Chapter 20: A Three of Hearts

The crowd began to cackle, the nervous energy turning into mocking chatter as patrons nudged each other with arrogant grins.

"Looks like the kid’s luck finally ran dry!"

"Lady Luck might have smiled on the first few tables, but even she knows better than to mess with the big boss!"

They laughed.

"Standing on eighteen against a face card? Dead on arrival. Drawing? Pure suicide!"

"The goddess won’t save her this time,"

Fools, I thought, keeping my brim tilted low. They have eyes, but they just don’t know how to use them. They saw luck where there was only cold, calculated probability; they saw a desperate kid where there was a predator setting a trap.

I feigned a subtle, deliberate crack in my composure. I let my hand twitch slightly over my stack of chips, chewing on the inside of my bottom lip while staring intensely at my hand, letting my eyes widen just enough to look like a desperate gambler realizing they were backed into a corner.

Edgar caught the reaction instantly—just as I knew he would. His golden eyes gleamed with satisfaction. He thought he had me backed up against the wall, reading my manufactured panic like an open book.

"Hit," I whispered, sounding as though I was making a wild, panic-driven gamble out of sheer desperation.

"Is the kid insane?!" someone in the crowd shouted. "Drawing on eighteen?!"

The pale dealer hesitated, his trembling fingers sliding the next card off the top of the shoe. He flipped it onto the felt in front of me.

A three of hearts.

Twenty-one. Perfect Twenty-one.

The entire floor went so quiet you could hear a pin drop. The spectators stared at the green felt in dead-silent, jaw-dropping shock.

I didn’t smile. I kept my face utterly blank as Edgar’s smirk slowly faltered.

"Your turn, Edgar," I said, dropping the mock-panic instantly, my voice ringing out with cold, lethal precision. "Flip your hand."

Edgar stared at my three of hearts for two long seconds before turning over his hidden card. A Queen of spades.

Twenty.

He had a solid twenty—a hand that would have crushed my original eighteen—but my calculated, desperate-looking draw had taken the exact card I needed to edge him out by a single point.

Anyone would say it was a lucky guess, but I hadn’t guessed; I had tracked the card density from the last three shoes while letting him believe his sheer presence was suffocating my judgment.

"House loses," the dealer squeaked out, his voice cracking violently under the sudden spike of tension.

Instead of snapping and releasing his wolf aura at the fact that he lost, he leaned back in his chair, a low, deep rumble building in his chest until it broke into a genuine, dark laugh that echoed across the quiet hall.

"You baited me," he murmured, his golden eyes burning into mine with an entirely new level of dangerous intrigue. "You intentionally played weak to draw the card."

I reached across the felt, dragging the massive forty-thousand-dollar pile of chips toward my side of the table, before tossing his matte-black crest chip right back onto his lap.

"I told you, Mr. Edgar," I whispered, leaning forward so only he could hear me under the low casino lights. "I’m a gamble you’ll never lose on. Now... are you ready to talk business?"

Edgar didn’t even blink. Before the crowd could process what had just happened, he surged forward, snagged my wrist, and turned on his heel. In one swift, fluid motion, he flipped me straight over his broad shoulder like a sack of grain.

"Hey! What are you doing?!" I demanded, my hands slamming against his rigid back but it was no use compared to his strenght. "Put me down! I have to cash out my money!"

Edgar didn’t even slow his stride. He flicked a cold glance toward the trembling manager on the balcony. "Deal with that," he ordered flatly.

"Right away, Boss!"

I immediately stopped struggling, letting my body go completely limp over his shoulder. Sprawling around like a frantic animal in front of fifty gaping onlookers was an amateur move, and against an Alpha of his caliber, raw physical resistance in this weak shell was a total waste of kinetic energy.

Since he told the manager to deal with it, I guessed he was going to cash out the money for me, but one can never be too trusting.

I saved my strength, tracking our route as he carried me up the grand staircase, down a lavishly carpeted hallway, and toward a massive set of double doors.

Two armed guards stood at attention as soon as they spotted Edgar.

"Boss!" they echoed.

"Do not let anyone in," Edgar commanded, pushing the door open with his foot and stepping inside.

The moment he dropped me onto the plush velvet sofa, my body reacted with instantaneous, lethal instinct.

Before his feet could settle on the floor, I kicked off the cushions, twisted my torso, and brought my forearm up, locking my sharp elbow directly over his trachea.

The edge of my joint pinned his neck back against his collar, my eyes burning down into his golden ones with cold, unyielding fury. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ

"Do not disrespect me simply because I am weaker than you right now," I hissed, my voice dropping into an icy register that held no trace of a sixteen-year-old girl.

Edgar didn’t flinch. He didn’t choke, and he certainly didn’t panic. He just stood there, towering over the couch, taking in my tight defensive posture and the deliberate angle of my strike point.

A slow, raspy breath of a laugh escaped his throat, vibrating straight through my arm.

He raised two fingers and lightly tapped the edge of my elbow.

"’For now’?" he repeated softly, his golden eyes gleamed with a dangerous, dark amusement. "You really think this is temporary, little cat?"

"I’m telling you... yes," I replied, holding my elbow firm against his neck despite the wall of muscle beneath my joint. "It’s temporary."

I locked my gaze onto his, refusing to give an inch. In my past life, I had climbed out of deeper graves than this frail Omega body. Tactical instincts, pain tolerance, and raw lethality were already embedded in my soul—it was only a matter of time before this weak shell caught up.

"This is why I’m asking you to invest in me," I added, my voice steady and completely unbothered by his size. "Edgar, you won’t regret it."

His golden eyes twitched with subtle amusement. "So, it’s just Edgar now? What happened to ’Mr.’?"