Gambling Wives (Happiness & Other Chores Book 1), page 1
Gambling Wives
Katarina Mayer
Contents
From the author
I. The Cards Are Dealt
II. What Happens in Vegas…
Six Months Later
Beyond The Thrill
About the Author
Copyright Page
From the author
I have two sons. When they were little, I used to drive them to school in our small village. In front of the school, after dropping their kids, other mothers hang out most of the days, chatting. A regular routine. Every morning. On the days when we walked to the schools, I would even join and catch up with them.
Sometimes, I wondered what do they do after the school run. Did they go home? What did their day look like? What was the life we couldn’t see?
They all looked very content, comfortable with their existence, but I wondered which one of them was truly happy.
And a story started brewing in my head.
We all play our roles, but some of the parts we hide really well. I hope – reading this story – you’ll enjoy your inner gambler. Reading is the most healthy escape after all.
Love,
Katarina Mayer
Part I
The Cards Are Dealt
1
“How could you?” Laura asked icily.
It wasn’t the words but the judgment that squeezed Val’s stomach. Laura was her best friend. She should have understood. But then Laura, of all people, couldn’t and wouldn’t approve.
“How could she what?” Hannah’s voice surprised Val. “Sorry I’m late. What have I missed?” the petite blonde asked cheerfully as she sat down and reached for the coffee pot.
“Val cheated on Alex,” said Laura, each word cold and sharp, hurting Val like a chainsaw.
Hannah raised her brows and put down the pot slowly, as if it could break under the weight of the admission. She looked from Valerie to Laura and then down.
I wish I could turn invisible like Hannah does all the time, thought Valerie. She forced herself to look at Laura and face the critique. Laura’s eyes didn’t meet hers. Her friend was staring at a white wall in front of her. Her blue eyes were a shade darker. It was always Laura’s eyes that would give her away. They were light blue when she was happy, but they would usually grow a bit darker with a change of mood.
The familiar kitchen had never felt so strange to her. Maybe Val was a stranger now. The morning sun shined through the window into a dark, somewhat neglected kitchen that might have easily been the set of That ’70s Show.
Playful rays of sun danced on the old cupboards. Too many shadows loomed around, Val thought. Laura didn’t care about the kitchen. In fact, she didn’t care about the house. A place she used to call home. No longer.
Val took a sip of her coffee. The three used to meet at Laura’s almost every day for a pick-me-up. While good coffee was essential, it was the company, the friendship, and their secret that brought them together. Not today.
Not cozy by any stretch of the imagination, Laura’s kitchen provided privacy they cherished. Valerie’s eyes rested on the fridge, where there was a photo of them taped to the door. Attractive mothers, whose lives were simple at first glance, they looked almost like the Witches of Eastwick. Dark Laura, ginger Valerie, and blond Hannah hadn’t planned a murder, but their lives in a small village were definitely not simple or ordinary.
Val knew very well that an affair was a topic too close to Laura’s heart, but she’d still expected to feel relieved after sharing her news. Relief was far from what she was currently feeling. Her heart was pounding with anger, her stomach knotted with guilt.
Laura walked to the kitchen sink and started washing.
“How could I?” Val said to Laura’s back. “Who are you to judge me?” As soon as the words came out, she regretted them. Her features she kept under control, a poker face, but inside Val fought a tug-of-war between remorse and anger.
“Who am I to judge you?” Laura turned slowly, the water still running behind her. “Who am I to judge you? You know very well what my affair did to me, to my fam—” The words stopped somewhere in her throat. She turned, shut off the water, but kept her back to them.
“Girls, let’s just focus on tonight. We’re leaving this evening. Have you packed already?” Hannah said in her usual soft voice, trying to sound cheerful. Val turned, surprised. She had forgotten that Hannah was there. What a talent!
Hannah slowly tucked an unruly short blond curl behind her ear and kept looking down, her finger circling the edge of her mug, her face as pale as the white wall behind them.
“Who was it?” Laura turned back. “Who did you sleep with?”
Hannah sighed, and Valerie was sure that a change of subject was as probable as them teleporting to a different world. She would have welcomed the latter option very much.
“Mark. Mark Bellini.” Val felt as if her heart was going to jump out through her mouth. She swallowed slowly, hoping to keep it in. Relief was definitely not what she had acquired through her confession.
A towel dropped from Laura’s hands. She gasped and sat, or rather fell back into her chair. The small lines around her eyes got deeper. Her jaw clenched, she stared at her hands.
Valerie closed her eyes and wished she had never confessed. In fact, she wished she had never slept with the man.
“Mark Bellini? The Mark Bellini?” Laura managed at last. She spoke slowly, as if hearing the name again would somehow help her make sense of the information.
Val opened her eyes. Hearing Laura speak made her feel a complete fool. She looked from Laura to Hannah, but neither met her eye.
Years ago, when she was a little girl, she had broken the handle from her mom’s favorite china cup. She’d put it in the far back corner of the cabinet and turned it, hoping her mom wouldn’t find out. She’d spent days unable to sleep in fear of discovery. In the end, she’d confessed. She couldn’t recall her mom’s reaction, but she had never forgotten the agony that had led to her admission. Similar feelings now floated through her body. She looked for support from her friends. Both women were staring at the bottoms of their unfinished coffees.
“The manager of the casino where you’re playing the tournament? The man who sometimes deals the cards?” Laura spoke again at last. Her eyes finally turned to Valerie.
“Yes.” Val swallowed the short answer. Laura’s question made her realize that her choice of one-night stand was more than unfortunate.
“Are you crazy? What if someone finds out? What if they claim you’re cheating? They had their share of accusations at those tables last year. Christ! We trusted you with our money!” Laura leaned back in her chair, resigned.
Val let the words sink in and tried to assess to what degree they were an exaggeration on Laura’s part. All three had been gambling fairly successfully for several years. Only this year, they—well, Valerie—had been invited to a private tournament. They had been so excited. They’d decided that each would chip in for the entry fee and that Val would play for all three of them. And surprisingly, she had been doing well. And tonight, they were flying to Vegas to play in the semifinals. If she did well, they would be one last round away from potentially winning the bank, or at least adding a nice six-figure sum to their accounts.
“And you just go and start an affair!” Laura threw her hands in the air as if she could grab some sense in this situation.
“I did not start an affair! I slept with him once! And no one will find out!” Valerie defended herself, speaking through her teeth with somewhat regained confidence. “Don’t worry.” The corner of her mouth moved slightly upward in the effort to sound reassuring and apologetic at the same time.
Who would have thought we would end up here? At first, they’d only played online. All three gambled for fun, and maybe that was why they were winning. She and Laura didn’t actually need the money, but it was nice to make extra cash on their own. Hannah had started small and somehow kept up with them. Or they had helped her when needed. After they had made a substantial sum, they’d craved the taste of a real casino. They had travelled to Vegas, just to try it once. Their “just once” plan had collapsed with the first substantial win. They had started flying to Vegas regularly and had invested some of their gains. They’d saved even more for future games, all secretly put away in offshore accounts. They had allowed themselves only a few small luxuries they would otherwise never have had in their lives. Where they lived, a new tractor would be a luxury. And after several years, they now played for stakes higher than the total domestic product of the entire village.
“Was it good?” Hannah looked up, her light eyes sparkling with mischief. Valerie raised her brows, trying to understand. “Was the sex good? Was it worth it?” Hannah amended.
“Unfortunately”—Val took a deep breath in—“it was a-ma-zing!”
The room filled with a burst of laughter. Valerie felt the burden of the conversation lifted slightly. They had known each other for a long time, and they trusted each other. None of them could stay upset for too long. All three women were tied by their strong friendship, and by their secret. A secret that compelled them to lie and deceive others, but encouraged their mutual honesty with one another.
Val reached for Laura’s hand and squeezed it, seeking redemption.
“I love you too, but you really screwed up this time,” Laura answered Val’s unspoken question and squeezed back. “Okay, is everything arranged for the evening?”
“Done!” Val winked. She was usually in charge of their travel arrangements. They would drive Laura’s car to the airport, where a chartered plane waited for them. They’d stopped flying commercial when they could afford it. They sought privacy, speed, and a flexible flight itinerary. They didn’t welcome unwanted encounters with people who knew them.
2
“What kind of woman would go away and leave her family for the whole weekend? Poor Alex,” a voice in the other room whispered, loud enough for Valerie to hear. Valerie rolled her eyes and continued tying her shoe while balancing on one leg. Her mother-in-law wanted her to hear. Alex’s mother hadn’t reacted when Val had told her she was leaving, but Valerie had known the judgment would come. And it sure did.
The two were bound because of the man they both loved, but that didn’t mean they rewarded each other with mutual affection. Instead, they settled for a begrudging acceptance. Alex’s mother had never liked or trusted Valerie. At first, Val had wished to win her husband’s mother over, but she had soon realized that no such thing could ever be sincere. After all, Val blamed the woman for everything, including the unplanned turn that Val’s life had taken. Having a culprit helped Valerie deal with the situation.
“Will Alex visit this weekend?” Val heard her mother-in-law ask. “I’ll cook for him!”
Really? She can’t feed herself but can dance in the kitchen for her son?!
“Don’t worry. He’ll come to visit and bring you a meal. I cooked for all of you,” Val shouted before leaving, swiftly crossing the freshly mowed lawn to the main gate. Hmm, Alex said he was late at work. Clearly he didn’t mean the bank. Val sighed, but wasn’t surprised her husband had lied about spending time at his mother’s. They had been playing this game long enough not to get emotional about it anymore.
Alex and Valerie had met at university. They were ambitious, with big plans and dreams to conquer the corporate world. During the last year of their studies they had both applied for prestigious jobs, and they’d both gotten amazing offers to kick off their careers in management consulting. Their careers were well rewarded by six-figure salaries and other benefits attractive to young people who didn’t care that it came at the price of an eighty-hour work week. And they would have enjoyed it, Val was sure. Until Alex’s father had died suddenly, leaving his grieving mother unable to care for herself. Alex, the only child, had come to the rescue, abandoning all prospects for their successful life together. They’d married and moved to Nickelsdorf, a village of fifteen hundred inhabitants on the Austrian-Hungarian border.
Val opened the big gate and stepped outside to the main street. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the warm sun tickling her face. She leaned on the cold white wall of the house and enjoyed the tranquility of the main street. Chirping birds in the old blooming trees helped her relax after the obligatory visit with the old lady. She had to bring her mother-in-law lunch two or three times a week. A nurse had the pleasure of her mother-in-law’s company during the other days—an arrangement Val had insisted on after it had become apparent that the old lady was not so sick after all. That she was not going to die anytime soon, as they had believed when they’d moved here more than ten years ago.
The life of a housewife in this small community was not Valerie’s dream. A successful entrepreneur, a member of parliament, the first female president of a multinational corporation, maybe. A housewife, not so much. But love had changed her dreams. She had chosen love above her career, and for that, she had been rewarded daily. She had a beautiful life with a man who was willing to pave the ground she walked on with roses. She also had an unfulfilled desire to achieve something on her own. Alex’s love and devotion gave her life a purpose, but deep down, there was still an emptiness she needed to fill. At first, she’d played the markets to fill that void. Finally, she could have put her education to work. She had scored big and hoped to build a nest egg to invest in her own business. As the years had passed, her entrepreneurial dream had faded, but she hadn’t stopped playing. She’d exchanged stocks and commodities for the game of poker. Was it the thrill she was seeking? She didn’t know anymore. The higher the stakes were, the easier she could cope with reality.
It didn’t matter now, Valerie reminded herself. She started walking down the street to deliver another lunch, Alex’s favorite tuna sandwich that he ate every single day. She enjoyed her lunch walks very much, especially in spring. The smell of blooms pushing through moist soil, and a distant busy humming from the fields as life was starting again everywhere. A dog barking, the loud sound of a lawnmower, singing birds: the typical village concert was a balm for her soul. She loved her daily ritual of delivering her husband’s lunch. A brisk walk through the village was her opportunity to clear her mind, assess the stakes, and calculate wins and losses—in poker, and in life. Especially today, after the morning at Laura’s. Val looked at the lunch bag in her hands. The thought of Alex sent a tickling feeling to her stomach, and she picked up the pace.
She walked down the main street, where maple trees provided shade for the fronts of old, original houses. Each building had a slightly different shape, height, and color, but all of them together formed a barrier that separated the public road from the private yards. Each façade continued into a wall attached to the next building, creating privacy for a garden behind. The street was always quiet and very tidy. Behind the walls, however, were tractors, barns, animals, harvesters, crops, and other signs of a vibrant agricultural life that fed most of the people who had lived here for generations. And as a faint experiment to remind people that this was a village of the twenty-first century, a contemporary town hall erected in the middle of a square. Made primarily out of glass, it allowed anyone to watch the three clerks and the mayor at work. Whoever designed the building had an ironic idea of transparency in politics, thought Val, as she watched an elderly lady gesturing in front of the mayor’s nose.
On the bench across the street, a group of seniors enjoyed the spectacle of public service, as usual. Valerie waved to the onlookers and smiled to herself. They were trying to read lips and find out what was going on in the office. Gossiping was the favorite pastime in this community, and eventually, everyone would take part in it. Val shook her head, entertained by the scene. For a long time she had hoped that they would live here temporarily. When Alex had gotten a promotion and become the manager of the local bank branch, Val had started to accept that she needed to settle. At first, her new life occupied her enough to push away her own ambitions. Alex needed help, and she truly wanted to stand by him. Eventually, she had decided to replace her absent career with a baby. At least she wouldn’t have to put her career on hold once she returned to work. After her son, Peter, was born, she’d understood she couldn’t have another child. She had found a different project and started to build a house for them. From the outside, she had it all. Her life was ideal—and boring.
Val squeezed the brown bag she had prepared, just like any other day. She didn’t want Alex to wait for his lunch. She loved him. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough. She needed excitement and entertainment. She craved an occasional escape from the dullness of her life. She’d started playing poker after her son was born. Slowly, the gambling had brought much-needed harmony into her life. That was, if a rollercoaster ride could be called harmonious.
“Hello, Val,” a chubby florist greeted her.
“Good day to you, Adam!” Valerie smiled at him and sniffed the potted red tulips on display in front of the store. The flower shop was only a short distance from the bank where Alex worked. The sidewalk was full of pots, with tulips and pansies of all colors. One benefit of deserted streets was that nobody complained if the path was blocked. Those few who passed through didn’t mind the blossoming barriers, and most of the time, they would buy something. Flowers blocking the sidewalk was a nuisance beneficial to the owner of the store, as well as any passersby. There were no fresh flowers, though—not enough customers for those.
