Bad Girl Reputation (Avalon Bay #2)(52)

“Tate, what the hell?” Wyatt yells. “I’m about to divvy up your chips.”

“Coming,” he calls from the garage, where we keep the drink coolers.

“I check,” Chase says, skipping Tate.

“And dealer checks.” Our old high school buddy Luke burns one card off the top of the deck and turns the next faceup on the table. “Queen of clubs. Possible straight, possible royal flush on the board.”

“Oh, come on. That’s not cool.” Tate comes in with his arms full and sets several beers on the kitchen counter. “I was going to raise.”

Coop and I smirk at each other across the table. He definitely has the king. We both fold out of turn.

“Yeah, screw you both,” Tate says, watching his best hand of the night go belly up.

“Where’d you go? Milwaukee?” Wyatt reaches out an impatient hand for his beer. “Or did you have to brew them yourself?”

“Next time you can get your own damn drink.”

It’s boys’ night at our house, a usual poker game we host every month or so. Enough time for the guys to replenish their wallets after the cash Coop and I took off them the game before. You’d think they’d catch on that the odds are stacked against them. Yet every month, here they are, swimming upstream and right into the bear’s mouth.

The rest of the hand quickly plays out, with Tate taking a small pot as everyone either folds or calls. Hardly worth the excellent hand. I almost feel bad for the guy. Almost.

“You gonna have the boat ready for tomorrow?” Danny glances at Luke for an answer, while Tate deals the next hand. Danny’s another friend from high school, a tall ginger who works with Tate at the yacht club as a sailing instructor.

“We put it on the water this morning.” Luke sighs. “The thing’s more duct tape than fiberglass at this point, but it’ll float.”

“Think you’ll try to stay on the race route this time?” Coop glances at his cards, then tosses his chips in for the small blind.

The big blind falls to me this time. Peeping my cards, I luck out with a pair of nines. I can work with that.

“Let me ask you something,” Danny says, popping the cap on another beer. “When the teenage girl on the Jet Ski had to tow your sad little dinghy back to the dock, did your balls physically recede back into your body, or just fall off altogether?”

Luke flicks a bottle cap that smacks him between the eyes. “Ask your mom. They were in her mouth last night.”

“Dude.” Danny deflates, his expression sad. “That’s not cool. My dad’s in the hospital. He has to have hernia surgery from railing your sister last night.”

“Whoa.” Luke flinches, staring horrified at Danny. “Too far, man. That’s messed up.”

“What, how is that different?”

They go on like that, occasionally remembering to call or raise as Tate lays down the flop then the turn. Meanwhile no one is noticing I’m running up on a full house. Easy money.

“I’m racing tomorrow,” I say casually, raising the pot again.

“Wait, what?” Cooper arches an eyebrow at me. “In the regatta?”

I shrug while the guys call my bet to see the river. “Yeah. Riley mentioned it sounded like fun, so I put our names in.”

“Riley?” Tate asks blankly.

“His Little Brother,” Chase supplies.

“You guys have another brother?”

“No, nimrod.” Chase shakes his head. “His Little Brother, like that charity thing.”

“Where did you get a boat?” Tate demands, dealing out the river card. And there’s my flush.

“Weird Pete had one at the yard,” I tell him, watching everyone limp into the pot. “Some guy stopped paying rent a few months ago, so it’s been sitting around.”

“You do realize you don’t know anything about sailing, right?” Coop’s been paying attention, though, and he quietly folds.

“I watched a couple videos. Anyway, Riley can sail. How hard can it be?”

The regatta is an annual event in the bay. It’s a short course, the entrants a fairly even mix of tourists and locals sailing two-man crews on little boats. Some of the guys have competed for years, but this will be my first time. While I warned him we might be lucky to finish at all, Riley seemed stoked on the idea when I brought it up. I figured I ought to start relating to what he’s into if I’m going to take this Big Brother thing seriously.

“Welp,” Danny says with a self-assured grin. “Good luck with that.”

I win the pot with little trouble, the guys all looking at the table like they blacked out for the last ten minutes, uncertain how they let me run away with that one. Poker’s as much a game of misdirection as anything else.

“I hope Arlene can come out for the race.” It’s Cooper’s turn to deal. He tosses the cards at us while peering at me sideways. “I’m sure she’d hate to miss your big day.”

“Eat me.” My cards are trash. Best I can hope for is to pick up a flop pair.

Luke tucks his cards away like they tried to bite him. “Who’s Arlene?” he asks.

My brother grins broadly. “Evan’s got a stalker.”

“Jealous,” I answer.