David was silent for a moment. "You still want to go in tonight as a customer?"
"I made the reservation three days ago. It was confirmed."
"Maya, we have years of complaints. You don't need to test them personally."
She considered the framed photograph.
"Numbers tell us where a problem lives," she replied. "They don't always tell us what it feels like to stand inside it."
"I don't love this."
"Neither do I. But I want to see how the front door works before I change the sign above it."
David sighed. "Then promise me you'll leave if anyone threatens you. Whatever happens, the company comes first, and that includes you."
Maya smiled faintly. "You sound like my mother."
"Your mother has better judgment."
After the call, Maya opened the last page of the acquisition proposal. She had authorized a price of $4.7 million for the operating business and associated rights, with a separate long-term lease arrangement for the property. A further $800,000 was reserved for renovations and training. It was a large commitment, but one grounded in meticulous due diligence, not impulse.
On a sticky note beside the proposal, she had written a sentence from Pearl: Feed people first. Impress them second.
Maya folded the note and placed it inside her handbag.
That afternoon she would put on her navy blazer, confirm her reservation, and enter Meridian Prime without an entourage. She expected to learn something about the restaurant.
She did not expect a woman at the front desk to tear up her proof that she belonged there.
At four twenty that afternoon, Meridian Prime was nearly empty, and the staff moved through the dining room preparing for dinner service.
Maria Alvarez polished wineglasses beneath a brass lamp. She had worked at the restaurant for almost six years, long enough to remember the days when the dining room had been full every Friday and a reservation on Saturday required planning weeks in advance. The guests were still wealthy. The china was still expensive. The kitchen still produced beautiful food. But somewhere along the way, the room had lost the happy noise that used to rise when people were enjoying themselves.
"You're doing that one again," said Luis Ortega.
Maria glanced at the glass in her hand. She had polished it so thoroughly that the stem squeaked against the cloth.
"My mind's somewhere else."
Luis was nineteen, a busser saving for culinary school. He carried a stack of folded napkins and had the careful posture of a person who had learned to make himself unobtrusive. "Manager's in a mood."
"Which one?"
"All three."
Maria looked toward the hostess station. Brittany Foster stood before a mirror tucked beneath the counter, checking her hair. At twenty-six, Brittany was efficient with regulars, quick with names, and skilled at making a dinner reservation seem like an invitation to a private society. Those qualities had earned praise from Richard Whitmore, the general manager. Other habits, less admirable, had been encouraged by the same praise.