Page 16 of Devil in the Details

Well, he’d been trying to turn over a new leaf here in Las Vegas, to be a new and improved version of himself, and that meant not spreading around lies unless it was absolutely necessary.

“Yep, my first,” he said cheerfully. “I only moved to Las Vegas a few months ago, and I heard about this one and thought it would be a good place to get started.”

“My feelings, too,” Jeff Kosky replied. “And my wife thought it sounded like fun, what with the way I’ve been cleaning up at our neighborhood poker nights for the past couple of years.”

He tilted his head slightly toward the area where spectators could gather to watch. In answer, a petite woman with light brown hair in a choppy bob smiled back at him. Caleb wouldn’t have said she was exactly pretty when in repose, but she did have a megawatt smile.

“Something in it for her?” he asked, and Jeff grinned.

“I told her if I won, we could go to Paris for our anniversary. So I’ve got a lot riding on this.”

Whereas Caleb was only here to prove something to himself.

Would it be mean to win and deprive Jeff and his wife of their anniversary trip?

That wasn’t the sort of thought which would normally go through a demon’s head…even a quarter demon’s. But Caleb didn’t want to be that guy anymore. He couldn’t model his behavior on what he’d seen from his mother, either, because she was almost as bad as the half demons that made up his father’s generation, even if she happened to be wholly human.

By birth, anyway.

On the other hand, anyone competing in one of these tournaments knew there could be only one winner. The odds of Jeff Kosky making it all the way to even the final round, let alone winning, probably weren’t all that great.

The other two players arrived then, an older, dignified Black women, Nita Street, whose air of brisk confidence told Caleb she might be the one to look out for, and another man in his thirties, with dark hair pulled back into a ponytail and the kind of easygoing, almost Zen manner that made him seem an unlikely candidate to be playing in a poker competition.

Or maybe the guy — who introduced himself as Ty Carter — had only adapted that kind of attitude to lull the other players into a false sense of security.

After they’d all greeted each other, they lapsed into an awkward silence…one that didn’t last very long, as a middle-aged man Caleb didn’t recognize approached a podium placed near the table where the final round would be held and spoke into the microphone.

“Welcome to the sixth annual Desert Paradise poker tournament,” he said. “I’m Lew Phipps, the general manager here at the casino. I just wanted to welcome all our participants, whether they’re new or coming back for another chance this year. Today we’ll be playing three rounds, with the winner from each table moving on to play against the other winners until we’ve narrowed things down to thirty-two. Those winners will advance to the quarterfinals next Thursday.”

This was all information Caleb already knew, since it was in the brochure he’d been given, but hearing the details spoken out loud just made him that much more determined to get past this round. The last thing he wanted was to tell Delia he’d been forced to slink home in ignominy after not even being able to make it to the quarterfinals.

If that happened, then he’d know for sure that his demon powers had been the only thing propping him up, and he might as well stay far away from any casinos unless he was going there to see a show or maybe stuff himself at a buffet. He couldn’t exactly be the new Caleb Lockwood if he kept trotting out the same old tricks.

Men and women wearing white shirts, black bow ties, and black pants began fanning out to the various tables. Obviously, they were the dealers, here to play a double role of dealing out cards and keeping an eye on everything to make sure there weren’t any shenanigans. No doubt, closed-circuit cameras were also monitoring the tournament, but Caleb couldn’t let himself worry about that too much. Everywhere you went in Las Vegas, you were being recorded. It was fine…as long as none of that footage was being broadcast.

Everyone at his table wished the other players good luck, and he murmured the empty words as well. Or maybe they weren’t that empty. Nothing wrong with everyone having good luck…just as long as it wasn’t better than his.

Their dealer — a Latino woman who looked around Caleb’s age, maybe a little older — broke the seal on her deck of cards and began expertly shuffling them, fingers almost a blur. She wasn’t wearing any rings except a gold band with a thin line of diamonds set into the center, a ring that he guessed was deliberately low profile so it wouldn’t get in the way as she worked.

He already knew the preferred game for the tournament was Texas Hold ’Em, so he had his chips ready since he was seated immediately to the left of the dealer and therefore would be the first to put in his “blind,” or the small bet necessary to get the pot going.

Except the tournament had already begun, and the blinds were set at twenty-five and fifty dollars for this first level.

The dealer button was positioned so that Caleb found himself in the small blind, which meant he had to put in twenty-five dollars before seeing his cards. Nita, sitting to his left in the big blind position, posted fifty dollars. The tournament structure was beyond his control now — no more choosing his own stakes like he could in cash games.

“Hole cards,” the dealer said briefly, and dealt everyone their designated two.

Caleb looked down at his hand and schooled himself not to respond.

A four and an eight. Both spades, true, but there wasn’t much he could do with that unless he got really lucky.

Naturally lucky, not the kind of luck influenced by his demon powers.

The action started with Jeff, who was sitting to Nita’s left in the under-the-gun position. He had the choice of folding, calling the fifty-dollar big blind, or raising to at least one hundred dollars.

“Call,” Jeff said, matching the big blind.

Ty was next. “Raise to one-fifty,” he said smoothly, pushing his chips forward.

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