All In

Two in the hand. Four on the table. Two pairs—jacks and sevens—and the look on her face just tells you she knows you’re holding something. So when she bets big on the river, you call the bluff. It’s a risk, it always is. The cards on the table don’t offer a lot, but if she’s sat on a pocket pair, she could have you beat. Or two clubs maybe, with two on the table, a fifth in the river would spell disaster.

But Yuqi has been bluffing all night, and you’ve got her dialled in, that rules out the pair.

Everyone else’s cards are on the table, this is a game between you and her. If Yuqi has you, you die on your sword. If you read her correctly, you’ll take her everything. The entire game.

The dealer makes it five cards on the table. Jack of clubs.

There’s a flicker in Yuqi’s eye, the same one as a few hands ago when the river gifted her a third king. Why does she make this so easy? And the poor woman is so blissfully unaware. She drags her eyes up from the table to give you a look. Pure arrogance and hubris.

“All in.”

A few hours of play and it all comes down to this. Yuqi stares at you, head tilted forward, dark eyes beneath thick eyelashes, a smile hanging off those berry-red lips. She pushes every chip she has into the middle of the table.

“You have been waiting for this all night, haven’t you? A chance to put me down?” you ask her, hesitating to call.

“Mhm.” That devilish smirk on Yuqi’s face drives the heart right out of your chest and sends it racing. “Call, or fold.”

“Raise.” A single word to take her breath away. “Everything I have on the table, plus my car.”

It’s a crazy bet, truly insane, but toying with this girl every time you find yourself at the same table in this place has become something of a secret pleasure. What can she call with only what she has on the table?

“Sir, you can only bet with chips,” says the croupier but Yuqi is quick to accept.

“No. It’s fine. If he wants to hand me everything he has, I’ll call the bet.”

“With?” you ask. Yuqi fidgets her necklace between her thumb and index finger and smirks at you.

“I’ve nothing physical at the table but myself…” Yuqi purses her lips and runs the tip of her tongue along the underside of her teeth. “One night. All night. With me. I’m putting myself on the table.”

This girl absolutely refuses to back down and it’s going to be her undoing.

“Miss, this is highly irregular—”

“I’ll take the bet,” you interrupt. “Though I must say, Miss Song, isn’t it? Awfully foolish of you to put yourself on the line with a flush.”

Yuqi’s eyes open wide, her poker face gone completely. Everyone around the table knows you’ve got her. “How?” Just a single word before she drops her queen and nine of clubs on the table.

“Flush, clubs,” the dealer declares.

“Sevens in jacks,” you say as you throw them on the table to a gasp from the other players.

The utter despair in Yuqi’s eyes gives way to a visceral hatred. Not because she just lost her final hand of the night, but because she put literally everything on the line.

“Full house, sevens in jacks,” the dealer confirms before declaring the hand yours.

“I’d like to cash out, take my winnings,” you finish that sentence looking across the table at her. She’s no longer that dominant temptress who was teasing you with the same smug grin every time you’d come to her table, instead, her bottom lip quivers in anger, and before she has an outburst, she takes her purse and leaves the table.

A clerk arrives to take your signature and sign over your winnings to be paid to your account. As you scrawl your name over a check, the dealer collects up the cards and chips, sets aside your car keys for you, and packs up his shuffling machine.

You excuse yourself and follow Yuqi across the floor. She’s headed right for the bar, and when she sits down you catch up and pull a stool out beside her and take a seat.

“That was an awfully bold bet you made back there,” you comment.

“No shit,” Yuqi replies. “You got lucky."

"You played the river more than I did."

She spins the barstool around to you and props her head up with a loose fist to her face and an elbow on the bar. "A bet’s a bet. Tonight, I’m yours. Tell me when.”

“I’d like an answer first,” you say. “Why do you go through that charade of flustering and provoking the men around the table every night?”

“People make mistakes when they get worked up. Lose themselves in the heat of the moment,” Yuqi says, before looking you up and down. “Most of them anyway, and then I get to bleed them dry.”

“Overconfident, aren’t you?”

“Haven’t met anyone yet who could keep pace with me when I decide to go all in.”

“Me neither.” You give her a mischievous grin. “Not until I met you anyway.” Yuqi can’t hide the smirk creeping across her face, the momentary glimmer of light in those devilishly deep brown eyes. “Nothing better than getting one over on a woman with a taste for power.”

“Careful,” she retorts.

“Careful never got me anywhere interesting.”

“Where are we going, then?” Yuqi asks, putting her hand on your knee as she leans close enough to kiss you.

“My room, we’ll open a bottle of red, something rich and spicy. Just like you,” you say, tracing the backs of your fingers along her arm.

“So, how will I suffer this humiliation, sir?” Yuqi asks in a sickly sweet, melodious tone. Her hand shifts higher along the inside of your leg, now on your thigh. “Perhaps by getting on my knees?”

“Wait and see, Miss Song.”

~~~

“Biggest win?” you ask. You’re both on half-empty, final glasses of that bottle of red, sitting in an armchair by the window of your hotel room, listening to some classical number.

“There was a Chinese businessman. Once he realised I spoke his language and I showed him a nice low neckline in that little black number I wore, he gave up his tell in his first few hands and was out six figures in two hours. Though that was barely a drop in the ocean for him, I suspect,” Yuqi replies before downing the remainder of her wine and reaching out for the empty bottle.

“You’re the worst,” you say, before finishing your own glass.

“I’m not the one going to take advantage of a pretty woman and her overzealous attitude.” She laughs. “Looks like we’re out of wine.”

“You know you’re free to leave, right? You could have walked out of this place right after the hand and I wouldn’t have chased after you.”

“Oh, I know. But I wouldn’t have put my body on the line if I wasn’t prepared for you to take it.”

You set your glass down on the glass-top end table and clasp Yuqi’s hand, before placing a soft kiss on the top of her hand. “How about you show me my winnings?” you ask, sending a chill running along her arm as you speak, leaving a wave of goosebumps in its wake.

Yuqi stands from the armchair. She looks down at you and says, “With pleasure.”