Misa smiled as the band played quietly in the back, "So. My mystery knight in shining armor… Tell me about yourself."
Beyond smirked, "First of all, I own no such shiny armor. And if I did it wouldn't be shiny… That means the metal hasn't been tested." He gave her a wry smirk, "I'm just a guy whose on a path to no where, going fast." He flashed a charming smile. "What about you?"
Misa smiled, "I'm a model. I'm widowed… Um." She looked up to lock eye contact with Beyond, 'Yikes. It's almost intimidating when you have his full attention…' "There isn't much to me anymore…"
Beyond trailed his eyes down and stared at his glass, "Well… Aren't we the boring couple of dopes." Misa smiled, her smile quickly faded when he stood up and held out his hand, "Where as staring at each other might be labeled as entertainment to some, I heard big talk of a lucky woman."
Misa watched with wide eyes as the small pile of chips Beyond started with was tripled in size. "Wow!"
Beyond smirked, "Guess you are lucky." Misa blushed at his soft smile, "Why don't you try?" He stood up and let Misa sit down where he was.
"But… I don't know how to play this game…" Misa peeked at the two cards in front of her.
Beyond leaned next to her with his arm around her shoulders, "That's okay. It's just money. I'll teach you." Some of the wives and girlfriends around them all gave them that 'aww' stare. "Now. You're going to look at these two cards the dealer gives you. You have to decide if you think it will be a good hand to bet on. I would say it is. So, you have to make your bet on your turn."
Misa nodded with determination and waited for her turn and threw her bet into the middle of the table. The dealer dealt three cards, Misa looked back to Beyond, he nodded, "That's the flop… These cards will help build your hand, so if your cards that you have, can't make a good hand you would fold… Which I would." Misa nodded and pushed her cards in when it came to her turn.
Misa looked up disappointed, "I'm sorry. I wasted a bet."
He nudged her with his shoulder, "Don't worry about it. I think it's more fun to teach you how to play, than rob these guys blind." He flashed her a charming smile that she returned. He dealer flipped another card. Beyond leaned in to her, "That's the turn, it's another card that's flipped to build even better hands. Same with the last card he will flip, but that one is known as the river."
Misa nodded, "Alright! I get it!" She gave a grand smile and leaned her head against Beyond.
He chuckled, "The trick, is to play the way that suits you. For me, I'm an aggressive person, so it makes sense for me to be an aggressive player, so I'll bait people into betting more and more. But never give away that you have a good or a bad hand, so you have to try to be as emotionless as possible, but your smile is just so blinding, you could probably get away with giggling the whole game and no one would even mind." He smirked at the glares the men were receiving from their accompanying women.
Misa blushed, "You're something else."
He leaned in close to her ear and whispered softly, "Learning how to count cards in Texas Hold Em is a little bit different from learning how to count cards in blackjack. In Hold Em, the dealer will reshuffle the cards after each hand, so there is no accumulation of information from hand to hand. The previous hand has absolutely no bearing on the odds of a certain card appearing in the next hand. Also, when trying to count cards in Texas Hold Em, you only get to see your own two cards and the common cards in the middle of the table. So, even though there might be cards no longer in play, such as the burn cards or the cards that other players have folded, since you don't get to see those cards they don't add to your ability to get an accurate count of what cards are left in the deck."
Misa widened her eyes and glanced at him then smirked deviously, "It all makes sense now!"
He gave her a crooked smile and leaned his lips against her ear, mocking perfectly, a romantic gesture, "I should teach you… So, that you can work dually with me when we're short on funds and need to win some money." He winked at her.
Misa giggled, "I like this game! It's fun!"
The dealer dealt another hand. He gave her a wolfish grin, "Count the number of cards you know. You always know the two cards that you have in your hand. After the flop you can account for three more cards. This number increases to four on the turn and five on the river. In rare cases, you might account for another card, if a player accidentally exposed his or her cards, for instance..." Beyond chuckled and placed a soft kiss on her neck causing her to squeak and startle, knocking a drink over, scaring the player next to her. He jolted up and accidentally dropped his top card from his hand. Beyond looked up, "I'm so sorry, sir!" The gentlemen waved it off with a smile, "Now, that's three cards you know…" He smiled against her ear.
Misa smiled, "You really are something else."
"Count the cards that are significant to the situation. You have two hearts in your hand, and there are also two hearts on the flop. You want to know the odds of hitting your flush. You need to know how likely it is that a heart will come on the turn, and then again on the river, so you need to know how many hearts are left." The dealer dropped the flop of the game. "You have now accounted for four of the hearts in the deck already, which leaves nine that you still haven't seen. So you see, you're not cheating in Poker when you 'count' the cards." He smiled brightly at her smile.
Misa leaned a little closer exposing a small amount of cleavage, nothing trashy, but an elegant amount, "Situational awareness is what you're teaching me then." He nodded and smirked at two of the players distracted by Misa's movements.
"Next lesson in counting, Count the number of cards you don't know. In the previous example, you have also seen five of the fifty-two cards in the deck. So, there are forty-seven cards that you haven't seen." Misa smirked at him.
Misa smiled at Beyond, "Thank you for teaching me… Even if I'm losing all your money." She blushed a little bashfully. 'He's surprisingly patient…'
Beyond smiled, "Because, I'm not a tool… Calculate the odds of certain cards coming. Continuing the example, in order to calculate the odds of hitting a flush on the turn, you can now use the basic counts that you've done to compute the odds. There are forty-seven cards that you haven't seen. Nine of them will complete your flush and thirty-eight of them won't. So, the odds of hitting your flush on the turn are thirty-eight to nine, or roughly four to one."
Misa smiled at her cards as the turn came about. "I get it!"
"Make sure you haven't double counted any cards. The most important thing to remember when trying to count cards in Texas Hold Em is to never double count the cards that you need to make your hand, also known as your 'outs'. You have Jack and ten of hearts and the flop is nine, eight, two, with two hearts. There are nine cards that will complete your flush. There are also eight cards that will complete your straight; four queens and four sevens. The total number of "outs," though, is not seventeen since you've already counted the queen of hearts and the seven of hearts. The straight draw only adds six, rather than eight cards to your "outs," for a total of fifteen. Therefore, the odds of hitting either a flush or a straight on the turn is thirty-eight to fifteen or roughly two and a half to one." He gave her a sincere smile, "Understand?"
Misa nodded and smiled, "I do. Thank you for teaching me how to be a good player!" She leaned in and kissed his cheek, earning a lopsided smirk.