Merrick was still puzzled by the missing reserve tray. The kitchen had recorded an additional premium item, yet no such item appeared in the regular cart. If Bria and Lenora had simply taken Zire's meal because no promotional food was available, the inventory might have been wrong. But if a legitimate promotional tray had existed somewhere on the aircraft, their choice to take food from paying passengers would be even harder to explain.
Roland asked Orla to examine the catering shelves rather than rely solely on the digital count. Orla found the legacy handling slot empty and the reserve position marked as loaded. She checked the rear galley supply record and confirmed that the item had not been moved there. Her staff had delivered a sealed promotional pasta tray along with the ten premium pre-orders, but the crew could not locate it.
"If it's aboard, somebody moved it," Orla said.
Bria looked up from the crew seat. "Maybe a catering runner put it on the wrong cart."
"My people handed it to the cabin team at the front door," Orla replied. "The handoff was signed."
Lenora shifted in her chair. Zire noticed that she glanced toward an unused service cart parked behind a row of water bottles. He followed her eyes, but Merrick was busy comparing the tablet entries and did not notice. Zire held onto the observation rather than interrupting, wanting to be certain there was a reason to ask about the cart.
A soft vibration came from Lenora's phone. She lifted it slightly, and the screen lit with a notification from a contact saved as Bria C. The preview displayed a sentence short enough to read from across the aisle: Delete the second video. The boy saw too much. Lenora's thumb moved instinctively toward the screen, but she stopped when she realized Merrick was looking.
"What second video?" Merrick asked.
"That's a private message."
"It appears to concern the incident we're reviewing."
Lenora tucked the phone closer to herself. "I'm not required to show you my personal conversations."
Roland kept his voice even. "No one is going to force you to hand over your phone. But I am asking you not to delete any relevant recording while this review is under way."
Zire had read only the visible sentence and was already struggling with the timing. When Lenora opened the message thread, the notification showed that Bria had actually sent it at 8:45, well before boarding began. How could she have claimed that the boy had seen too much at a moment when Zire had not yet encountered either woman about his missing food?
He looked at Bria. "What did you think I'd seen at 8:45?"
Her lips parted slightly. "The message isn't what it appears to be."
"Then what does it mean?"