Page 8 of You Owe Me (21 Rumors #2)

CHAPTER EIGHT

Rumor has it, poker nights are for planning murders.

Maverick

The cards feel different tonight.

Not wrong. Just… off. Slicker than usual.

Lighter in the hand. Like they’ve been handled too much by someone who doesn’t know better.

Or maybe it’s not the cards at all. Maybe it’s me.

My mood. The undercurrent of tension I’ve been pretending isn’t there since I woke up with my watch buzzing and my chest tight for no damn reason.

Either way, I don’t like it.

Poker night is the one constant I still have. Three hours of silence, strategy, and control. My system. My rules. My people. Everything else in my life might be one phone call away from falling apart, but this table is mine.

Or it was.

Until Sebastian brought a guest.

“Full house,” I say, voice even, cards sliding into place on the felt. Three kings. Two tens. Not flashy, but lethal.

Rowan groans, tossing his hand down. “Dammit. That’s the third time tonight. You counting cards again?”

“He doesn’t need to count.” Sebastian folds. “It’s that freaky robot brain.”

I don’t respond. I never do. Let them joke.

Let them pretend it’s luck or talent or some kind of parlor trick.

It’s not. It’s math. Discipline. Pattern recognition.

The fact that Rowan lifts his left shoulder every time he bluffs.

That Sebastian taps his chips in sets of three when he’s got something decent.

It’s knowing the rules so well you can bend them without anyone noticing.

I rake the chips toward me, stacking them by color. Red. Blue. Green. Left to right. Same order every time. Because it keeps me focused. Because it keeps my hands busy while my brain keeps working.

My watch vibrates softly against my wrist. 110 BPM. A warning, not a threat. I take a slow breath through my nose and let it out through my teeth. Medication’s working. For now.

“Dude, that was sick!”

And there it is.

The reason I’m one ill-timed joke away from snapping.

Tweener.

Not his real name, obviously. I didn’t bother learning that. Sebastian calls him that because he’s “between” majors, “between” girlfriends, and based on the way he’s been bouncing his leg for the last hour, “between” doses of something synthetic.

“I mean, the way you knew he was bluffing? That’s, like, Jedi shit, man. You just stared him down and boom—folded like a cheap suit.”

He laughs. Loudly. Alone.

I don’t look at him. Just start shuffling the deck again. Not because we’re ready for the next hand. Because I need the sound. The rhythm.

Because I don’t want to be the guy who murders a guest in front of two witnesses.

He’s got a backwards hat on like it’s 2007 and we’re all still recovering from the MySpace era. His shirt has not one, not two, but three popped collars, layered like some kind of frat boy nesting doll. And whatever body spray he bathed in is strong enough to qualify as chemical warfare.

“I’m telling you,” he goes on, “it’s like you’ve got a sixth sense or something. Poker ESP.”

“It’s not ESP,” I say. My voice is flat. Final. “It’s observation.”

He grins like I’ve just handed him a secret.

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s what I meant. You just read people, huh? That’s badass.” He holds out a fist for a bump.

I ignore it.

Across the table, Sebastian catches my eye and gives me that half grimace he saves for when he knows he’s messed up but doesn’t want to admit it out loud. He knows better than to bring someone into my space without clearing it with me first. But here we are.

“Anyway”—tweener leans back like he belongs here—“everyone’s always talking about you. Like how you run shit. You know what I mean?”

The shuffle stops.

Rowan takes a slow sip of his beer. Sebastian stops mid-chip tap.

“You’re, like, the guy on campus,” Tweener continues. “IOUs, favors, trades. Someone said you helped the swim team dodge a hazing investigation. That true?”

I keep my hands still.

It’s a skill I’ve had to master: staying calm when everything in me is vibrating with the urge to react. When every instinct is whispering to shut it down. End it now. But that’s the thing. You don’t build something like mine by reacting. You build it by listening. Watching. Waiting.

And I want to see what this idiot says next.

“Just curious.” He holds up his hands like I’ve pulled a weapon on him. “No offense, bro.”

“I’m not your bro.” I damn near growl.

He laughs like I’m being charming. “Right. Totally. I just mean, it’s impressive. Everything you’ve built. I respect the hustle.”

Respect. He has no idea what that word means.

He thinks this is a game. He thinks I hand out favors like candy and collect IOUs like friendship bracelets.

He doesn’t get it. That every deal I make, every card I write, comes with weight.

The people who come to me desperate, quiet, careful, they’re the ones who know the rules.

They don’t ask how it works. They just say yes and wait for the call.

Because they know when I call it in, they’ll do what I ask. No matter what it is. No questions. No warning. And absolutely no telling anyone.

And if they don’t?

They don’t get to play anymore.

“Big blind’s yours, Rowan,” I say.

The deck moves again, passing from hand to hand. I don’t look up.

I need this night to settle. To fall back into the rhythm I built.

But Tweener’s not done.

“So, how long have you been dating that marine bio girl?” He asks the question casually, like he didn’t just swerve into a death wish. “What’s her name? Abby?”

My head lifts.

Slow.

Controlled.

“Ainsley,” I say.

“Right, right. Ainsley. She’s in my environmental science class. Always raising her hand, talking about ocean stuff. Sea lions and plastics and whatever. Passionate chick. Real smart. Real hot, too.”

The silence at the table isn’t awkward.

It’s surgical.

Rowan scratches his neck like he suddenly wants to disappear. Sebastian’s tapping stops completely.

And me?

I stare at the cards in my hand like they matter. Like I’m not calculating how long it would take me to pick this kid up by his shirt and put him through my window.

We’re on the fourth floor. He might survive.

But it would be close.

My watch buzzes again. 114 BPM. Still manageable. Barely.

I don’t say anything. Don’t trust myself to.

Not because I think Ainsley would ever look twice at this walking stereotype. But because he said her name. In this room. With that tone.

And I don’t like it when people talk about what’s mine.

Tweener doesn’t notice the silence.

Or maybe he does and just mistakes it for everyone being really impressed by his dumb-ass commentary. Either way, he keeps talking.

“I mean, not gonna lie, I thought she was single at first.” He tosses a handful of chips into the pot. “She gives off that don’t-need-a-man energy, you know? That confident, smart-girl vibe. Super hot.”

Sebastian shifts like his chair has just become uncomfortable. Rowan sips his beer without blinking. Neither of them looks at me.

Because they don’t have to.

They can feel it.

The air’s gone thin. Tighter. Like a room just before a storm. Static in the walls, pressure behind your eyes. And all I’m doing is sitting here completely still, hands folded around my cards, pulse steadily rising.

But that’s the thing.

I don’t lash out.

I wait.

I sit in it.

Let it burn.

Because silence, when it’s deliberate and loaded, makes people squirm harder than shouting ever could.

“You know who else thinks she’s hot?” Tweener continues. “Carter Mills. I heard he’s been sniffing around lately. Said he was gonna shoot his shot.”

He grins like he just told a good joke.

I set my cards down, face down, with no reaction. No outward one, anyway.

Internally?

I’m sharpening knives.

“He said what?” My voice is calm. Perfectly calm. The kind of calm that makes smart people leave the room.

“Just stuff, man. That you’re old news. That she’ll come around eventually. Typical cocky shit.”

Sebastian coughs.

Rowan mutters, “Fuck.”

I press my thumb against the edge of my chip stack. Not hard. Just enough to feel the resistance. My watch vibrates again—122 BPM.

Of course, it is.

My eyes stay on the felt, but my focus is narrowing in on Carter’s name.

The tone Tweener used. The casual way he brought it up, like it was gossip.

Like it was nothing. Like I haven’t already spent the last two weeks watching Carter circle like a well-dressed vulture with a father-shaped safety net.

And Ainsley?

She hasn’t said a word.

Not about Carter in the library. Not about the fake “accidental” run-ins near her marine bio building. Not about the question he asked her at the coffee shop, the one my guy near the register overheard and texted me about the minute she left.

She hasn’t said a thing.

And I’ve been letting it slide.

Because I trust her.

Because I don’t want to be the guy who interrogates her over every guy who breathes near her.

Because part of me thought maybe she hadn’t told me because it didn’t matter.

But now?

Now Carter’s out there running his mouth like she’s a prize he’s already claimed. And she still hasn’t said anything.

That silence?

That matters.

Not because I don’t trust her.

Because I don’t trust him.

And because I can’t stop wondering if she’s trying to protect me from myself. From what I’d do if she handed me the full truth and gave me permission to act.

“Big blind.” Rowan’s voice is stiff as he pushes two chips forward without looking at anyone.

I match the blind automatically, the movement mechanical.

Across the table, Tweener chuckles to himself. “Dude’s got balls, I’ll give him that. I mean, going after your girl? That takes some serious?—”

I look up.

Just once.

Just long enough to meet his eyes.

That’s all it takes.

His voice dies in his throat.

Finally.

Sebastian shifts, not meeting my gaze. “Tweener, maybe cool it for a sec, yeah?”

“Sure, yeah,” he mumbles. “Didn’t mean anything by it.”

I don’t respond. I just start stacking my chips again. Deliberate. Measured.

Let them all sit in the discomfort. I’m not breaking the tension. I am the tension.

I know how this game works. The real one. The one with no cards. Where dominance is about who speaks the least and controls the most.

So I don’t say another word.

Not for a while.

And slowly, the others start playing again, pretending like the room doesn’t still feel like it might implode. Like I didn’t just file away every detail Tweener accidentally gave me and every reason why he might still be useful.

Because if Carter Mills wants to play games?

I’ll stack the deck.