Page 8 of Love Is A Draw (Check Mates #2)

“He’s over seventy-two years old! Where could he possibly go?” Victor’s heart constricted in his chest, cutting his next thought short. What if he wasn’t alive anymore?

“ Wo soll’ne Ratte schon hin wollen? ” Where would a rat want to go?

“London?” Victor growled.

“Ah, well, perhaps. If one buys into the myth that this is the greatest and largest city in Europe. But for all its size, it’s never been truly Catholic, has it? Not like Rome. Not like Vienna. A city without the proper faith lacks the fullness of greatness.”

“There are plenty of Catholics here, but also Jews and many others. Why can’t we all coexist in freedom? Not something you could understand.”

“And what would you think they’d do together? Play a game of chess?” List spoke as if he were telling a dirty joke. “Who’d win?”

“The best player would win. Chess is like math. It’s logical. And even though its board has only black and white squares, chess is universally blind to colors, religions, wealth, and even luck.”

“If you’re so sure of that, perhaps you ought to play me sometime? I’ll show you what it truly means to be above you. Put you in your place, boy.”

“P-put me in my… and what place would that be?”

“The loser.”

Victor lifted his chin and glared at List, taking in his purple, wrinkled hands. He truly appeared as sick on the outside as he was rotten on the inside. “Challenge accepted.”

“What?”

“I’ll play you. When? Now?” Victor produced his bag. “I have a chess set with me.”

Something like terror flashed in List’s cold eyes, but it was instantly suppressed by a chilling, calculating glare.

Victor didn’t move until List’s cane-tapping footsteps had vanished into the fog. Even then, he stood frozen for a long moment, heart pounding like the echo of some long-forbidden truth. The alley around him seemed colder now, and not because of the wind.

He had said too much.

Or maybe he hadn’t said enough.

He wasn’t afraid of List. Not exactly. But he had seen something in the man’s eyes—a glint, sharp and strange, like a player calculating four moves ahead. And Victor knew enough about strategy to understand the danger of underestimating one’s opponent.

He exhaled hard, raking a hand through his hair. This conversation would hold repercussions. But for once, he didn’t care.

Let List rattle his sabers. Let him twist history and mock the dead. Victor would not yield. Not in this tournament. Not in Parliament. And certainly not on the chessboard.

Not while Dmitry’s memory demanded justice.

My opinion here is that Victor jumps to a conclusion about Gail without any preamble or tie in to her knowledge and abilities. Not while Gail—clever, courageous Gail—might be the only one to challenge List’s wife and emerge victorious.

He began walking toward the carriage and whatever came next. The board was set. And whatever game List thought he was playing…

Victor would be ready.

Victor claimed an easy win in the first round. He’d quickly checkmated his opponent, a viscount he didn’t know much about, except that he’d only played one flank of the board, and the backrank mate at move 19 was inevitably his defeat.

After his opponent left, disqualified in round one, Victor leaned against the threshold of the drawing room at the Pearlers, who’d become more than welcoming hosts, but nearly friends now he knew he’d help them and Greg fight more than a formidable chess opponent in List. The warm hum of conversation drifted from the adjoining salon, where laughter floated like perfume, and silver spoons clinked gently against porcelain saucers.

Here, in this adjoining chamber arranged with quiet elegance, a different energy ruled.

Chessboards lined the tables, players hunched in silent concentration.

Not a whisper passed between them—only the soft knock of wood against wood as pieces advanced, retreated, and disappeared to the margins—a fate he didn’t want in life but that could loom if he lost the tournament.

It was a strange sort of party. One where the stakes weren’t about the food or gossip, but the excitement of matching wits.

He scanned the room once more and found her.

Gail, the governess, sat near the far wall, her expression serene, almost indifferent—but Victor knew better now.

Her name was among the players. And across from her sat the Baroness von List.

He read the stillness in Gail’s fingers, the way her eyes never strayed from the board, even as Sofia von List shifted forward on her velvet settee with feline poise. The air between them thrummed with calculation.

They had drawn an audience. The baroness and the governess—the only two women in the tournament. He didn’t know whether it was more scandalous that Gail was one of the Jews playing or that she was one of the women. Either way, she stood alone. Unflinching.

Rachel Pearler stood by the mantel, Fave beside her. Even Lady Hermy had crept forward, arms folded, chin tilted in fascination. Maia, to Victor’s surprise, stood closest of all, breath shallow.

Victor stepped nearer, glass in hand, the stem biting cold against his palm. He couldn’t look away. Gail played as if the board were a language, and she, its only fluent speaker.

Sofia’s eyes glittered as she moved a knight forward into a daring position. Risky, but not foolish. Not a blunder, a calculated trap.

Victor leaned slightly. This wasn’t showmanship; it was strategy layered in arrogance. Von List wasn’t toying with Gail. She was testing for blood.

Gail’s gaze flicked to the knight. She didn’t flinch. She let the moment hang like a breath held too long.

Victor could almost hear her thinking: take the knight and walk into the snare. Decline it and yield control.

Gail reached for her bishop and angled it subtly, threading it through the gaps in Sofia’s defenses, a seamstress slipping a needle between threads.

The audience took a collective breath. The line was defensive. Unexpected. But it opened a diagonal Sofia hadn’t sealed. A line Victor hadn’t seen—until now.

Sofia blinked. Just once. And Victor saw it: the faint tension in her throat as she swallowed. Her next move—swift, sharp—was meant to cover. Too late.

Victor exhaled slowly. Gail hadn’t avoided the trap. She’d turned it inside out. She wasn’t playing to win with flash or brute force. She was playing to dismantle von List one thread at a time.

Maia glanced up at Gail, her small hand hovering near Gail’s sleeve, almost touching. As if reaching for permission to understand something deeper than rules.

Gail moved again. A pawn—small, silent—slipped forward to protect the bishop, reinforcement disguised as concession. A declaration in miniature.

Victor’s throat tightened.

Sofia von List faltered. She stared at the board too long before her hand lifted and withdrew from the piece she had hovered over.

Retreat.

A murmur rippled around the room.

Victor didn’t smile. This wasn’t a triumph born of luck or hesitation. Gail had forced the retreat—elegantly, ruthlessly—without ever raising her glance from the board.

He looked at her then, really looked. She sat straight, unyielding. Unapologetic.

She had dismantled a high-caliber player. A former Russian spy. Crushed. Not with pride, but with purpose.

Gail’s eyes lifted and met his across the room.

No smile. She didn’t need one. She had already won.

And for the first time in Victor’s life, he wanted to learn more of the game—not to win, but to understand her.

To Gail’s relief, the room had emptied slowly, the way a candle guttered when the wax ran thin—bit by bit, until only silence remained.

She touched the edge of the chessboard lightly, aligning the white pawn that had tipped askew when Sofia von List rose from her seat, made a polite farewell with a draw on her scorecard, and drifted back toward the salon on a wave of perfume and velvet. They were both progressing to round two.

But Gail had chosen the draw—carefully, deliberately.

Winning outright would have drawn attention, perhaps even retaliation.

She hadn’t needed the win; she needed Maia to understand how power could be shaped, not flaunted.

And above all, she needed Victor to stay safe.

List might not tolerate his wife’s defeat at the hands of a Jewish girl—not twice in one household.

She hadn’t looked back.

But others had.

Rachel had nodded once, a tiny flicker of something in her eyes—approval, perhaps.

Hermy had said nothing at all, merely watching Gail with the distant gaze of a woman turning over the pieces of something not yet fully formed.

Even Fave’s mouth had twitched, as if he were about to speak but thought better of it.

And Victor…

She clenched her fingers before resting them in her lap. Victor had seen. He had stood there with that intense, measured stare that left no room for pretense, no shadow unexplored. She hated that she’d noticed. Hated more that it had mattered.

It had been about Maia. Gail had seen her in the doorway—those curious, eager eyes tracking every piece, the way she always did when she didn’t want to blink and miss a move.

Gail had felt the small hand at her sleeve like a tether, a reminder.

So, she had chosen the Queen’s Gambit line. Slow. Logical. Learnable.

A little girl ought to believe her queen could win through strategy, not violence.

Even now—especially now—Gail knew what it was to shape a girl’s belief before the world could take it from her.

Perhaps with Gail playing in the tournament, horizons were opening for Maia that Gail had never anticipated.

It may be her parents hosting the tournament, and her mother Rachel ensuring that Gail could play, but it was up to Gail to show how she’d do so.

And this may be the gravest lesson she’d ever teach her charge.

A creak on the floorboards made her pause.

Rachel stood there, now alone.

Gail rose and brushed her skirts smooth. “I thought you’d cleared the room.”

“I had.” Rachel stepped forward. “But then I thought you might like to know… my husband believes that might’ve been the finest game played under this roof since my daughter learned to crawl across a board.”

Gail allowed a small smile.

A pause.

Gail glanced down at the board again, where the pieces waited patiently in their positions. “I almost let her win.”

“I know.” The words startled Gail more than they should have.

Rachel stepped closer, quiet but certain. “I also know you could’ve won in four moves.”

Gail said nothing.

“She baited you,” Rachel went on, her voice measured. “And you gave her something better than victory. You gave her control of the board. You made her think she had it.”

“It was for Maia.”

Rachel’s gaze softened. “I know that, too. But you still chose it. That restraint… it’s the mark of someone who doesn’t need the win to prove her power.”

Gail’s throat tightened. “My grandfather always said the most dangerous players are the ones who know when not to take.”

Rachel smiled. “And what do you think?”

Gail stared down at the queen, the white figure standing at the center of her empire. “I think I’d rather teach a child to hold the board than dominate it.”

Silence fell between them—not empty, but full.

Finally, Rachel said, “You belong in that tournament.”

Gail’s eyes snapped up. “Pardon?”

“You heard me.” Rachel’s tone didn’t waver. “And don’t pretend it hadn’t crossed your mind.”

“It’s not—” Gail’s voice caught. “It’s not my place but my privilege.”

Rachel’s expression hardened. “True. But consider this: If you’re good enough to play for a baroness’s dignity, you’re good enough to play for your own.”

Gail looked away, her hands clenched. She’d worked so hard to be indispensable without ever being irreplaceable. A maid could be dismissed. A servant could be forgotten. But a woman who reached too far? She could be ruined.

“It wouldn’t be allowed,” she whispered.

“Maybe not,” Rachel agreed. “But I didn’t say you had to play all the rounds. I said you belonged there.”

Gail kept quiet, because the truth pressed too hard behind her ribs to be spoken aloud. She reached for the board and began resetting the pieces. Each one clicked into place. Pawn. Knight. Bishop. Rook. Queen.

One day, if the world let her, she would choose not to hold back.

Not for strategy.

Not even for love.

Only when it truly mattered.

And that day, she would play the game to the end.

She turned away from the drawing room where she’d just drawn in the first round and stepped into the hall, intent on slipping upstairs after bidding Rachel good night. But halfway to the stairs, she stopped.

Victor stood at the far end of the corridor, half in shadow, one hand curled loosely around the banister post as if anchoring himself to the quiet. His eyes found hers instantly. He didn’t move. Didn’t speak.

The silence between them was louder than the salon’s applause.

He’d seen her play. He knows what I did. Her throat went dry.

He stepped toward her—not rushed, but deliberate. “You played with extraordinary precision. And mercy.”

“It wasn’t mercy. It was a choice.” And I can decide to draw and not win because … she lost her train of thought when she looked into his eyes.

His eyes searched hers, steady, sure. “Then it was the strongest move on the board.”

He saw that? He understands me. That was more puzzling than any chess position in the books.

She couldn’t breathe. Or she could—but not normally. Not with the way he was looking at her.

Without preamble, he reached for her hand. His fingers barely grazed her glove before he raised it to his lips. The touch was light. But the warmth of it lingered.

“Good evening, Gail,” he said against the soft leather. “I hope it’s only the first of many games of yours I’ll have the honor to witness.”

And just like that, he was gone, retreating into the hush beyond the staircase like a move already played.

Gail leaned back against the wall, breathless. One hand on her chest. The other still tingling. She’d played for Maia. For the game. For something larger than herself. But now—just for a moment—she let herself wonder what it might mean to play… for him.