All Chapters of Seafood Feast, Dine and Weep: Chapter 1 - Chapter 8

8 Chapters

Chapter 1

Me: [That seafood restaurant isn't run by my family. My family's shop is the little breakfast place next door. Everyone's misunderstood.]For two seconds after I sent that message, the chat went quiet.Then Denise Sutton posted a video.In the clip, I walked into the seafood restaurant, and the hostess greeted me with a smile. "Amy, you're back! What are you in the mood for today?"Denise slapped a string of question marks under it.[Not your family's place? If it's not your family's place, why does the hostess know you by name? Why's she asking what you want to eat?][Amy, nobody's trying to freeload off you. I'm paying for this. I'm supporting your family's business, and you're throwing up excuses and acting difficult. What's the point of that?]My stomach dropped. That video had been secretly filmed the night before, right after I left work.I was about to explain myself when Tyler Chapman — who was usually friendly enough with me — beat me to it. [Is this really necessary,

Chapter 2

I took a deep breath and typed out my reply, pressing hard on the screen.Me: [The owner next door and I are just neighbors. He's a good man who occasionally treats me to a meal, that's all.]Me: [I'm telling the truth. If nobody minds, you're all welcome to come to my family's breakfast shop instead. I'll have my mom pick up fresh seafood, and she's a great cook. She won't shortchange anyone…]Once my message went out, the chat went quiet again.After a long pause, someone finally responded.[That greasy little breakfast place next door? Gross. If we're eating there, I'm out for Saturday.][Same here.]Denise immediately jumped back in, tagging the whole group.[Don't worry, everyone. It's the place I dropped the pin for — no mistake. We're all still on for Saturday.]The chat lit right back up.[@Amy, the lobster needs to be sashimi-style, sliced thin.][Steam the king crab with garlic, and don't break the legs.][My kid only eats tuna belly. Get a few extra servings.]A

Chapter 3

Someone tagged me in the chat.[Amy, my wife's allergic to shrimp. Steam her a separate grouper when we're there.]Another message popped up right after.[My dad's got gout, no shellfish for him. Make him a private bowl of oatmeal with foie gras, freshly made — don't you dare fob him off with day-old leftovers.]I gave a cold, silent laugh. Eating and drinking for free wasn't enough for them — now they wanted to work me like hired help?I didn't reply. The next morning, I went straight to Gerald's office.Gerald was on the sofa, drinking coffee. I got straight to the point."Gerald, you saw the message I sent yesterday, right? That seafood restaurant really isn't—"Gerald's face darkened. He set his cup down, not gently."Amy, your attitude is a real problem."My stomach dropped.He frowned and rapped his knuckles hard on the desk. "Do you honestly think I care about some birthday party? You think I'm dying for a taste of your seafood? I'm doing this for the company!" He s

Chapter 4

Saturday came.At noon, someone started pounding on my front door."Amy! Open up!"Denise's booming voice cut straight through the door. "We're here to get you! Amy!"The knocking turned to full-on fist-pounding, hard enough to shake the whole building. A neighbor stuck his head out to look, and Denise called over to him, all smiles. "We're Amy's coworkers, here to pick her up for a meal."Then she turned back to the door, and her smile went cold. "Amy, your grandmother's still at the nursing home, isn't she? If you don't open this door right now, we'll go pay her a visit instead."My temper flared. I yanked the door open, and before I could get a word out, a hand grabbed a fistful of my hair."What took you so long?" Denise's grip was brutal. Without another word, she hauled me toward the elevator. A couple of other coworkers grabbed my arms and wouldn't let go."Amy, you're the guest of honor today. How could we do this without you?"I stumbled down the stairwell, my scalp b

Chapter 5

Denise's lips trembled, then she screamed. "Nonsense! You must have set this up with Amy! This is her restaurant! She's the owner! The two of you are in on this together, trying to con me!"She jabbed a finger back and forth between Marcus and me, practically leaping out of her seat like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.Marcus slapped the business license down on the table, pointing impatiently at the registered owner's name."Read it carefully. My last name is Doyle. This restaurant has nothing to do with Amy. Her family's shop is next door. They sell meat pies."Dead silence fell over the room.Clear as day. No room for argument.An uproar broke out."So then, what we've been eating this whole time is—"Kevin shot to his feet, his chair clattering to the floor."This restaurant's owner was in the news before. Someone tried to dine and dash here, and then..."He didn't finish the sentence, but everyone understood exactly what he meant.The whole table went cold, like t

Chapter 6

Kevin was the first to slam his hand on the table and stand up."Denise!" His face flushed red, veins bulging in his neck as he jabbed a finger straight at her."You're the one who kept insisting this was Amy's family's restaurant. You're the one who swore you'd treat us to this meal in the group chat and told everyone to come. Now that it's blown up, you'll have to answer for it!"Denise scrambled up off the floor, screaming back like she'd lost her mind."Didn't all of you eat too? Huh? Who ate the lobster? Who tore through the king crab? Twenty-four bottles of cognac — did all of that go down my throat alone?"She jabbed a finger at Kevin's face. "You alone put away three pounds of lobster meat, and now you're playing innocent?"Paula Franklin from HR slammed her gift bags down on the table and crossed her arms with a cold laugh."Denise, did you forget who started the sign-up thread in the first place? We're all victims of your scheme.""Victims?" Denise's laugh came out sh

Chapter 7

The mediation room at the police station had lights so white they hurt to look at.The mediator squared up the fifty-three identification forms and tapped them against the table. "Everything's on record. This is the arrangement you all agreed to yourselves — Denise covers forty percent of the total cost, Gerald covers twenty percent, and the remaining forty percent is split evenly among everyone else present. Sign here."Denise's hand shook so badly she could barely hold the pen.Gerald's face had gone the gray of a wrung-out dish rag, a vein pulsing hard at his temple.The rest lined up one by one to sign. With every signature, someone muttered a curse or slammed their pen down.The colleague with the family of six had to come up with nearly three thousand dollars. His eyes were rimmed red as he signed, and the look he gave Denise could have skinned her alive.Only a handful of people could actually pay on the spot. Everyone else signed IOUs, pressed their thumbprints onto them,

Chapter 8

That night, Denise posted a sprawling, several-hundred-word rant on social media, dripping with crying emojis.[I was such a fool to treat Amy Hartwell like family. She set this whole trap from the very beginning, deliberately staying quiet, watching all of us walk right into it. Here's the address of her family's breakfast shop. Does someone with a heart this poisonous even deserve to run a business?]Underneath, she'd attached a photo of the shop's storefront, the address and unit number clearly visible.Once she'd posted it, she decided it wasn't enough and forwarded it to every group chat she could find.Within minutes, the comments under her post exploded. People who had no idea what was actually going on piled on with insults. Others took screenshots and shared them further, and some messaged her privately asking what had happened.Denise replied to comment after comment, getting more worked up with every message, sounding like she'd suffered some grave injustice.I looked

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