Inside Straight

Fortune settled into the comfy chair. He had to call his mother, but later. There was still too much on his mind. He turned on the TV, turned down the sound, and dialed room service to order more food. The channel was CNN. He watched the news flicker by silently as he put in his order for steak sandwiches, fries, and a couple of milkshakes. He couldn’t decide between chocolate and strawberry, so he ordered both as he watched President Kennedy and his hot actress wife receive foreign dignitaries at the White House. When a story about Egypt came on, John turned up the sound.

It was terrible. A bunch of fanatics calling themselves Ikhlas al-Din were killing jokers in Cairo—women and children as well as men. Fortune stared at the horrific images on the screen. He couldn’t believe that no one was protecting these people. That the authorities were allowing this to happen. Something had to be done.

Someone…someone had to do something.

He turned off the television, unable to watch any more. The words Lohengrin had spoken before they’d burned down his mother’s house came back to him. “You must find your destiny,” the German had said. “If God has need of you, and this is the path your honor demands, you must go.” John got up out of the chair and paced around the room. He didn’t know if God needed him, but there was sure as hell a bunch of poor devils in Egypt who did.

The doorbell rang and Fortune called out, “Yeah?”

The door opened. It was his food. A smiling bellboy wheeled it in with a flourish.

“Thanks,” Fortune muttered. He signed for it, and when the bellboy noticed the size of the tip he smiled even further.

“Thank you, sir.”

Fortune didn’t even notice that he left. He took the cover off the dish on the cart. The steak sandwiches and fries looked great and smelled even better, but suddenly his appetite had disappeared. He wanted to do something, but all he could do was pace.

He thought of Kate. How he had spoken about wanting to make a difference. He did. He did want to help people. What he went through to try to regain his ace …

And now. Here was another opportunity.

Most people never got one in their entire lives. So far, he’d had two.

He could take it, or he could go back to being Captain Cruller for the rest of his life.

He flopped down into the comfy chair. He had to think. Kate …

His heart’s desire?

When he closed his eyes, exhaustion took him. Fortune fell asleep.

~ ~ ~

He woke in the shower.

He didn’t remember getting into bed, sleeping, getting out of bed, undressing, and going into the bathroom. That bothered him.

But then a lot of things had been bothering him lately, and he still felt enough residual weariness to suspect that he hadn’t slept well at all. Given the events of the last couple of days, that was hardly surprising.

He felt for Isra’s presence in his mind, and found her, silent, curled up like a kitten in a dark corner. He still wasn’t sure what to think of her, of what her presence in his life offered him, for good and bad. He pondered as he washed his hair, soap-slick fingers slipping over the amulet that weighed like a stone against his forehead. He was getting into deep waters. Maybe deep enough to close over his head and drown him. John had no illusions about himself. He liked to think that he was reasonably bright, but he knew he was terribly inexperienced in the ways of the world. He had been sheltered and protected all his life, and he suspected that, by nature, he was a little more trusting—all right, naive—than most. He pondered this as he dried himself off, and went back into the bedroom to dress in his borrowed clothing.

But if he could believe in Isra, if he could trust her, she offered him the type of life that he had once tasted, and lost. Not that he regretted the loss of his ace. Not much, anyway. He could have done good with it, but clearly it was out of control. Whether his ace had been inherently unstable or something in Fortune himself had been tacking—training, focus, willpower—he knew that his father had sacrificed his life to save him, and perhaps save the entire world as well.

But that stage of his life was over. Isra was offering him entry onto a new stage. If he could believe her. If he could trust her.

The phone rang. He had a sudden premonition.

“John?”

“Hello, Mom.” He didn’t ask her how she’d managed to track him down. Peregrine had her ways. And her detectives. “Sorry, I meant to call you last night—I mean, last morning, but I guess I fell asleep.”

“Thank God you’re all right.” Peregrine sounded relieved. That was good. “You are all right?”

“Sure, Mom.”

“That’s good.” Solicitous. “Now I won’t feel so bad about killing you.” Not so solicitous.

“Uh—”

“Do you know how worried I’ve been?”

“Yeah, uh—”

“Do you know that you and your idiotic friends burned my house down?”

“Yeah, uh, I’m really sorry—”

“My Emmys melted!”