Yaletown was on the opposite side of downtown Vancouver from Ava’s hotel. Once an industrial area, its proximity to False Creek had been a lure for developers in the late 1980s. The rows of brick warehouses had been converted into trendy offices and loft apartments that sat on top of restaurants, art galleries, bars, and boutiques.
“The parking spot costs me five hundred dollars a month,” Maggie said as she pulled her car into the underground garage off Mainland Street. “I have classmates who spend less than that on accommodation.”
They took the elevator to the top floor of the four-storey building. As Ava entered Maggie’s open-concept loft she was struck by the living area’s sixteen-foot ceilings and ten-foot wall-to-wall windows that flooded the space with light. The kitchen counters were empty, the walls were bare, and the only furniture in the living room was a beige leather couch and matching chair and a glass coffee table.
“We’ll call Jack from my study,” Maggie said, motioning Ava to follow her.
Ava walked into the room and was visually assaulted by piles of books and paper strewn everywhere. Pictures of Maggie’s family covered every wall and framed the flat-screen television. Empty mugs and glasses lined the windowsill next to the desk, which held a large Mac. Ava stood by as Maggie leafed through some papers spread over a loveseat. “Sorry for the mess. I kind of live in here,” she said. She held up a sheet of pink paper. “Here we are.”
“Just a second,” Ava said. “Before you call, why don’t you tell me a little about Jack Maynard.”
“Sure. Do you want to sit down?”
Ava sat on the loveseat. Maggie took the office chair and rolled it closer. “He’s a young guy, late twenties maybe, and he’s a professional poker player. Believe it or not, he graduated from MIT with a master’s in math. He started playing, strictly online, while he was in university, and he discovered he was very good at it. He’s well known in the professional gambling world. A couple of the poker magazines rate him among the top twenty online players in the world.”
“How much did he tell you he lost?”
“Just under six million, and there were two other regulars who lost in the three- to four-million-dollar range.”
“Not as severely damaged as your father.”
“They’re professionals, not addicts. They knew when to stop.”
Ava nodded sympathetically. “I remember when my mother made my sister and I sit in the car in a casino parking lot for five hours while she lost her monthly household allowance playing baccarat. My sister asked her why she did it, and she said that she just couldn’t help herself.”
“My father took my mother and me to Vegas once, dropped us off in a room, and then disappeared for four days. She said he almost lost the house.”
“If this Jack Maynard is so good, how did he lose all that money?”
“That’s exactly what he’s going to explain to you.”
“One other thing before you call him,” Ava said. “I know next to nothing about Texas hold’em poker.”
“You understand something about poker, though?”
“Just the basics. I mean, I know how the hands are ranked.”
“We’ll look online,” Maggie said.
She turned on the computer and clicked an icon that looked like a waterfall. “This is The River, the gambling site that my father and the others played on.” She signed in and opened up a page that listed table after table of hold’em poker options. She hit one that read $10/$20. “We don’t have to gamble at a table to be able to watch it. Jack told me that when my father and the others were playing, there would be several hundred onlookers. Morbid fascination, I guess.”
There were six people at the table, each with an avatar. “People don’t use their real names?” Ava asked.
“No. Jack played under the name Brrrrr, and my father was Chinaclipper.”
“Then how did they get to know each other’s real identity?”
“Maynard was so famous that everyone knew who was behind Brrrrr. My father was just an anonymous player until he and Maynard and some of the others began to share personal information on the chat line. Over six months they got to know each other quite well.”
As Maggie was speaking, Ava watched the play of cards and quickly began to understand the basics. Each player got two cards, face down. Five cards were then turned face up in the centre — first three, and then one and one. Players bet after they had received their first two cards, then after the first three cards were turned over, and then again after each of the single cards was exposed — four betting rounds in all. Players could use any of the seven cards to make a five-card hand.
The table she was watching was no-limit hold’em. That meant that players could bet every dollar they had in front of them at any given time. She was amazed by how quickly some of the pots grew. At the $10-$20 table they were watching, two pots were raised to more than a thousand dollars each. She began to grasp the multiples that must be involved at tables with antes of $1,000 and $2,000.
“Let’s call Maynard,” Ava said.
Maggie punched in the number and turned on the speaker. “Maynard lives in Virginia,” she said.
“Hello? Is that you, Maggie?”
“I’m here, Jack. I have you on speaker phone. I’m with that woman I mentioned to you this morning. Her name is Ava Lee.”
“Ms. Lee,” he said.
“Call me Ava.”
“Maggie tells me you’re some kind of special accountant.”
“I guess you could call me that.”
“She says you recover money for people.”
“Sometimes I can, but not always.”
“Just how do you that? Get it back, I mean.”
“Persuasion,” she said.
He laughed, more disbelieving than amused.
Maggie interrupted. “Jack, I don’t think we need to quiz Ava. Why don’t you start by explaining to her what happened.”
She could hear him breathe, and in the sound she felt his tension. A bottle cap popped. “Have one for me,” Maggie said.
“I’ve been drinking every day for the past couple of months. I need to stop,” he said.
“Talk to me,” Ava said, pulling out her notebook. “But before you do, please understand that I have only the most rudimentary knowledge of poker.”
“I’m a pro,” Maynard began. “I’ve been playing poker for a living for the past five years, mainly online. I was putting in a minimum of eight hours a day, five days a week.”
“You use the past tense,” Ava said.
“I’m giving it a break — the losses crippled me. I need to rebuild my self-confidence, and my bankroll.”
“Where did you play?”
“On several sites, but in the past year I played primarily at The River. There was always good high-stakes action there.”
“Maggie mentioned the amount of money her father gambled. Is that what you mean by high stakes?”
“Yeah. There were about fifty of us who played for those kinds of stakes on a regular basis. And then of course people were always coming and going, testing their talent at a higher level. Those were the ones we usually took to the cleaners.”
“‘Talent’?”
“It isn’t just a game of luck when you’re playing poker for that kind of money. Maybe in the short term luck will hold, but over the long haul your ability to read people — to understand who you’re playing against and what their tendencies and habits are — sometimes matters more than the cards you’re dealt. And then there’s the mathematical element, which is one of my strong points. I can get into it if you want, but it gets complicated.”
“No, I believe you. The thing is, if talent prevails, how did you and your friends lose all that money? Did you run into someone more talented?”
“No fucking way,” he said, his voice rising.
“Is that ego talking?”
“No fucking way.”
“So who was winning when you were losing?”
“There were two of them. Their poker names were Buckshot and Kaybar. They never played together at the same table, but we never thought that was strange until we started looking back. We also never found out their real identities, which is also strange, because ninety-five percent of the guys knew each other.”
“Just those two were winning?”
“No, but they were by far the main beneficiaries of our supposed bad run.”
“Maggie tells me you believe you were cheated.”
“I’m certain of it.”
“How can you be so sure?” She heard paper rustling in the background. “Is there someone there with you?” she asked.
“No, I’m alone. I’m just going through my notes.”
“So, again, how can you be so sure?”
“I’m a math grad and so is Felix Hunter, who played under the name Felix the Cat. Like I said before, mathematics plays into this, and understanding the basic math of no-limit poker is fundamental to playing well. I mean, there are odds attached to every hand, risks attached to every bet, but let me say that the way we lost ran completely counter to the laws of probability.
“At first I wrote off my losses as just a run of very bad luck. It doesn’t matter how good you are — everyone hits bad streaks, and I thought I was just going through a particularly long one. But when it continued and I kept losing to those same two guys, I started to think that maybe it had nothing to do with luck. I talked to Felix about it first, and he felt the same way. So we backtracked. We traced the hands we had played over the past few months. When you look at just one hand, it doesn’t mean a thing; two aces can lose to a two and four at any given time, and even a number of losses like that can be rationalized. But when we looked at literally thousands of hands, we saw a very clear pattern.”
“You have all those hands on record?”
“Of course. All the hands are displayed after they’re finished, and I have software that stores and files them by date and time. I mean, this is my job, the way I earn my living — I apply myself to it. Going back and studying how you played a hand or how you played against a certain individual, that’s the only way you can improve. So, yeah, I had the hands, and so did Felix.”
“So what did you find?”
“We were cheated.”
“How?”
“We think — no, we’re convinced — that they could see everyone’s hole cards.”
“The two cards turned face down?”
“Yeah. We think they could see all the cards on the table.”
“And what makes you think that?”
“I’ll try to keep it simple,” he said. “Basically, they knew exactly when to bet heavy and, just as important, they always seemed to know when to fold. And bluffing either of them — well, it was impossible. It didn’t matter how much money you bet, they always called and they always won. I’m looking at a hand I lost more than a hundred thousand dollars on. I had an ace of clubs and the king of hearts, a great starting hand. The flop was the three of spades and an eight and nine of hearts. I raised. Buckshot called me. On the turn, the fourth card was a ten of hearts. So now there was a possibility on the board of a straight and a flush. I raised again. He called. The river card was the two of clubs, which didn’t change anything. There was fifty thousand dollars in the pot; I bet another fifty. It was a huge bet even for a bluff. He had to give me credit for having a straight or a flush, or at the very least a high pair or even two pair. He called, and when his cards were exposed, he was holding the three of diamonds and the six of spades.
“He won a hundred thousand dollars with a pair of threes. Do you have any idea how unlikely that is? He called a fifty-thousand-dollar bet with garbage, and into a board that nearly every poker player in the world would think had him beat. And let me tell you, it wasn’t the only time.”
“Yes, I can see the improbability of it,” Ava said.
“Another thing Felix picked up on was the number of hands they played. It was an inordinately large percentage, and it stuck to a pattern. They seemed to want to see just about every flop, the way Buckshot did with the three and six that beat me. They played rags — cards such as a deuce and seven of different suits, the very worst starting hand in poker — all the time. They’d call the opening bet and even call raises so they could see the flop. In reality, your opening two cards don’t mean much until the next three cards are flopped and your hand starts to take shape, but there are hands like the deuce and seven that are so bad statistically that hardly anyone ever plays them. These guys were playing them all the time, and naturally, when they got lucky, they cashed in in a big way because the other players never gave them credit for starting with cards that bad.
“When Felix pointed that out to me, I went over the data myself and found something else. Buckshot and Kaybar seemed to fold before the flop every time someone else had a monster opening hand — a hand such as two aces or two kings, which is really difficult to beat. And what I also noticed was that they folded against those hands even when the other player didn’t raise before the flop. We call that slow playing. When you have a big hand and you want to maximize it, you bet small to avoid scaring off the other players. Both Felix and I did that often enough. The thing is, when we looked at the numbers, guess what?”
“I have no idea.”
“I had pocket aces or kings more than eighty times during that losing stretch. Felix had them more than a hundred times. On nearly every single occasion, those guys folded before the flop. It didn’t matter how little or how much we bet, they folded. Can you imagine, statistically, what an anomaly that is? It’s fucking impossible that they’d fold that many hands. They had to be seeing our fucking hole cards. There isn’t any other explanation.”
Ava could feel Maggie’s eyes on her. “Jack, if you’re so certain about this, why haven’t you done anything about it?”
“I tried.”
“And?”
“I went to the local FBI office first. They told me that none of the online poker sites were American companies — they’re all offshore. Strictly speaking, they’re illegal in the U.S. They said they had no jurisdiction and kind of implied that I was an idiot for even going to them. So then I called a couple of guys I know who do promotions for The River. I told them what I thought had happened and asked them to put me in touch with some senior people at the site.”
“Did they?”
“Yeah. I had several tense conversations with some English guy named Jeremy Ashton. He sort of nudged me along during our first talk, trying to find out what my beef was, and then he asked me to send him my analysis of the play. I did, and when I didn’t hear back after about a week, I called him again. He wasn’t so nice this time. He basically said I was just a sore loser and that they had decided to ban me from the site. I went off on him, screaming, swearing, threatening to go public with my information. He told me to calm down and that he would take another look at my material.”
“To what end?”
“I never heard from him again.”
“And did you go public?”
She heard a big sigh. “No, I didn’t. The night after my rant at Ashton, my car was blown up in the driveway.”
Did you know this? Ava mouthed to Maggie. Maggie nodded.
“And you think it was them?” Ava said.
“Who else would have done it? The car was blown up at four in the morning, and the state police said it was a professional job.”
“Why didn’t you tell the police of your suspicions?”
“I’m a coward, plain and simple. If they could blow up my car once, they could do it again, and this time maybe with me in it,” Maynard said. “And Felix had a worse experience. He went to Ashton about the same time I did. He lives in Vegas, and two days after he called Ashton, his apartment was trashed. They left a note on his front door that said We can get to you anytime. I thought I should tell you that before you go chasing after them.”
“That was thoughtful. Thank you.”
“You don’t sound too concerned.”
“These kinds of things happen from time to time. I don’t pretend they don’t; I just don’t let them paralyze me.”
“So you’re going to help Philip? Is that what I’m hearing?”
“I’m not working for Philip, but if getting some money back for my client helps Philip, then I guess you could say I’m going to try to help him.”
“How about trying to get my money back while you’re at it?”
Ava hesitated. She was tempted by the idea of another fee, but then she thought of the complications that would entail. “I can’t do that,” she said. “I’m under contract and I handle only one client at a time. If I’m successful, though, there should be some side benefits. We can talk then.”
“I guess that’ll have to do,” he said.
“In the meantime, are you willing to help me?”
“How?”
“I want a copy of your paperwork. I want whatever analysis you and Felix did. I want a signed statement from you, Felix, and whoever else was involved on the losing end, attesting to the fact that you think you were cheated and how you think it happened.”
“I can do that.”
“Now I also need to understand how these sites operate. For example, how are the hands constructed? I imagine there’s some kind of sophisticated computer program at work here.”
“Yeah, there is. The River created its own software but the site is managed by a First Nations band on an island near Kingston, Ontario. The company is called the Cooper Island Gaming Commission.”
“How do you know that?”
“It says so on the website,” he said. “First Nations are exempt from all U.S. and Canadian gambling laws — that’s why we have so many casinos on Native land in North America. It’s just a natural extension to have them administer online gambling. The Cooper Island Gaming Commission supposedly has a hell of a server capacity.”
“So they supply the servers and administer the site.”
“Yeah. There are more than ten billion poker hands in the River system, all dealt on a random basis.”
“And no issues, no problems until about six months ago?”
“That’s right.”
“So if you’re right about Buckshot and Kaybar seeing your hole cards, someone has obviously messed around with the software.”
“That’s what had to have happened.”
“Have you approached the band?”
“They were next on my list, until my car blew up.”
“Do they handle the money as well?”
“No, that all goes offshore. For a few years it went to Cyprus, then for about nine months it was Madagascar, and for the past year it’s been Costa Rica.”
“Ah, I was wondering where Costa Rica fitted into this. That’s where Philip was sending his money.”
“Like the rest of us.”
“What was the procedure for transferring money in and out?”
“They’d take money any way you wanted to send it and they’d pay you just about any way you wanted as well. I never had any problems putting money in or getting it back.”
“Philip’s money was sent to a variety of banks, and to a different person each time. Why was that?”
“For security. When you wanted to send a wire, you had to email them from an address they had on record to let them know what you were planning. They would email you back with the name of the bank and the individual the money was to go to. Once the wire had gone, you had to send them its number and the exact amount of the transfer. You were given detailed directions not to use the words gambling, poker, or The River in any of your communication with the banks. They were trying to avoid any possible problems with the U.S. government.”
“Where does this Jeremy Ashton work? Costa Rica?”
“Shit, no, he’s in Las Vegas. Amazing, isn’t it? A company that’s incorporated in Cyprus, has its operations centre on a Canadian reservation, and flows its money through Costa Rica, and the operations are directed from Vegas. God bless cyberspace.”
“Is it a public company?”
“No.”
“Shareholders?”
“I couldn’t find out.”
Ava drew a circle around the word software. “The First Nations band, could they be investors in the company?”
“No, they provide a service, that’s all. Their main interest is in supplying the server support. A lot of their customers are gambling sites but they make it very clear that they have no financial involvement with any of them.”
“You would think they would know if the software had been penetrated,” Ava said, as much to herself as to Maynard.
“You would. That is, if they had a reason to investigate it.”
“And they should know who Buckshot and Kaybar are.”
“They’ll know.”
“What’s the name of the band?” she asked.
“The Mohneida First Nation. Their reservation is on Cooper Island, which I’m told straddles the U.S.-Canada border about twenty minutes from Kingston.”
“And you didn’t approach them?” she repeated.
“No.”
“Did anyone else?”
“Not that I know of. Felix and I were the only ones doing the forensic work until they dumped that shit on us.”
“That’s good,” she said.
“So what are you going to do?” Maynard asked.
“I don’t know. I need to think about it. And Jack — and I’m saying this as much for Maggie’s benefit as yours — my interest in this revolves around my client. Any reporting I have to do I’ll do to him, and believe me when I tell you, there won’t be much of that anyway. So neither of you should expect to hear from me unless I need something. I’ll make sure that when it’s over, you’ll know the result, good or bad.”
“Are you going to talk to Philip?” he asked.
She looked at Maggie. “Not unless Maggie wants me to. I have enough information here to get me started. Do you think Philip will have anything else to add?”
“Not really.”
“Then I’ll get on with things.”
“The information you want me to send?”
“Send it to my email address,” Ava said.
“I’ll get it off to you in the next hour or so, and I’ll send Felix’s as well,” he said. “You will talk to the Mohneida?”
“It seems to be the logical starting point.”
“Try to keep our names out of this, will you? We’re both still a bit nervous.”
“I’ll do what I can,” Ava said, and signalled to Maggie that the conversation was over.
“Jack, we have to go now,” Maggie said, turning off the speaker.
Ava went over to the computer, where the River website was still open. She clicked over to the administration section and found the gaming commission’s phone number and email address. She would need to find out more about them before making contact. She would also need to decide whom to contact.
Her thoughts were disrupted when she felt Maggie leaning over her shoulder.
“What do you think?” Maggie asked.
“Maynard is credible. Let’s see if his numbers hold up,” Ava said.
“And you really don’t want to speak to my father?”
“Let’s leave him alone for now. Why cause him more distress?”
“So what happens now?”
“Maggie, go home and look after your parents. Hopefully in a few days, a few weeks, I’ll get Tommy Ordonez his money back and your father can work out his issues with him on a different footing. Now I need to get back to my hotel.”
“I’ll drive you.”
“That’s not necessary.”
A cellphone rang in another part of the loft. “That’s mine,” Maggie said, going to answer it.
Ava remained in the study to copy Jack Maynard’s phone number into her notebook. When she walked into the living room, Maggie had her back turned. Ava thought she heard a sniffle and was about to ask if everything was okay, but before she could speak, Maggie spun around. Tears were running down her cheeks.
“That was my mother. She’s hysterical. Uncle Tommy phoned our house and she made the mistake of answering. He bullied her into putting my father on the phone. My mother said my father didn’t talk to him — he just listened, and then he started to shake. Our doctor’s on his way. I need to get home.”