Eleven million dollars. I'm up again, I'm actually up again, Steve thought, pulling two million worth of chips into his pile. Numbers had always been too abstract for him to put much stock in their particular amounts. He never equated it with what he could spend. So long as the number grew bigger. Otherwise numbers had no more effect on his mood than the weather forecast when he knew he'd be stuck indoors all day anyway. That trait made him a great trader – he could hold steady while everyone around him panicked – but sometimes it got him into trouble too. Like whenever a final notice for a long-forgotten bill came in the mail, or in the round much earlier when an absolutely stupid bet almost wiped him out.
While Madame Nemours was oh so sure she had a winning full house in that pair of queens in her hand to go with the one in the flop and that pair of eights on each side of it, Steve had the other two eights in his. "Four of a kind does beat a full house," Lachlan had whispered in her ear when she realised the winning hand was in someone else's fingers. She did at least have the grace to twist her mouth into a smile for Steve to congratulate him.
Steve's moment of triumph evaporated when he scanned the lounge for Rebecca. He hadn't seen a trace of her for three rounds now. Eying the reflections in the glass beyond the far side of the table, he spotted two men in maroon hotel manager uniforms striding past the bar. Their hurried pace meant one thing and one thing only. Keep your head down and keep playing, don't mind anyone else! a voice in his head screamed to him. He still felt sore from his run-in with that British guy, Benson or whatever his name was. You only have one thing to do tonight: stay alive long enough to get out of here. Lachlan, who'd been up nearly six million on Yushenko before passing out, was all the reminder he needed not to get too far ahead in his winnings.
The dealer sent cards flying around the table for the new round. Steve waited until all of them had been dealt to pick up his hand. Feeling tense, he loosed his shirt collar. His tie already hung rather too rakishly around his neck. Lachlan could pull off that kind of look, along with the longish, artfully mussed hair. Steve could not. He straightened his poster and caught the oversized German man staring at him out of the corner of his eye. Now what was this guy's problem? Steve felt more tense than ever. He lifted his cards; a black face card and a three of diamonds. He was also big blind in this round. He was up, he reminded himself, but he doubted it would be for long.