Re: The Rex: Cat & Jack
Journalism, in Cat's experience, was very seldom earnest. Oh, she'd known a few reporters outside the city at home, and they'd been painfully earnest, but they were always being dangled from some rooftop or another for their pains. No, the news was like everything else in Cat's world: Bought and paid for. And Cat, she knew all about living in lined pockets. This place, it even had shades of being a pocket that she was tucked into. But, mostly, it was her version of borrowing from the past. She built herself up on a name, and it had worked brilliantly. A gamble? Sure, because she could've been seen as a threat. But she'd managed Switzerland, and it gave her a beautiful view.
She remembered the days when anger was spice. When anger led to sweating, to bodies pressed close on rooftops. Police sirens below, and being unable to look away from the person in front of you. But those days? They were so far gone. Ancient history, and Jack didn't hold his ire, spice or not.
"You can game everything. I'm telling you that in my world? What matters is perception. We aren't talking about your world right now, and we're not talking about reality. Keep up." She said it all with a smile seated firm, unconcerned. If she frowned, it would be noticed, and Jack didn't want someone shooting him in his little newspaper office, did he? See, paying allegiance to Switzerland? Keeping on good terms with her? That was considered quite important. Welcome to the war zone, Jack Penhaligon.
And someone at that table would lose. Each round, they would lose. But sitting here? Was an investment, and it had nothing to do with the cards.
Cat led him away from the expensive table, because lingering there wasn't something on the cards for her. She led him to roulette, and she motioned with a graceful turn of wrist. "How about here? If you ask even one question in that other room? You're not going to make it home." Her grin was a teasing one. She was playing surely, surely, surely.
She waved an attendant over, his black and whites impeccable, and she asked him for a chip - on her. The chip, which was placed into her hand, she transferred to Jack's pocket, alongside his mussy plaid square. It bore a 5k mark on it, which was like to a penny, and she grinned. "Play it."