pair—than by straights, flushes, or bigger displays. Five-card draw is all about percentages and aces. Play to scoop the pot in Omaha Hi Lo; getting half barely keeps you in the game. Play strong, high hands very aggressively in Texas Hold ’em or go ahead and fold ’em. It’s all about the numbers.

It’s all about the chips.

And Zane started raking them in.

Numero Uno got frustrated early by watching his chip stacks dwindle and let his emotions get the better of him. Zane put him out with a jack-high straight after a round of Texas Hold "em, and the man left. Bianchi started folding out more than he stayed in, content to drink his whiskey and play commentator after losing the bulk of his chips to Numero Dos"s nines over sevens in a particularly brutal round of seven-card stud.

Zane"s chip stacks grew. Numero Dos held her own until Armen duped her out of a couple hundred thousand dollars in chips by—in Zane"s opinion—bluffing her into folding. So that left Armen and Zane with the bulk of the chips between them, and it was Zane"s turn to choose the game. Just what he had been waiting for. The prodigious chip stacks meant Armen would be more willing to play, if Zane"s profile of him was correct. What Zane didn"t know about the hard-to-read Mr. Armen was if the man would be goaded into action.