Chapter 10 - The Truth Costs Everyone
James did not invite Victor farther inside.
He did not threaten him either.
That seemed to bother Victor more.
“You are suspended from this property,” James said. “You were told to communicate through counsel.”
Victor glanced at the reporter.
“See?”
Daniel Reeves looked uncomfortable.
“I was told Mr. Hale had arranged an on-record meeting.”
“He did not arrange it with me,” James said.
The reporter shifted his camera bag higher on his shoulder.
“Then I can leave.”
Victor turned toward him.
“Daniel, you came because employees are being pressured.”
Maya laughed from behind the bar.
“By who?”
Victor’s face tightened.
Daniel looked at her.
“Maya Torres?”
She crossed her arms.
“Yes.”
“I’ve been trying to reach you.”
“I know.”
“Would you be willing to speak?”
“Eventually.”
Victor looked betrayed.
“Maya.”
She raised her eyebrows.
“What? You wanted everyone to tell the truth in the same room.”
James stepped away from the door.
“Mr. Reeves, you can stay if the employees want you here. Victor cannot.”
Victor laughed.
“Still controlling the room.”
James’s expression did not change.
“It is my restaurant.”
“There. That’s exactly it.”
Victor looked around at us.
“Everybody wants to make me the monster because I was the person who said no. No free drinks. No missed shifts. No bringing children into the dining room. No stealing inventory.”
His eyes landed on me.
“You were not starving because of me, Grace.”
I felt the old reflex to shrink.
It lasted one second.
Then I stepped forward.
“No. I was starving because I was broke.”
Victor blinked.
“You took advantage of that.”
“I gave you money.”
“Yes.”
The room went still enough for me to hear the refrigerator compressor behind the bar.
“You helped me when I needed help. That is true. You also used that help to control my schedule, take my tips, and make me afraid to disagree with you. That is also true.”
Victor’s face reddened.
“You cannot have it both ways.”
“Why not?”
The question surprised him.
“Why can’t both things be true?” I asked. “Why do you have to be either a saint or a villain before anybody is allowed to judge what you did?”
Maya looked at me.
James did too.
Victor stared at the floor for a moment.
Then he said, “Because nobody else was helping.”
The anger had gone out of his voice.
Now he sounded old.
“When my sister needed chemotherapy, the insurance company denied a drug because they called it experimental. I borrowed from everybody I knew. Nobody gave me terms. Nobody cared about dignity. They wanted dates and collateral.”
Nobody interrupted.
“She died owing money to people who called every morning.”
Victor rubbed one hand over his mouth.
“I promised myself if my people needed cash, they would get it. No bank. No credit check. No begging.”
My anger shifted, not away, but sideways.
“You became the person who called every morning,” I said.
His eyes snapped to mine.
I had not meant to be cruel.
The truth was cruel enough.
Victor looked like I had slapped him.
Daniel Reeves slowly took out a notebook.
Victor noticed.
“Don’t write that.”
Daniel paused.
Victor laughed once, bitterly.
“Of course you’re writing it.”
After several minutes of silence, James spoke.
“Victor, helping people does not give you ownership of them.”
Victor turned on him.
“And fear does?”
James’s face hardened.
“No.”
“Your father thought it did.”
“My father is not standing here.”
“No. You are. Wearing his name. Benefiting from everything he built.”
James took that without flinching.
“Correct.”
Victor frowned.
James continued.
“And that means I own the damage attached to it too.”
The sentence seemed to take something out of Victor.
For a moment I saw not a tyrant, not a victim, but a middle-aged man who had spent so long believing control was responsibility that he could no longer tell the difference.
Daniel looked around.
“May I ask one question?”
Nobody answered, which he apparently took as permission.
“Why is there a New Year’s dinner if the restaurant is in the middle of this?”
James looked toward the long dining room.
“Because it was scheduled as a charity dinner for the neighborhood food pantry.”
Victor snorted.
“Good optics.”
“It was scheduled six months ago.”
“Cancel it.”
James looked at me.
I shook my head before I realized he was not asking.
Maya said, “Don’t.”
Everyone turned toward her.
She walked out from behind the bar.
“Do the dinner.”
James frowned.
“With what staff?”
“Us.”
Maria, who had been stacking menus near the host stand, looked up.
Maya continued.
“Not because everything is fixed. Because it isn’t. But half the food was donated. The pantry planned around it. Why should the neighborhood lose dinner because Victor and James spent years confusing fear with management?”
“Thank you,” James said dryly.
“You’re welcome.”
A few people laughed.
Maya looked at the employees.
“If anyone doesn’t want to work it, don’t. Paid either way. But I’ll be here.”
Luis raised his hand.
“Me too.”
Maria nodded.
Then Andre.
One by one, hands rose.
Not everybody.
That made the choice more real.
Three people walked out.
James watched them leave and did not stop them.
Victor looked around the room as though he could not understand what he was seeing.
“You think one dinner changes anything?”
“No,” I said. “That’s why we’re not pretending it does.”
Daniel Reeves closed his notebook.
“I think I have enough for today.”
Victor looked at him.
“You haven’t heard what I have on Moretti.”
James’s eyes sharpened.
Daniel hesitated.
Victor reached inside his coat.
Elias moved instantly.
Victor stopped and slowly pulled out a folded set of photocopies.
“Relax.”
He held them toward Daniel.
“Old payroll ledgers. Cash bonuses. Payments to people who never worked here. James’s father ran half this place off the books.”
James stared at the papers.
Victor’s mouth curved.
“That name on the door? You want to own the damage? Start there.”
Daniel took the copies.
James did not stop him.
May you like
But I saw the look on James’s face.
Victor had finally found the wound that went deeper than the restaurant.
