Cam: For them, and for me. Honestly, shutting down was something I should have done ages ago.
Juanita: So why didn’t you?
Cam: Because like me or not, all those people depended on me for a job. They depended on me for a paycheck and health care. My mother depended on me. Jade and the kids depended on me. I’m the one who put a roof over everybody’s heads and food on everybody’s table.
Juanita: And not just any roof. Your roof covers six thousand square feet in one of the most desirable neighborhoods in Buckhead.
Cam: Do you want it? Because I hear the bank’s still looking for a buyer.
Juanita: I can’t afford it, which is exactly my point. The asking price is well into the seven figures.
Cam: I’m sure they’ll work with you on the price. There hasn’t exactly been a run on the place after what happened upstairs. Nobody wants to live there. I certainly don’t.
Juanita: But what happens to your employees? With five locations, the number must have been well into the hundreds. That’s a lot of waitstaff and dishwashers and bartenders out of work.
Cam: They’re the best in the business, they’ll find another job. Most of them probably already have.
Juanita: That sounds a bit harsh.
Cam: Does it? I’m only saying it because it’s true. My staff were trained to serve the most demanding clientele, and any chef in town would be lucky to have them. And look, did I make mistakes? Absolutely. Are there things I wish I could go back and do differently? Hell, yes. But do you have any idea how hard it is to run a restaurant, much less a chain of them? I did what I had to to survive.
Juanita: Did you garnish their wages?
Cam: [smiling] Let me guess, we’re talking about George. For the record, I didn’t garnish, I subtracted the costs of the damages he inflicted during one of his infamous tantrums. Ask any of my former employees. George is known for his temper, and the last night he was with us he destroyed my kitchen. There were plenty of witnesses.
Juanita: Okay, but what led up to him breaking those things? And what do you say to the other complaints, the ones of improper firings and questionable business practices?
Cam: I’d say I made a ton of mistakes. I’d say I got carried away by the glitz and the fame, by the television appearances and fancy parties and people eating at a Lasky steak house just so they could get a picture with me. What’s that old saying? The higher your star, the farther it is to fall. That’s not an excuse, but I hope it’s an explanation, at least.
Juanita: How many lawsuits are you dealing with right now?
Cam: Enough.
Juanita: How many, Mr. Lasky?
Cam: Three. The fourth we settled last week.
Juanita: So when you received the call from Jade that someone was in your home, holding your family for ransom, did you suspect any of your former employees and business partners?
Cam: I suspected all of them.
J A D E
3:52 p.m.
The asshole separated us.
After he rushed the three of us upstairs, after he tied me to the blue chair in the guest room, he pressed a six-inch strip of silver duct tape over my mouth, took the kids by the hands and led them out the door.
Now they are in the playroom across the hall, doing God knows what, while I am here, helpless, attached to a chair. Losing my damn mind.
What is he doing to them?
What is happening?
I hold my breath and strain to hear, but I can’t pick up on anything other than a muffled murmur of their voices spilling into the hallway and my own heart banging against my ribs. From where I sit, I can see a slice of hall, one of the two double doors swung wide, but that room is like a vault. Walls soundproofed within an inch of their life, with double layers of insulated drywall lined with vinyl sheets and pockets of air so that Cam can crank the volume on his movies up to deafening, and the rest of the house doesn’t have to listen along.
But with the doors open, I would hear if there was screaming. If God forbid there were gunshots. I think these things, and my entire world teeters on a knife-edge. I am shaking—no, convulsing with fear and frustration and fury. If he hurts them, if he so much as touches a hair on my babies’ heads, I will kill him with my bare hands.
I thrash against my bindings, but they hold firm. Braided vinyl rope, bright yellow and scratchy, wrapped multiple times around each ankle and wrist then strapped to the brass arms and legs of this blue velvet chair. The rope is too tight to wriggle loose, the slipknot tied with a sailor’s skill. No way I can pull free without a knife.
And I can’t scream, not with the duct tape over my mouth. Not that anybody would hear me, but still. If I could, I’d sure as hell try.