Maxim shrugs. “I don’t know, but you could start by looking at who thinks you owe them seven hundred thousand and some change. The answer is in the number.”

I nod. “Yeah, but there’s more than one possibility, if you know what I mean.”

“You’ve burned some bridges, huh?” He leans back in his chair, shaking his head. “What did I tell you about loose ends, kid? You’ve got to tie them up, otherwise they come back later to bite you.”

Maxim doesn’t mean this literally. He means bury the bodies under three feet of concrete, which is how he wraps up his loose ends. And though I may occasionally use Maxim’s money to bridge the tight spots in my business, I don’t operate the way he does. I’m a chef with money problems, not a mobster.

But I also run a crew of oddballs and misfits, most of whom could stand to brush up on their anger management skills. Sometimes I’m the one stepping in to defuse the situation, other times I’m on the receiving end of the punches.

But at the end of the day, a restaurant is a business. I’m the one out here taking the risks, doing the backroom deals with guys like Maxim in order to stay afloat. I’ll choose my family over any one of those knuckleheads every time. There are going to be some burned bridges.

“As much as I’d love to deliberate which maniac is in my house right now, Maxim, I don’t have time. I have exactly—” I glance at my watch and the room goes upside down “—forty-eight minutes to get my ass home with a bag of cash. If you don’t loan me that money, I won’t... I can’t... I don’t think I can save them.”

He stares across the desk at me. Rock-hard. Giving me nothing. No pity, no sympathy and, most importantly, no olive branch. Not even a teeny tiny twig. Every last ounce of hope I was holding on to with both hands fades away like a cheap buzz.

I toss the cigarette in the ashtray and drop my head in my shaking hands, pressing down hard with my palms until my skull creaks. I wish I could go back and rewind this shitty, shitty day, and undo every one of my decisions. All of them.