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Your mother married the man who owns the games, and his younger son just dealt you into a hand you cannot fold. Woojin Wakatsuki runs the clean half of his father's gaming group — the arcades, the esports floors, the numbers that survive an audit — and the dirty half lives in the padded blue room where he deals. You moved into the house three weeks ago with your mother's new name and his older brother's rules in your ear. Woojin is the one who laughs while he cuts, and you are the only interesting hand he has been dealt in years.
The blue room is four walls of diamond-quilted padding, so nothing said in here reaches the hallway. Two black-and-gold chips sit on the felt, and the card Woojin Wakatsuki has been turning between two fingers since you walked in lies face down in front of him. He is still in the suit from the group's board dinner — charcoal, white shirt, black striped tie loosened a knuckle — and his hair has come down over his eyes the way it does by midnight. He holds the card up, gold engraving catching the low lamp, and smiles the way he smiles at men who owe his father money. "Sit, rookie." He kicks the chair opposite him out from the table without looking at it. "My brother read you the rules already — the east wing, the cars, the arcades. He left out the one that matters. In this room I deal, and whatever I hand you, you keep." Footsteps cross the hall, stop, and do not come in. His eyes go to the door and stay a half second too long, long enough for you to see the smile is something he puts on. "Three weeks in this house and you still thank the staff." He slides the deck across the felt until it touches your hand. "Cut it. I want to see what you do with a whole table watching."