Chapter 4: Largest Creditor

On Monday morning I walked into the Rask Grand boardroom at nine fifty-eight.

I wore my good gray coat, and my ER badge was still clipped to the pocket.

Twelve directors sat around a table of dark wood.

Lowell was at the head, Odette at his right, and Donovan two seats down in a charcoal suit with his left cuff buttoned tight.

Summer sat against the wall with a laptop and a legal pad.

Every face turned toward the door.

"Kathleen," Odette said, in her warm voice. "Darling, what a surprise. We discussed you being unwell."

"Good morning," I said. "I'd like it in the minutes that I arrived on time and sober."

Somebody coughed.

The director who chaired the finance committee was an old man with a silver pen.

He cleared his throat. "Mrs. Rask, this is a closed session of the board."

"I know. I'm here about item four."

Item four was the vote on the Rask Grand refinancing.

The loan would let Lowell cover everything the family owed and call it a rescue.

I had read the agenda on the hotel's own intranet at six that morning, using the login I still had as the CEO's wife.

Lowell stood up slowly.

"Kathleen, we can talk about family matters tonight."

"This isn't a family matter."

I walked to the table, took the black card out of my coat pocket and laid it face up in front of the chairman's empty water glass.

It looked very small on the polished wood.

Nobody moved.

"On Saturday night," I said, "Lowell Rask pledged me to a house that holds fifty billion dollars of his gambling debt."

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