Card Sharks (24 page)

Donny looked even more pissed, if that were possible. “There's nothing more annoying than fake maturity.”

Peter looked him up and down. “Yeah, there is. Real immaturity.”

Donny got in Peter's face. “You make Marianne cry, and I will kill you.”

Peter stepped in even closer. “I've
never
made Marianne cry. I don't think you can say the same.”

“You son of a bitch!”

“Get out of my face or I'll make you very sorry,” Peter growled.

“I'd like to see it. You wanna take it outside?”

“Sure. How about after the tournament and before the annulment?”

“The annulment?” Donny asked.

“Obviously.”

“Annulment,” Donny repeated. “Right. Obviously.” His body visibly relaxed. “Well, if we don't get to it before the annulment, we'll do it another time.”

Bijoux cleared her throat. “We're really late for the tournament. It's already started.” Stating the obvious, of course. “Will you guys go down with me?”

They stood there, still close enough to plant one on each other if they were so inclined. Donny broke the silence first this time. “I'd still like to beat your face in,” he said pleasantly.

“And I'd still like to beat in yours.”

Bijoux rolled her eyes.

Donny nodded at Peter, an appraising look in his eyes. “All right then . . . So you wanna check out a strip club before we leave?”

Peter cocked his head, giving Donny an appraising look in return. “Sure. Yeah.” He took a step back and straightened his jacket. Then he held out his hand and Donny took it. The two
men shook hands in a cursory manner, and the testosterone levels in the room returned to normal, just like that.

As they headed down to the tournament spectator area, Bijoux just shook her head and looked up at the ceiling in wonder.
Men.
Marianne had better be doing her part at the table to put them in their place.

T
he featured table wasn't any big news for Marianne anymore. The cameras followed her around like flies. She sat down in her assigned spot, uncapped her bottled water and set it to one side. She pulled her sunglasses from her jacket pocket and put them on the table, then tucked her jacket around her chair, tying the arms around as she'd seen Johnny Chan do. Then she dumped her card cap on the table and signed in her plastic bag of chips. Thank god it was all beginning to feel old hat, by now, because her focus was wrecked.

Find your killer instinct, Marianne.

After all, there was nothing she could do at the moment about the big mess waiting for her after the game. All she could do was play her best and not create a big mess
during
the game.

“Way to hang in there,” her seatmate said.

“I was cutting it pretty close,” Marianne said, gesturing to the fairly meager stack of chips in front of her.

“A chip and a chair. That's all you need. Good luck.”

Marianne nodded and they shook hands. “Good luck to you too,” she said.

Out of habit, she turned around and craned her neck over the crowd to see if she could find her friends behind the rail. To her surprise, Donny, Bijoux, and Peter were all there. She quickly turned back around and stared down at her hands as the ESPN crew finished checking the rigging above. A makeup guy suddenly attacked her, fussing over the size of the bags under her eyes and the slight pallor of her skin. “You must be so tired,” he said, pressing his hand to his chest in dramatic fashion.

He had no idea. This wasn't quite so much fun anymore. This moment should have been more fun. She'd made it to the final day. She'd be made up and be on TV at the break, interviewing about her game and how she'd gotten into poker. They'd film her trying to do chip tricks, laughing as she, the novice coming from nowhere, adorably messed up.

Marianne would go back to the room, and she and Bijoux and Donny would cram onto one bed, Donny lying between Marianne's legs with his head on her stomach. They'd point and laugh and scream at the ESPN rerun package. They'd have the time of their lives. Everything would be . . .

“Marianne, could you lift your chin a little?” A light meter was thrust into her face and they took a reading.

She looked around at her competitors. The playing field had condensed to the point where she was actually playing at a table with Howard Lederer, Barry Greenstein, Phil Hellmuth, and Richard Sparks.

Another lucky Dead Money player at her side pointed to the felt in front of her and asked, “Did you mean to have two card caps? Is that even allowed?”

“Oh. Oops. No.” She stared down at the stretched penny alongside the plastic wedding ring that had tumbled out with the rest of her stuff. She stuck the ring back in her pocket and focused.

For the final time, the announcer called out, “Dealers: shuffle up and deal!”

The gears of the tournament began to turn and Marianne headed down the home stretch.
Win this thing.
Marianne settled in, pushing her blind into the center of the table. Her head might be pounding and her stomach might be protesting, but she was going to give this last run everything she had.

The dealer laid the cards down, waiting as everyone pulled the corners up for the keyhole camera. Jack/ten, suited. She was already in for the big blind, so all that was left was to wait and see what kind of a raise might come out of the table.

There wasn't a raise. The small blind paid to see the flop, but surprisingly, no one else wanted action. The flop came as a queen, nine, and three, setting Marianne up for a straight. She bet, the small blind called, and they watched a king come down on fourth street. Marianne raised big and scared her opponent out. Oh, well. A small win was better than nothing.

Another round. Marianne looked at her suited jack and nine this time. She paid to see the flop, then instantly regretted it as a pair of kings came on the board. She mucked her cards and took a hit that was about the same size as her prior win.

As the lights shone down on the table and time passed, jackets were removed and eyes were rubbed. Marianne was feeling incredibly weary—weary with her cards, and with her chips going up and down in small increments. She had the strange sensation of wanting to just chuck it all and end this thing. It didn't seem like she could win. And it did seem like this game could last forever.
No, no suck it up! Focus!

Marianne signaled for another water, blinked to clear her blurry vision and looked at her newest hand. Ace/three, unsuited. As the small blind this time, she paid only a little to see the flop. It came down as ace/five/jack. With the ace showing up, she had to work hard not to show sudden signs of alertness.

There were too many people in this hand. Too many people had paid up to see the flop. If anyone else had an ace, chances were that they'd have a better kicker than she did with her paltry three. And if someone was slow-playing a king/ace combo, the story ended there. A raise came around the table. Marianne figured that with the chips she'd already put in and the chips she had left, she didn't have many more hands to get lucky with. She might not get another chance with an ace pair. She played the hand out to the end, only to find she'd been beaten with an ace/four.

The crowd behind her groaned in unison as the announcer repeated the cards. Lederer pulled the chips in and Marianne knew that she was only one or two hands away from her last stand. She'd fight to the very end, though, because if she could wait even one more opponent out, the prize money would be that much higher. But also for the principle of the thing. She was not going to mentally quit now. She'd had a lapse earlier in the day and she was paying for it, but she was not going to quit now.

She and Greenstein eyed each other, both the smallest-stacked of the table. There were only five players left—four players away from glory. Marianne looked away from Greenstein and steeled herself as the cards came around.
A pair of tits. How appropriate.

Marianne played the queens aggressively, raising big and acting like she had a pair of pocket aces instead. Greenstein went all-in. Marianne went all-in. And Hellmuth called.

The flop came with a third sister to bring Marianne's pair the good news. Three queens. It didn't take long for Greenstein and Hellmuth to realize their fates. Within minutes Greenstein was standing up from his chair, shaking hands with Marianne and the others, and making his exit in a hail of applause and cheers.

Marianne pulled in her winnings, her heart pounding like a heart attack. She'd driven one of poker's biggest out of the tournament, and she'd won big, but compared to the other men it wasn't big enough. On her next good hand she was going to try to double up.

The dealer spread the cards. Marianne took one look and folded, since she wasn't on the hook for either blind. A new hand came around. Again Marianne folded. This went on for a while, as she just couldn't seem to catch the right cards on the deal. But even as she stayed on the sidelines, the more aggressive players continued to knock each other off.

A sudden flurry of activity distracted her, and in a burst of applause, the remaining players at the table got up and started stretching out, ordering up bottled water, or wandering up to the spectator section. Marianne looked up at the ESPN assistant. “We've lost enough players to combine to the final table,” he said. “Congratulations.”

Marianne's jaw dropped. She looked behind her at her friends in the stands, squared her shoulders and forced herself to go do what she had to do before the tournament officials called her back over. She marched up to the stands, where Peter, Donny, and Bijoux sat in a row, and went first to Peter. “Peter, it was great getting to know you. You're a fun guy . . .”

He stepped down and gave her a hug. “It's all going to be fine,” he whispered into her ear before returning to his seat.

“Donny, I don't even know where to begin.”

“How about going back to the table and trying to win?” he said, holding up crossed fingers. “At least give me bragging rights to take back with me.”

Marianne looked at him helplessly, then turned to Bijoux. “Bij, I just wanted to say that I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings. I—”

Bijoux stood up. “Marianne Hollingsworth!” she shrieked.

Everyone went silent.

“Now you listen to me,” she said. “You are in the middle of something very important. Don't you get distracted now. Not at this late date.”

“But, I—”

“Don't interrupt me.”

Marianne gulped and shut her mouth.

Bijoux leaned down over the rail. “Don't mess up your chance to win over something stupid that we'll get over and laugh about later. Turn around and focus on finishing in style.”

Marianne stared up at Bijoux. “It's not stupid.”

Bijoux's eyebrow arched.

“I said, ‘it's not stupid.' ”

“Okay, it's not stupid. But I guarantee you that we are all going to laugh very hard about it all later.”

Marianne glanced over at Donny and couldn't tell if he agreed with that or not. She looked back up at her best friend. “For a golddigger, you're just about the most generous person I've ever met.”

Bijoux went and teared up, which made Marianne tear up. “Don't make me cry on ESPN. I doubt Annie Duke has ever cried on ESPN.”

“I bet not. But sometimes the tennis players do. And the Olympians always do,” Bijoux said.

Marianne swallowed her tears. Showing one's car-accident underwear was one thing, but crying internationally was something else. “You are the very best friend I could ask for.”

“I know,” Bijoux said. “But so are you.”

“You gotta get back out there, Mare,” Donny said, peeling Bijoux and Marianne away from each other. “Go.”

Marianne went back to the table and settled in once more. She was short-stacked to say the least. It only took a few hours of play to bounce out five more players, putting Marianne in the final four. The dealer dealt the cards. Marianne took one
look and folded. A new hand came around. Again, Marianne folded. Yet another hand. This time, Marianne was the big blind. She took one look at her cards and knew this was her moment. The men across from her didn't make a sound as she pushed her chips into the center of the table and uttered the timeless phrase: “All-in.”

All or nothing.
Please don't let me end up with nothing.

“I
can't breathe,” Bijoux said. “Did she just go all-in?” Peter took her hand, an act that Bijoux registered on several different levels. But her primary focus was on Marianne, who was just sitting there rather limply in her chair, stock-still. She didn't move. Her hair was in her face, and Bijoux couldn't see her expression.

Bijoux strained to get the best view, looking up at the television monitors, then craning her neck to see over the people in front of her.

“She's gone all-in, folks. This could be the end of the line for our favorite new sweetheart of poker. . . .”

Bijoux cringed.

“What do you think, Bob?”

“Well, Stan, I think it was the right move. She's short-stacked against three of the world's best players. This is no place for conservative play. And frankly, she's probably thinking that whatever she's going in with is probably as good as she's likely to draw before her chips drain out on the blinds. Okay, wait a minute. . . . Right, so Phil Hellmuth has asked for a
count on her chips. He's thinking about it . . . and yes . . . yes, both Hellmuth and Sparks have called. Lederer has folded, steering clear of what might be the final bloodbath.”

“Anything can happen, Stan. All our Miss Marianne needs now is a little luck.”

The color commentator laughed. “Funny how it all comes down to that. Let's see what we're looking at.”

Having gone all in, it was time to show the stuff. As Marianne moved to flip over her cards, Bijoux sucked in a breath so loud it drew notice from the other spectators. A pair of threes.
Oh, God.
A pair of threes against Sparks's damn suited ace/king and Hellmuth's pocket tens.

Bijoux watched Marianne plaster a frozen grin on her face as Hellmuth tried to shake her confidence with a running commentary.

“I think I'm having a heart attack,” she hissed.

Peter gave her hand a squeeze. She looked at him and smiled, then clutched at her heart. “I'm not cut out for this kind of stress. I don't know how Marianne can sit there in front of all these people and not completely panic.”

“I think everyone's a little tense,” he said, pointing to the floor.

Richard Sparks leaned back in his chair, taking a long, noisy slurp through the tiny cocktail straw in his drink. But his knee bounced under the table, suggesting that maybe he wasn't feeling as cavalier on the inside as he was trying to portray on the outside.

“Here it comes,” Donny said. He leaned forward in his seat as the dealer burned a card and flipped the first three community cards.

A king. Sparks's odds soared, and he wasn't shy about his excitement. Marianne's odds tanked; she just sat very still.

The dealer burned one card and dealt the fourth card. Bijoux sucked in another breath as the crowd reacted and she got a look. A six. Didn't help anyone. It would come down to the final card.

Bijoux shook her fists in front of her. “Come on, come on. Let's see a three!”

The dealer flipped the fifth and final card. It seemed to take an eternity for her hand to move away and reveal the card. Bijoux gripped Peter's and Donny's wrists on either side and shrieked in dismay.

A ten. It was all Hellmuth with a set of tens. Sparks nearly fell out of his chair with his hands up to his head and a look of total pain on his face. Hellmouth was celebrating big time, and Marianne was just . . . sitting there. That was it. That was the end. Bijoux stared, gaping out over the rail at her friend still just sitting there watching Phil Hellmuth rake in the pot with a cocky grin on his face. The crowd started to applaud as they realized Marianne was out. Marianne didn't get up.

“Oh, God. Don't cry, Marianne. Whatever you do, don't cry in front of all these people. You'll never forgive yourself for being all blotchy and gross on television.” Bijoux swallowed as her friend finally stood up, still staring down at the table as the commentators took a moment to salute her play and close out the discussion of the hand.

Suddenly Marianne pumped her fist in the air. She brushed her hair back, and Bijoux could see the look of sheer delight on her friend's face.

“Yes! I rock!” Playing for the cameras now, Marianne thrust her arms up in the air,
Rocky
-style and jumped up and down. “This was so great! This was so great!” As she mugged and played to the cameras and the audience, the remaining three guys at the table stood up to shake her hand, paying her the
respect her play throughout the tournament had deserved. And as she turned back to face them all, the crowd around them rose in a standing ovation.

Bijoux started laughing even as she couldn't help crying a little.

Marianne
Rocky
'ed all the way from the table, shrieking with glee, “I'm fourth! I'm fourth!” as a harried cameraman followed her every move.

“We'd like to pull you for a final interview,” one of the assistants ran up and said.

“Okay. I just need a minute. . . .” She looked at Bijoux.

“Well, we're going to break in, like, ten seconds. Can you come with us?”

Marianne looked back at her friends.

“Go on,” Bijoux said.

Marianne headed to the interview area. Lights. Camera. Microphone thrust in face.

“You seemed to take your loss pretty well,” the host said by way of a question. “Usually the guys going out this close to the prize look pretty trashed.”

“It just suddenly hit me—what I'd done. I'm so excited.”

“Yours is another one of those fairytale stories—an amateur winning a buy-in from an online tournament, and then breaking out of the Dead-Money Roundup to make her mark. A hell of a story. What does the future look like for you now, Miss Marianne?”

Bijoux leaned over the rail. “It's actually Machine Gun Marianne. That's what they call her in L.A.”

Marianne smiled gratefully, and Bijoux just knew that everything was going to be fine.
Never let a man come between you and your best friend. Good advice, good policy.

“Machine Gun Marianne,” the announcer repeated, turning
to the camera and building his closing metaphor, making his voice even deeper and more dramatic, as if he were selling an audience on an upcoming action flick. “A fitting nickname on this bloodbath of a week for many of poker's greatest. She took them down one after the next, shooting aces and kings all week until her bullets just barely ran short today. With a fourth-place finish, this newcomer has proven she can play with the big guns. Back to the table action as we take the top three to the end of what has been a very long road.”

They cut the transmission. “Thanks. And congratulations on making it so far.” Marianne shook hands with the announcer and turned back to face Peter, Marianne, and Donny in a line—at what was essentially the end of the line.

She exhaled loudly. “Wow.” She looked at Peter and just shook her head, obviously finding it difficult to articulate her feelings. “Wow. So, Peter—”

“It's okay. We both know—”

“No, I've got to explain this. I mean, you see me like this and maybe you think, ‘Where did Marianne go?' But I'm not really who you think I am. You don't really know me. This is me,” Marianne said. She indicated her jeans and loud, fun blouse. Splashy jewelry. Outrageous makeup. Bijoux thought her friend looked terrific—a much less slutty, much more comfortable version of her own former exterior.

Marianne exhaled, an impatient sound. “Peter, what I'm saying is that we've got to go get an annulment. Now. The careful, tasteful suit . . . the plain shoes . . . the subdued makeup . . . the tax accountant job and the stuff I do to convince them I'm a safe choice for partner . . . all that's just a costume. For me. Look at Bijoux.”

Everybody looked at Bijoux, who blanched at the unexpected attention.

“That stuff works on her,” Marianne said, gesturing to her clothes on Bijoux's frame. “That's her. I mean, not the plain part . . . Oh, crap, Bij. I don't mean it like that. You know what I mean.” She looked wildly between the three of them. “You know what I mean.”

“I know what you mean,” Bijoux said softly. “We've just been wearing the wrong clothes.”

Marianne looked back at her, such a grateful look. “Yeah.” She looked at Peter. “And you've been kissing the wrong girl.”

Peter held out his palm. Marianne stared at it for a moment, her brow furrowed; then her expression cleared. She dug into her pocket and pulled out the plastic ring, which she placed in Peter's palm. He winked at her, then turned to Donny. With an exaggerated flourish of his arm, he presented Marianne and Donny to each other.

Marianne stood there, blinking up at poor old Donny like an idiot.

Donny cocked his head. “Congratulations . . . on the tournament.”

Her face fell a bit. “Thanks,” she said nervously.

Bijoux felt a growing horror. Donny wasn't going to make the first move. He had way too much pride. “Do something, Marianne,” she hissed at her friend.

Marianne took a tentative step toward Donny, one eyebrow raised in a question mark.

Donny broke, his expression melting into a huge grin. He tried to play it cool, dropping his arms from his chest and turning his palms out to indicate that he was receptive to a hug.

Marianne didn't waste the gesture. She leaped into Donny's arms and kissed him with everything she had, and Donny answered back.

Bijoux wrapped her arms around her chest and gave herself a delighted squeeze. “Oh, my God. It's the ending
Pretty in
Pink
should have had. She goes with Duckie. Except Donny's so much better-looking.”

She turned to Peter.

He looked down at her, then looked back up at Donny and Marianne kissing. “Bij, you remember how there was one thing I needed to tell you?”

“Yeah.” Bijoux asked.

“You know how you said that I was as fake as you?”

“Yeah.” Bijoux crossed her arms over her chest. “And I meant it.”

“Well, you're right.”

He put his arm around her shoulder and cradled her in close. Leaning down, he said, “The truth is that I have been faking things as much as you have. The truth is that I'm going to be filthy, stinking rich.”

Bijoux blinked rapidly, attempting to process the validity of his statement. Suddenly, it dawned on her. “Mrs. Keegan's fortune?”

Peter gave her a wink. “Yeah. Why do you think I'm putting up with that damn cat?”

“Huh. Remember back up at the room, you asked if you had a chance with me, and I said it would take a little time? Maybe these things don't take as much time as I thought,” Bijoux said. She flashed him a wicked grin and the two of them just started to laugh.

Donny broke away from the kiss first. Marianne looked up at him nervously. He'd been the one all along. She'd just refused to see it because he didn't fit the parameters of what she thought she wanted.

She pulled at her blouse, trying to explain. “What I've been doing—before this, I mean—that's just not me. You know it. You know what I'm really all about. I'm not the girl who—”

He put his finger on her lips to shut her up. “You don't have to hide it, Mare,” he said. “Wear it on the outside, girl. Wear it on the outside.”

Marianne looked up at him, at this guy who'd been in her life for what seemed like forever, this guy she could never let go of, even when it seemed like an impossible fit. The truth was, Donny had straightened himself out. She thought he had some growing up to do. But it wasn't just him. It was both of them. And now that Marianne had straightened herself out, too, the fit didn't seem so impossible anymore.

“Donny, you know how I nagged you all those years about being responsible and doing something with your life and developing a long-term plan?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Will you hate it if I quit my job and become a professional poker player? Will you hate it if I stop being so responsible all the time?”

“I've never hated anything about you, Marianne. You make me crazy. You make me mad. But you're my girl. You've always been my girl. And what the hell's better than a girl who plays poker?”

“A girl who plays poker and loves to watch football?”

He shrugged dismissively. “That's what boys are for.”

“Okay,” Marianne said. “This is one of those times where you just gotta put it on the line. If it's bad, then it's bad and I lose my pride. I lose my guy. . . .”

The corner of Donny's mouth quirked up in a hint of a smile.

Marianne took a deep breath. “You know that dorky expression, ‘you're my everything'?”

He laughed—a little uncertainly, though. “Yeah.”

“I want everything.”

Donny went very still. “Don't tease me, Mare. I don't think I can stand any more of this. Don't get back together with me unless you mean it.”