Molly's Game Page #8

-Nope.

In other words,

he was playing poker

and the others were gambling.

And he won.

By midnight, Harlan had tripled

his original $50,000 buy-in

but everything came off

the rails with one hand.

And that's how it happens.

That's how you go full tilt.

Harlan, the best

player at the table,

the best player at most tables,

was about to get bluffed off

the win by, of all people,

Bad Brad.

How?

Because Harlan had never

played with Brad before

and didn't know yet

that Brad was bad.

Harlan's got a boat, nine's full.

Brad's got nothing

but his pre-flop

betting made it look,

entirely accidentally,

like there was a chance

he had pocket kings,

20 thousand.

which, if true, would give

him the better full house.

Brad's counting off 20 thousand

which means he's gonna call

and Harlan knows that if Brad's

gonna call and not raise

it means he didn't have the boat

and he's betting a high two-pair,

probably kings and queens.

But then instead of

calling the bet,

Brad pushes 72 thousand

dollars into the pot.

I'm all in.

Harlan looks a Brad.

Every tell Harlan knows about,

carotid artery pumping,

stiff hands,

Brad's doing the opposite.

Brad's betting had

represented a huge hand

by calling on the flop,

check-raising the turn

and bombing the river.

Of course, Harlan didn't

know that Brad didn't know

what any of that meant.

So Harlan, always

a good sport, said,

Nice bet. I'm laying this down.

as he tossed in what

he didn't realize

was the winning hand.

Brad tosses in his cards too

and one of them flips

over and Harlan sees...

You didn't have pocket kings?

I didn't have any kings.

Except the one in the middle.

You had two pair?

I had one pair,

the nines in the middle.

Harlan, what are

you thinking, man?

Thank you.

It wasn't even that

it that much money.

Harlan only lost about

$40,000 on the hand.

But a circuit breaker blew and

Harlan was out for blood now.

Everyone's.

You have 112,000 on the table,

you want another 50?

Give me another hundred, please.

Sign here for 100,000.

By 5 a.m. Harlan was

down half a million.

He'd abandoned everything

he knew about poker

and was playing like a frat kid,

swinging for a home run

on every hand.

Another hundred, please.

-Hey, bud--

-Molly.

Please. Let's go.

Sign here for a hundred.

Six a.m.

Text messages

were going out

letting everyone know

Harlan was bleeding.

Guys were coming by to play for

a couple of hours before work.

They'd been losing

to him for months.

Everyone wanted a check

from Harlan Eustice.

If you go home now,

you can have

a few hours of sleep

before Sheila's party.

Soon.

Come talk to me.

Hi, guys, help yourselves

to some coffee.

You're on tilt.

Everybody knows it.

You're playing without the

weapons you need to win.

You're right.

All right, thank you.

Just give me 500,000.

I just gotta get back to even.

That should be the second

line of every gambler's obit.

"Mr. Feldstein died while

trying to get back to even."

Harlan never did.

And he never got to his

wife's birthday party.

She filed for divorce

two days later.

There was one last punch coming

that would put Harlan

on the floor for good.

Harlan was heads-up against

a guy named Frederick

who was Austrian royalty.

Go.

Harlan had pocket queens.

His Excellency had ace-king.

They were both in 65K pre-flop.

Flop's queen-seven-seven.

Harlan has a full-house again,

queens full of sevens,

with three rounds of

betting in front of him.

The Count has nothing.

All in.

And the Count goes all in.

He wants Harlan to think he's got

two more sevens under there.

Call.

Nope, says Harlan, he's not

falling for this again

and he snap calls all in.

There's $750,000 on the table.

Diego burns a card

and deals the turn.

A king.

Otto von Bismarck

now has two pair,

kings and sevens,

but two-pair's nothing

next to a full house.

And at this point,

the only hand left that can

beat a queen full house,

is a king full house.

Captain Von Trapp

-All right.

bluffed two pair

and rivered into kings full.

Motherf***er!

Motherf***er!

F*** you,

you f***ing mechanic!

Hey!

F*** you! You bottom-dealing

party magician!

Hey!

Get out on the terrace.

You've been pullin' this

sh*t on me for two days!

Come on! Come on!

Party magician.

-You good?

-I'm good, thanks.

What the hell?

I'll apologize to Diego.

Yeah.

And you're gonna go home.

I'm making a floor call, that's it.

Did you hear me?

I don't have it.

A million two.

I don't have it.

I'm sorry.

Go home.

I'm very sorry.

You gotta tell Sheila

the truth, okay?

Tell her the truth.

Tell her what happened.

I'm gonna help you,

I'm gonna get you to a meeting.

We'll meet tomorrow and

figure out what to

do about the money.

Harlan and I didn't

meet the next day.

He just called me and

said everything was okay

and showed up the next

week with a bank check

for a million two hundred

thousand dollars.

Where'd he get the money from?

I loaned it to him.

Loaned it?

I get 50% of his wins

until the debt's paid off

and then 50% for the next

two years with no exposure.

You're getting 50% of the wins

and no exposure on the losses?

Yeah.

First of all, he'll never

climb out of that,

that's sharecropper math.

It's also usury,

it's racketeering.

Second, you can't

stake a player

and play in a game

at the same time.

I've been doing it for two years.

-You've been staking Harlan?

-Yeah.

-Jesus Christ.

-It's not cheating.

It creates the opportunity for it.

Tell me how.

-Are you kidding me?

-Tell me how.

If you have an interest in

another player winning?

You think I'm gonna

take a dive?

And if I did,

who would care?

You fold your hole cards,

five of clubs, jack of hearts,

he's still in the game.

It would benefit him to know

-that the five of clubs--

-You think I'm signaling him?

I'm saying it can't

f***ing happen again.

You disapprove of me.

It's not personal.

It feels personal

when you chat up

every other guy at

the game except me.

When you stay late for a

drink with JT but never--

Have you visited his Oscar?

I think it's bolted on

the hood of his car.

It's noticeable

when you go out of your

way to demonstrate

that you have

no interest in me.

You did the

same thing to Dean.

These guys wanna play

cards with me, not you.

Be that as it may--

You know who the biggest

winner in this game is?

It's you.

You know who he second

biggest winner is?

-Look--

-It's you.

What are you taking home,

ten thousand a night now?

That is my business, literally.

Between you, the dealers,

and the servers,

you're taking a lot of money

out of this game.

Not as much as

I'm bringing to it.

That 10,000 is 10,000 that

doesn't go in my pocket.

Again, my money--

Your money is my money.

Is it?

I think we should talk

about capping your tips.

You want to get together

with the other players,

who on my tax return

are called clients,

and discuss putting a

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