The Last Hand Was for My Family

My wife lost every cent we had at the gambling table. She even pawned the clothes off her back. Desperate to win it all back, she borrowed money and kept playing. When she was broke again, she gave up. She spent her last few dollars on sleeping pills and tried to kill herself. After the doctors revived her, she lay naked in a hospital bed, clutching my hand and sobbing. “Honey, I lost everything. I’m so sorry!” I clenched my teeth and took our daughter to the gambling table. “I’m putting my child up as collateral. Let’s keep playing!” My wife lay naked in the hospital bed, gripping my hand. “Honey, I was wrong. This is all my fault. I got carried away, but our child is innocent!” “I’ll find a way to pay it back. I promise. Please, leave our daughter out of this!” Tears and snot streamed down her face, but I had no desire to wipe them away. To be honest, I wasn’t exactly poor. I’d spent years building my fortune, caught a few lucky breaks, and used a few tricks along the way. My assets totaled around ten million dollars. I’d married a woman I adored in this city. I loved her, and she loved me. After we got married, I spoiled her more and more. I even gave her some control over our finances. But she became increasingly flashy. Designer bags and luxury cars gradually stopped satisfying her need to show off. A few wealthy wives introduced her to poker. Small games wouldn’t have bothered me. But she became addicted to the rush of gambling. This time, she had gone too far. She’d lost everything she had on her and walked out of the casino stark naked. I stared at her coldly. “You’ve lost everything. We have no money, no way to make more, and a mountain of loans. We don’t have a future anymore.” “Either loan sharks bleed us dry for the rest of our lives, or we gamble one more time and win everything back!” “I have no choice. I have to trade our child for chips and try again!” My wife, Claire Hayes, cried even harder at my cold expression. Usually, the second she started crying, I would rush to comfort her. But this time, I had to teach her how dangerous gambling really was. What she’d lost was only a small portion of our assets, but it was still a million dollars. With the loans added in, it was no small sum. How had the sweet girl I’d married managed to burn through that much money? Combined with her increasingly strange behavior lately, it wasn’t hard to guess. Someone had set her up. I could forgive them for scamming me out of some money. If that were all, I would have taken it back and let the matter drop. But those scumbags had tortured my wife. They had driven her to this state, stripped her naked, and made her walk down the street. That kind of humiliation was unforgivable! I was going to make sure every last one of them paid! I had my driver bring her some clothes, then carried our one-year-old son to the casino. Claire clung to my arm. Her tears kept falling, and her eyes were swollen from crying. “Honey, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry! I’ll sell my body to pay them back. Please, leave our child alone!” Sell her body? I said nothing, but my expression darkened. My wife had been raised well. How had she even thought of borrowing money to gamble? Or selling herself to pay off her debts? Those ideas had to have come from the people setting her up. They must have casually planted them in her head until she accepted them as normal. They might even have been planning to force her into that life all along. They dared to try to turn my wife into a prostitute! I clenched my fists until my knuckles turned white and led her to the gambling tables. “Show me where you were playing.” “I’m going to have a little fun with them.”My wife was too distraught to think straight. All she could do was point at a nearby table. Only three people sat there: a bald thug with a tattoo on his scalp, a wealthy wife Claire had recently met named Vanessa Reed, and Vanessa’s husband, Eric. Vanessa spotted my wife and smirked. “Well, look who’s back. Do you even have enough money to buy in?” “Haven’t lost enough yet? You actually came back? Ha!” The bald man beside her grinned. “What is it, sweetheart? Made up your mind?” “My offer still stands. I’ll forget everything you owe me if you spend a few days at sea with me. I’ll tear up your IOU. How’s that sound?” Going to sea didn’t just mean taking a ride on a yacht. He meant international waters, where every kind of depravity and bloodshed could be bought and sold aboard a cruise ship. If he took her out there, she might come home in a box. The bald man licked his lips, his expression hungry. I’d spent years running cons myself. One look told me exactly what was happening. Vanessa probably wasn’t a wealthy socialite at all. She was the bait, scouting for victims. Eric and the bald man handled the actual con. Play with fire long enough, and you eventually get burned. After all the traps I’d laid for other people, someone had finally targeted my own family. My wife wouldn’t lift her head. She only tugged at my clothes. “Honey, let’s go. I’ll find a way to pay them back.” “Please, don’t gamble!” I pretended to lose my temper, shaking off her hand and shouting at her. “Go? Go where?” “You mortgaged our house, put up our car, and took out all those loans! Where exactly are we supposed to go?” The bald man and Vanessa burst out laughing. “Sure, you want to play? We’re happy to have you. But you need to prove you can afford our game. Got any money left?” “If you don’t, I can help. Let your wife spend a few months with me, and I’ll lend you a hundred thousand. How about it? Ha!” I watched their smug faces without a ripple of emotion, though I made sure my own face burned with rage. They were saying those things deliberately. They wanted me furious and reckless enough to keep gambling. I had to convince them I’d completely lost control before I could lure them into my trap. Sometimes you had to risk something precious to catch your prey. I had money, but today, I needed them to take the bait! I gritted my teeth and set the child in my arms on the gambling table. This place was notorious for swallowing people whole. Organs, children—anything could be exchanged for cash. Humanity meant nothing here. Only money mattered. A casino employee approached and moved my son to one side. “A healthy one-year-old boy. Lucky you. Overseas demand is high right now. We can give you two hundred thousand.” I turned to my wife. “How much do you owe them?” She lowered her head in fear. “Only fifty thousand in gambling debt now. Most of it is loans.” I waved the floor manager over. “Give the bald guy fifty thousand. Turn the rest into chips!” The bald man looked at me, a cigarette hanging from his mouth. “Now that’s a stand-up guy! Ha!” “But don’t expect me to go easy on you. I really do have a thing for your wife!” I looked as though I was barely holding back my fury. My voice shook with anger. “Dealer. Deal!”The four of us sat around the table. Vanessa said her luck was bad today and decided to sit out, leaving three of us to play. I glared at them through gritted teeth. “My wife lost over a million today. I’m shuffling this hand!” Eric started to stand, but the bald man pushed him back into his seat, grinning nastily. “Fairness is what matters here. It’s all luck. If he wants to shuffle, let him!” The casino wasn’t cold, but both men kept their jackets on. Even with sweat beading on their foreheads, neither would take them off. Their sleeves were probably stuffed with cards. I didn’t expose them. Today wasn’t going to be decided by whose cards were better. We were playing for our lives. I finished shuffling and handed the deck to the dealer. The bald man wore the gold ring I’d bought my wife and tapped it rhythmically against the table. Eric bounced his leg. The dealer appeared to be looking down at the cards, but her eyes kept flicking toward the two men. So the casino was in on it too. I ignored their exchanged signals. Instead, I stared at the bald man with wide, bloodshot eyes, acting as though rage had swallowed all my reason. The minimum bet was ten thousand, with no upper limit. Each raise had to be at least as much as the banker’s. The bald man was the banker. Without looking at his cards, he tossed fifty thousand in chips onto the table. Eric didn’t look at his cards either. He confidently threw in another fifty thousand. “Call.” The bald man glanced at me, barely hiding his delight. He clearly thought I’d lost my mind. The second round began. Still without looking at his cards, he pushed another hundred thousand forward, his cigarette clenched between his lips. Then he asked a server for a thousand-dollar chip and added it. “I raise. One hundred and one thousand.” Eric set his cards down with a grin. “I’m not that rich. I fold.” He tossed his hand back to the dealer. One hundred and one thousand. A clever number, considering I only had a hundred thousand left. As far as they knew, I couldn’t possibly scrape together that extra thousand. I stared at him, my mouth hanging open, my voice frightening. “What are you doing? What the hell are you trying to do?” If he’d played a normal game, I might still have spared him today. If I couldn’t call, I would have to fold, and everything I’d already bet would go to him. He had money. I didn’t. That alone let him torment me however he wanted at the table. That extra thousand meant he was certain I was broke. He wanted to take my child and leave me no way out. In that case, there was nothing more to discuss. “I call!” Eric sneered at me. “You call? Where are you getting that extra thousand?” “You can’t call with words. At least put something up as collateral. Show us you mean it!” The bald man kept smoking, barely bothering to look at me. “Quit shouting. Cash is cash. If you don’t have any, nothing you say matters.” I called the manager over and pointed at my wife. “Take my wife as collateral. Give me chips for her!” Even the bald man seemed surprised that I would sell my own wife over a thousand dollars. Terror flooded Claire’s face. “Honey, I’m sorry! Sell me to him if you have to, but don’t sell me to the casino!” “Take the money and leave! Stop gambling. Buy our son back and go. Please, stop!” “Honey, I was wrong. I was wrong! Please don’t gamble anymore!” I looked at her coldly. “Didn’t you promise you’d find a way to pay the money back? Here’s your chance. Once I win, I’ll buy you back.” “Let me tell you something. Once you sit down at this table, whether you keep playing isn’t up to you anymore!” I took her hand and pressed her thumb onto the contract selling her into bondage. The floor manager smiled at my words. Without comment, he pushed a million dollars in chips toward me. I knew what that smile meant. Once someone was sold, there was no buying them back. Most were shipped overseas. First they became playthings. Then, once they were no longer useful, every part of them was harvested—skin, blood, organs... Of course I knew that. I was only trying to frighten her. If I truly sold my wife, I wouldn’t deserve to call myself human. They tied her up beside the table but left her mouth uncovered so she could watch us play. I pushed two hundred thousand forward. “I raise. Two hundred thousand!”The moment he’d said there was no betting limit, I understood. They weren’t interested in beating my cards. They planned to crush me with money. Fine. If that was how they wanted to play, I’d see it through to the end! Sweat broke out on the bald man’s forehead when he saw my two hundred thousand. He stared at me in disbelief. “You... you’re trying to kill me!” I slammed the table and shot to my feet. “You’re the one trying to destroy my family! You want our lives? Come take them!” He studied my vicious expression, then laughed again. “Now this is getting interesting. Come on!” I had raised, and he had just looked at his cards. As the banker, he had to double the next bet. That meant four hundred thousand. Four hundred thousand could be a doctor’s income for an entire grueling year. It could be what a cabdriver saved after a decade of pinching pennies. But here, it was just a few words and a pile of chips. The bald man could afford it. He pushed his chips forward with another grin. “Come on. Let’s see how far you can go today!” I grinned back. Four hundred thousand. Enough to keep him at the table. He exchanged some sort of signal with Eric. Eric got up to leave, patting the dealer’s shoulder on his way. I noticed everything, but said nothing. On his turn, the bald man pulled a Maserati key from his pocket and threw it onto the table. “Your wife lost this to me. Worth seven hundred thousand!” Without even looking, I shoved my chips forward. “I call!” He tossed the deed to our house onto the table, his eyes bloodshot. “The house your wife pledged to me. Worth one point one million!” “Let’s see if you can still afford to play!” I looked at my chips. Only a hundred thousand remained. Keeping my eyes locked on him, I called a casino employee over. “Claire, if the three of us are going to die, we’ll die together. I’m seeing this through!” “Bring me one of those contracts!” The onlookers murmured in disbelief. “He’s completely lost it. His wife and kid weren’t enough. Now he’s selling himself too!” “This is sick. This casino really will take anything!” An employee examined me, then called out loudly. “Healthy adult male. Fit for labor. Valued at one point two million. The overseas compounds need workers. If he isn’t redeemed, he ships out tomorrow!” I ignored him, took the chips, and tossed them onto the table. “Come on. I call!” The bald man stared at my bloodshot eyes, looking a little frightened. “You’re really putting your life on the line? Are you insane?” I roared back. “Insane? You think I’m playing with my life for fun?” “You emptied my bank accounts, took my car, put my child up for sale, and now you want to ship my wife to some overseas hellhole! What the fuck else am I supposed to do?” “Let me make this clear. One of us is dying here today. You or me!” He involuntarily backed away a few steps at the madness in my eyes. Just then, Eric returned with an armful of chips. The bald man chuckled and piled them onto the table. Two million dollars in all. “I sent my buddy to exchange some cash. Today, I’m taking you on!” “Let’s see if you can really take my life!” The house and car he had just won were now at stake. He was already desperate to avoid losing. It didn’t matter if something had belonged to someone else a moment earlier. Once a gambler won it, he considered it his. That was how their minds worked. I’d watched Eric closely. I doubted he’d simply exchanged cash for chips. He’d probably taken out a loan. Casino loans were never easy money. The bald man grandly shoved the entire two million forward. “Come on! I’m putting it all in. Let’s see if you dare call!” I said nothing and turned to my wife. “Claire, did you lose anything else?” She looked at the things on the table and shook her head. “No, honey. Nothing else. Please, I’m begging you, stop!” “I’ll go with you,” she pleaded with the bald man. “For as long as you want. Just leave my husband and child alone!” He walked over and slapped her. “Shut your mouth, you piece of merchandise!” Then he turned to me. “You want my life? Come on! We’ll play till one of us dies!” Seeing the handprint rising on my wife’s cheek made my heart ache. I borrowed another two million from the casino against my parents’ house and pushed it all onto the table. “Fine. Showdown!” At that word, he dropped into his chair. “Sure! Showdown! Ha! Let’s see who wins!” Every eye in the room fixed on the six cards before us. Before the bald man could celebrate, the dealer spoke in disbelief. “The winner is... Mr. Hayes. Three aces.”