Page 31

Sim, Portugal

W ell before Liam could begin to detail his brief encounter with two other members of the Knight dynasty, Victoria noticed what Avril’s family had not. It wasn’t the most obvious hickey out there, but her crystal blue eyes snapped to it almost the second she opened her door. Outside of that, nothing. No mention of it, no inquiry about who’d given it to him. She let him in, and he came in. She led him out back, and he followed.

By now, it was all pretty rote. Playing against one another, chatting while he did his best but inevitably crumbled in the mid- or late-game, having something to drink, maybe something to snack on. The only difference between then and now was how late he’d arrived. It was already about when he’d usually start thinking about departing. Fortunately, sunset had stretched out a little as spring arrived, so it was still bright, warm, and pleasant at four o'clock.

He was a little hungry, though. He’d worked his muscles in a way he hoped would also become rote.

Actually, there was one more difference than just his later arrival. His intentions. During his previous visits, he’d focused more on learning than winning. It was the right thing to do. Instead of praying for a fluke, he worked to improve his chances for the next week, and the next week, and the one after that.

Although he had one more chance the following Saturday, he’d decided he wouldn’t put all his hopes in that singular basket. Better to have two, one for each arm.

As he settled into his chair, his pieces already set up, Liam supposed that meeting Casey Knight might have been a gift, not a horror. Unintentionally, he now had something that might distract Victoria from the game, without hopefully ruining her interest in it. But she’d talked about him before, and it’d been so long ago, so he didn’t think it’d ruin her day. While it was clear that Casey was still wrapped up in the past, he didn’t think the same was true about Victoria.

“So, you know now, right?”

“Hmm? Know what?”

Victoria stared at him flatly, then moved her king’s pawn into the center of the board.

“Yeah, I finally found out,” Liam admitted, mimicking her. “I can’t believe all of you let her keep me in the dark like that for so long. It’s going to cause me trust issues.”

“You could have easily googled her name once,” Victoria said. “It’s not exactly a state secret.” She moved out her first knight, and the bishop sitting beside it would depart on her next turn.

“I’m not really in a habit of searching up people online. That seems kind of creepy.”

More moves took place. Victoria and he both got their knights and bishops out early, and she castled her king. Compared to where he’d been a couple of weeks ago, he could actually see the reasoning behind these moves. Freeing pieces, connecting rooks, getting the queen out of her opening position, it all flowed through his mind, no longer as overwhelming as it’d once been. Victoria had never put up a turn timer; she let him take as long as he wanted, within reason. But here, he felt capable enough to have worked within the restraints of a timer. He wasn’t floundering, flailing about. He was playing chess. At a level below Victoria, yes, but at least he was in the same building.

He didn’t plan to fall to the Scholar’s Mate ever again, checkmated in just four turns by white, at least.

“Well, you know all of our secrets now,” Victoria said. “So, you’re safe from any more jaw-dropping reveals. None of us are billionaires-to-be, I should think.”

“Is the plan for Avril to take over once her grandfather retires?” Liam asked. He hadn’t had much time to ask Avril on the car ride back to his place; they’d been a little preoccupied.

“I think that’s what he wants, and I know Avril adores the team, the sport, all of it. But she has at least a decade or two before she needs to worry about that.”

Around the time they reached move ten, Victoria finally struck, and Liam riposted. Pieces began to fly off the board, and maintaining space and maneuverability became key.

“No chance it goes to her parents?”

“I think not,” Victoria said, barely batting an eye at the question. “They’re undeserving, and Rory knows that. Every venture they’ve attempted, they’ve botched.”

“Is it the same for her brother? I met him today.”

Victoria’s fingertips had connected around her queen, which she’d intended to use as a weapon in the center of the board. A mention of Casey Knight, however, delayed that action.

“He was at the stadium?”

“With Rory Knight himself. I met them both. He was… holding a grudge over Avril getting to use their extra jet. It was a brief run-in, not the best first impression. I liked Avril’s grandfather, though.”

Victoria made her move, but Liam wasn’t so quick to retort. Her eyes betrayed nothing, but her lips seemed slightly thinned. “I assure you, there’s very little to go uphill with when it comes to Casey. You’ve seen him as he truly is. Anything more cleaned up that he displays, it’s a veneer.”

Liam nodded, then made his next move. “I’m squarely in camps Avril and Victoria already, so I don’t think I’m going to spend much time around him—or worry about him at all, really.”

“We have camps, do we?”

“The kind I want to spend all summer at, yeah,” Liam said.

Victoria rolled her eyes. “I’m sure you’ll have that opportunity. My gardening camp is waiting, after all.”

He hit her with a dazzling smile as a response. And then he took one of her bishops with his queen. She frowned, then tore her attention away from his face.

“I can’t wait,” Liam said, feeling galvanized by the misstep that had allowed him to take that bishop—and without outright losing his queen in the process. Chess was a battleground, the ultimate game of stratagem. But not all warfare took place on the board, so Liam didn’t allow himself to feel too regretful for his mind games. “I can’t wait for Fiji, either. Just one week away.”

“Yes, it is,” Victoria agreed, working to fix the vulnerability in her board state. “Are you planning to sleep on the trip, like Avril has suggested? I’m sure the chairs on her jet are comfortable enough for it.”

“It seems like the sensible thing to do,” Liam said. “But I know I have to watch some mandatory education before I’m allowed to do that.”

Victoria arched an eyebrow, and he explained how he’d failed to recognize Avril’s The Sandlot quotes.

“Really?” she said once he was through, squinting at him. “Geez, you are young.”

“A few years younger than she is,” he protested.

“My younger cousins watched that movie religiously growing up,” Victoria said, taking another pause—he didn’t call her out for stalling, but there was a chance it was her goal—from their match. “Many of them dreamed of being the next Benny ‘The Jet’ Rodrigeuz. Every trip we took through Alentejo, visiting relatives living in other municipalities, it’d be playing on this ugly block of a portable TV, stuck between the sides of the front two seats so we could watch.”

“Where’s that?” Liam asked. “Alentejo?”

“Portugal,” Victoria said. “Where much of my family is from. I lived there until I was seven, and then we still made trips back every summer. Long, long road trips, visiting every grandparent, aunt, uncle, and cousin. For not a very big country, I sure spent a lot of time in the car whenever I was there.”

“So, it is Portugal,” Liam said, announcing his thought as though he’d won a prize by finally figuring it out.

Victoria’s raised eyebrow led him to reveal that he’d been wondering for a while now where she was originally from.

“Sim, Portugal, a terra da minha família,” Victoria said, revealing a mild accent when she spoke Portuguese. “Not my land, however. I... don’t return very much. Not anymore.”

“A bad break with family?” Liam asked softly.

“With some elements of my family, yes. My mother, especially.” The game remained paused, and Victoria glanced toward her garden. For a few moments, she was no longer her usual inscrutable self, and Liam could practically peer into the past and see the time when she and her mother had gardened together. “My parents and brother moved back to Portugal when I was nineteen to tend to my ailing grandmother. I... refused to go. I had a scholarship to a good school, and I wanted to complete that, but my mother wished for me to ask for an extended leave. I didn’t. It has been a wound of fifteen years, worsened by my grandmother’s death six months later. I’m not certain if it will ever wholly mend.”

“I hope it does,” Liam said, unsure of what else there was to say.

“So do I,” Victoria said. Shaking her head, the dismal thoughts gathering over her head dispersed. “If you end up watching The Sandlot, I’ll join you. I haven’t watched it in a long time. I wonder if I’ll still be able to quote the movie fully. I could, once. From beginning to end.”

Propping his mouth up with a smile, he nodded enthusiastically. The game resumed. Unfortunately, having recovered her focus, Liam proved unable to close out the game, even if it was the closest to victory that he’d come. It might have made seeing his king put into checkmate even worse than usual, being so close.

Over the next three games, he continued to taste defeat. For a little while, it seemed likely that it’d be the only thing he tasted tonight. Victoria changed that with an offer to cook them some dinner.

“Yeah, if it’s not a hassle,” he immediately replied.

“It’s not,” she assured him. “We can pick up play again while we eat out here. It’s a beautiful afternoon, and I think it’ll stay beautiful into the evening.”

Nodding along, Liam shoved himself up and offered his immediate services to whatever Victoria intended to make. He felt like he earned a little bit of approval by doing so. And then a little more once she discovered he wasn’t completely useless in the kitchen.

Thank you, Tess! Liam thought, working to dice a few onions for the dish.