Page 13 of Love Is A Draw
Victor lifted his chin and glared at List, taking in his purple, wrinkled hands. He truly appeared as sick on the outside as he was rotten on the inside. “Challenge accepted.”
“What?”
“I’ll play you. When? Now?” Victor produced his bag. “I have a chess set with me.”
Something like terror flashed in List’s cold eyes, but it was instantly suppressed by a chilling, calculating glare.
Victor didn’t move until List’s cane-tapping footsteps had vanished into the fog. Even then, he stood frozen for a long moment, heart pounding like the echo of some long-forbidden truth. The alley around him seemed colder now, and not because of the wind.
He had said too much.
Or maybe he hadn’t said enough.
He wasn’t afraid of List. Not exactly. But he had seen something in the man’s eyes—a glint, sharp and strange, like a player calculating four moves ahead. And Victor knew enough about strategy to understand the danger of underestimating one’s opponent.
He exhaled hard, raking a hand through his hair. This conversation would hold repercussions. But for once, he didn’t care.
Let List rattle his sabers. Let him twist history and mock the dead. Victor would not yield. Not in this tournament. Not in Parliament. And certainly not on the chessboard.
Not while Dmitry’s memory demanded justice.
My opinion here is that Victor jumps to a conclusion about Gail without any preamble or tie in to her knowledge and abilities. Not while Gail—clever, courageous Gail—might be the only one to challenge List’s wife and emerge victorious.
He began walking toward the carriage and whatever came next. The board was set. And whatever game List thought he was playing…
Victor would be ready.
Victor claimedan easy win in the first round. He’d quickly checkmated his opponent, a viscount he didn’t know much about, except that he’d only played one flank of the board, and the backrank mate at move 19 was inevitably his defeat.
After his opponent left, disqualified in round one, Victor leaned against the threshold of the drawing room at the Pearlers, who’d become more than welcoming hosts, but nearly friends now he knew he’d help them and Greg fight more than a formidable chess opponent in List. The warm hum of conversation drifted from the adjoining salon, where laughter floated like perfume, and silver spoons clinked gently against porcelain saucers. Here, in this adjoining chamber arranged with quiet elegance, a different energy ruled. Chessboards lined the tables, players hunched in silent concentration. Not a whisper passed between them—only the soft knock of wood against wood as pieces advanced, retreated, and disappeared tothe margins—a fate he didn’t want in life but that could loom if he lost the tournament.
It was a strange sort of party. One where the stakes weren’t about the food or gossip, but the excitement of matching wits. He scanned the room once more and found her. Gail, the governess, sat near the far wall, her expression serene, almost indifferent—but Victor knew better now. Her name was among the players. And across from her sat the Baroness von List.
He read the stillness in Gail’s fingers, the way her eyes never strayed from the board, even as Sofia von List shifted forward on her velvet settee with feline poise. The air between them thrummed with calculation.
They had drawn an audience. The baroness and the governess—the only two women in the tournament. He didn’t know whether it was more scandalous that Gail was one of the Jews playing or that she was one of the women. Either way, she stood alone. Unflinching.
Rachel Pearler stood by the mantel, Fave beside her. Even Lady Hermy had crept forward, arms folded, chin tilted in fascination. Maia, to Victor’s surprise, stood closest of all, breath shallow.
Victor stepped nearer, glass in hand, the stem biting cold against his palm. He couldn’t look away. Gail played as if the board were a language, and she, its only fluent speaker.
Sofia’s eyes glittered as she moved a knight forward into a daring position. Risky, but not foolish. Not a blunder, a calculated trap.
Victor leaned slightly. This wasn’t showmanship; it was strategy layered in arrogance. Von List wasn’t toying with Gail. She was testing for blood.
Gail’s gaze flicked to the knight. She didn’t flinch. She let the moment hang like a breath held too long.
Victor could almost hear her thinking: take the knight and walk into the snare. Decline it and yield control.
Gail reached for her bishop and angled it subtly, threading it through the gaps in Sofia’s defenses, a seamstress slipping a needle between threads.
The audience took a collective breath. The line was defensive. Unexpected. But it opened a diagonal Sofia hadn’t sealed. A line Victor hadn’t seen—until now.
Sofia blinked. Just once. And Victor saw it: the faint tension in her throat as she swallowed. Her next move—swift, sharp—was meant to cover. Too late.
Victor exhaled slowly. Gail hadn’t avoided the trap. She’d turned it inside out. She wasn’t playing to win with flash or brute force. She was playing to dismantle von List one thread at a time.
Maia glanced up at Gail, her small hand hovering near Gail’s sleeve, almost touching. As if reaching for permission to understand something deeper than rules.
