"If you won't give me face, then I've got no reason to give you any either."
Janet's eyes were fixed on me as the words came out.
I smiled. "I've already called the police. We'll wait for them."
I turned to glance at the clients behind me.
This was supposed to be a client dinner, after all. That things had gone this far was embarrassing, and I owed them an apology.
"Everyone, I'm sorry about this. You're welcome to leave first."
"We can pick up the partnership discussion tomorrow."
"Don't worry. I'll handle this myself."
I addressed the group directly.
They nodded, understanding the situation.
Several of them were already rising to go.
The moment Janet saw that, her whole demeanor changed. Anger flashed across her face and she fixed me with a hard stare. "Nobody's going anywhere!"
"Lock the doors. Now."
"Not a single person walks out of here until this bill is paid in full."
The two security guards behind her moved at once and pulled the doors closed.
They slammed shut with a heavy thud.
Janet's stare was cold and unblinking when she turned back to me. "Ms. Dickerson, I'm warning you right now. You don't pay, nobody leaves this room."
"A woman in your position, Ms. Dickerson—you can afford to settle a bill. Don't make this ugly for everyone."
Her voice was ice, threaded with warning.
My clients frowned, their gazes shifting to me.
I knew what they were thinking—that I was the one trying to skip out on the tab.
"Lucille, what's going on here exactly?"
"If it's not that much, a few of us can cover it. No big deal."
A couple of clients I'd known for years spoke up.
I shook my head and set the two-hundred-thousand-dollar bill down in front of them.
The whole table froze. Then several faces went dark with anger.
These people had eaten here with me plenty of times. They knew what a normal tab looked like.
This was nothing close to normal.
Eight bottles of premium red wine, opened all at once.
Not to mention the cigarettes and liquor on top of that.
I always picked up the check when I hosted. They knew the boundaries and would never have ordered like this.
Janet watched their expressions harden and immediately turned back to me. "Ms. Dickerson, these are all your clients."
"Surely you don't want them stuck in this room with you indefinitely?"
"If you won't pay, none of you are leaving."
She said it like it was already decided.
I looked at her. Smugness was written all over her face.
She was betting that I'd cave because I had clients in the room. That I'd pay just to save face in front of them.
What she didn't realize was that these clients and I went back years, and the trust ran deep. And beyond that, I wasn't about to comply just because she demanded it.
The moment Janet had walked in, I'd quietly hit record on my phone.
I knew exactly what this kind of situation called for: evidence.
"Janet, I'm not paying this."
I held her gaze. "And I have every reason to believe you're trying to pin someone else's charges on me."
"The police have been called."
"We'll sort this out when they get here."
Janet's face went dark. She stared at me, hard—then her gaze cut sideways toward my clients.
