"No restrictions. Thank you."
"Good. I'll be back."
As she left, Leon watched her stop at table nine to collect a plate, then pause at table eleven to help an older woman retrieve a dropped napkin. She did not rush the woman, although Darren was watching from the service station with the fixed expression of a man measuring every second that could not be converted into a sale.
The kitchen was loud enough to make private conversations difficult, but Darren had a way of speaking that carried through the room whenever he wanted it to. Leon heard him before Roz reached the pass.
"Twenty-two by the door," Darren said. "Special sixty-eight for him."
A man's voice answered from the kitchen. "It's thirty-four, sir. It's been thirty-four since we opened."
"Three weeks, Benny," Darren replied. "Ellis retires, and I sign your schedule."
The kitchen went quiet for a beat.
"Yes, sir," Benny said.
Leon looked down at his menu, though he had already ordered. He wrote another line in his notebook.
12:24. Manager directs price override: $68 for $34 menu item.
He had not come to Ninth expecting to discover a crime. He had expected impatience, perhaps a little snobbery, a few bad habits that could be corrected with training. A manager deliberately doubling the price of a meal because of the person ordering it was something else.
Roz returned with a glass of water and a small plate of bread. "The fish will be about ten minutes. The chef is finishing a couple of orders."
"No rush."
"You've already had enough waiting for one day. I'll keep an eye on it."
She moved toward the kitchen, and Leon noticed that Benny, the line cook who had challenged Darren, looked at her with an expression that was part apology and part warning. He was a compact man in his mid-thirties with a shaved head and a faded tattoo on one forearm. He worked quickly, but his eyes kept moving toward the service station.
When the fish arrived, Roz carried it herself. She placed the plate carefully in front of Leon, turning the lemon so it sat beside the fish instead of under it.
"Careful, the plate's hot."
Leon cut into the fish. The flesh separated cleanly, the outside crisp without being dry, the brown butter balanced by the sharpness of the capers. He tasted a second bite before speaking.
"Your kitchen salts it right. Most don't."
Roz looked pleased. "I'll tell Benny. He'll pretend not to care, but he'll care."
"You know your food."
"I know what I like, and I know what makes people come back. Those aren't always the same thing, but they should be."
Leon looked at her more carefully. "You're not really just a server, are you?"
She laughed softly. "Today I am. Tomorrow I have a class at eight, and next week I have a practical exam. I'm finishing a hospitality management degree one semester at a time."
"Planning to run a room like this?"
"A room like this, yes. This room, exactly as it is? No. I'd like to run a place where the guest doesn't have to guess whether the person serving them is being honest."
"What does honest look like?"
Roz answered without hesitation. "Same check, same fish, for everybody. No secret prices because somebody's wearing old boots. No making a person feel grateful just because we finally do the job we're paid to do."
Leon felt the words settle somewhere deeper than he expected. He thought of his mother, who had once told him that the kitchen could make a good meal, but the front of the house decided whether a person felt welcome enough to taste it.