Battling Rapture Read Free Page B

less. We aren’t playing for steep
enough stakes for someone like you.”
    “We are Huntu. Are you telling me I may not play?”
    Silence descended on the table.
    “She’s mine. You have your own Earth exotic,” Isor Ja
blurted as he scraped his chair back.
    Rhine could feel her eyes on him. Her malevolence was now
directed at him.
    “You speak of my new cousin, Camryn, Lady Huntu. Do so with
respect.” Or die was a given.
    Niki’s hostility lowered and the look she gave him was more
speculative than murderous. Rhine leaned back casually in the chair. He felt
more than heard Gunter join them.
    “What are we playing?”
     
    He wanted to say his prowess at cards was saving the day. In
reality, the Earth woman, Niki, gave him clues to best his opponents. He’d
worked out a system based on how she moved her body. A toss of her hair
indicated a bluff. If she cocked her head to the right, it meant bid higher. If
she cocked her head to the left, it meant hold. Her clues were too reliable for
chance. It seemed the woman had chosen sides.
    Rhine didn’t feel at all guilty about cheating. Maybe Isor
Ja wouldn’t mind either if he knew that winning Niki would save Rhine from
slitting Isor Ja’s throat and tossing his body into the casino’s incinerator.
    Isor Ja was clearly in trouble. Their fellow players had
abandoned the game, saying the stakes were too steep. Isor Ja refused to admit
defeat. Olaf had already hacked into the other man’s credit account and knew
what his balance was. He’d whispered the information to Rhine five hands ago.
    “I raise my bet ten thousand credits,” Rhine said coolly.
    Isor Ja was visibly sweating now. “I can’t cover a bet like
that.”
    The man didn’t fold, though. Rhine stared at him for several
moments, allowing the man’s anxiety to escalate.
    “What do you have that I would want?” Rhine asked.
    “I have a cache of tryzu .” Isor Ja sounded hopeful.
    “ Tryzu won’t work on an Ordanian. I have no use for
drugs.”
    They sat there in silence for a while. Rhine allowed the
tension to build. Isor Ja was a compulsive gambler. When he wasn’t running
errands for his boss, he was hopping from casino moon to casino moon. The
B’wor’s Luck just happened to be his favorite casino.
    “Come now, if you can’t match the bet or make it worth my
while, I’ll take the entire pot.” Rhine made to move his credit badge to the
table computer, which recorded each bet and ensured it was paid.
    “I have a new single-man fighter.” Isor Ja leaned forward in
his chair.
    “If it’s standard issue, I won’t fit in it. Come, man, you
have a perfectly good exotic behind you. I would accept her as payment on the
debt.”
    “Fifteen thousand credits. She’s a level one exotic.” His
tone was proud.
    Rhine’s lip turned up in disdain. “You’ve already lain with
her.”
    “I haven’t. I was waiting for tonight after we partied
some.”
    Rhine inhaled. The man was telling the truth. Their scents
weren’t intermingled. He had merely touched her, and by the look of the cut
under the smaller man’s eye, Rhine knew why she was shackled.
    “Thirteen thousand,” Rhine said. “Make sure the codes for
her chains come with her deed.”
    She was angry again. Didn’t she understand that they had to
play this a certain way? They all needed to make it out alive.
    Isor Ja looked down at his hand. “Fine, I accept the terms.”
    The table computer flashed green. The bet had been recorded.
    “Barbarian’s hammer,” Isor Ja said. He smiled as he laid his
cards on the table.
    Rhine glanced down at all five warrior cards. The
holographic images of each armor-covered hulking warrior in red, black, blue,
green and orange bludgeoning an opponent with a mallet-like weapon flashed
repeatedly. Rhine could hear the blood pumping swiftly through Isor Ja’s three
chambered heart.
    Rhine laid his cards down one at a time. In the game
Warrior’s Curse, only two hands won over a barbarian’s