George R.R. Martin - [Wild Cards 18] by Inside Straight Page A

but I’m betting on fireworks in five minutes.”
    “Then let’s bring the popcorn,” he said.
    They all stood at the door, when DB and Wild Fox walked in, right on schedule. Kate, Ana, and Hardhat waited, leaning on the walls in the foyer.
    DB froze when confronted with the faces looking at him. He threw a glance over his shoulder at Wild Fox.
    The shorter joker grinned sheepishly. “Sorry man. I’d have pulled it off, but apparently I got no rhythm.”
    Ignoring them, DB barreled through the foyer without a second glance. Kate followed him, calling, “Hey,
Michael
.
    You get lucky, or what?”
    He turned on her, and for a moment he really did look like a monster, filling the room, hunching his shoulders andbracing his arms like he wanted to punch rocks. Kate stumbled back a step.
    “Yeah, I did,” he said. “Not that it’s any of your business.”
    This was when the screaming match started. Kate liked him, Ana knew. But maybe not enough to let this go. Or maybe too much to let this go. Ana readied herself to tackle Kate if she decided to throw something. She had that look, like when she lost her temper at Hive. Except this was worse.
    But Kate didn’t have anything in her hands. She didn’t get mad, didn’t scream, didn’t cry. Very quietly, very calmly, she looked square at DB, and her face was a mask. When she spoke, her voice was low, cutting, like a scalpel. “You really are just trying to get every woman here into bed before the show’s over, aren’t you? I had you figured out from the start.”
    She walked out of the room.
    The silence turned suffocating. Ana, Hardhat, and Wild Fox stared at DB like he was a train wreck.
    Wild Fox said, “Dude, I’m totally sorry—”
    DB went after her, where she’d fled to her room. “Hey, wait a minute. Kate!” His voice boomed.
    Ana, in her turn, ran after him. She couldn’t hope to get to Kate before he did, but she tried.
    DB leaned against the frame of the door to their room, six arms forming a cage around it. If Kate came out, she’d fall into his embrace whether she liked it or not.
    “I don’t want to talk to you!” Kate’s muffled voice came through.
    “Come on, what did you expect me to do? I wasn’t going to sit around
waiting—
”
    “Oh, please!”
    “Maybe you’ll think twice about playing hard to get next time!”
    Ana sidled up to the door. “Hey Kate, can I come in?”
    After a moment, the door knob clicked, unlocked.
    DB was tall, and Ana wasn’t. She slipped under his lowest arm and got in place to shoulder open the door. She turned the knob, but DB stuck a hand out, shoving the door, bracing it open when Kate tried to slam it shut from the other side.
    “Stop it!” Ana turned on him, glaring.
    His lips pulled into a snarl. “I’m talking to Kate here!”
    “She doesn’t want to talk!”
    He was immovable, a tree, a mountain. He could muscle his way in if he wanted, and they couldn’t do anything about it. He really seemed as if he meant to.
    “This is our room. You can’t come in!” Ana said.
    The plywood door cracked, then crunched as DB’s hand went through it.
    “Hey!” Kate shouted from inside. DB stepped back in apparent surprise, six arms raised in a gesture of innocence.
    Ana slipped in and slammed the door shut. She grabbed one of the chairs and pushed it against the door. Like that would keep him out.
    But DB didn’t try to get in again. “Bitch!” he hollered instead. “Earth
Bitch!
”
    After that, the hallway was silent.
    Ana sighed at the splintered hole in the door. Somehow, she found the edge of her bed and sat. She didn’t have any earth to use inside. She wouldn’t have been able to stop him if he’d really wanted to get in.
    Kate was sitting on her own bed, looking as shell-shocked as Ana felt. Her gaze turned downward, to her hands resting in her lap.
    “Maybe I should talk to him. Do you think I overreacted?” Kate asked. Ana automatically shook her head, though she honestly didn’t