Simone said nothing. She knew better than to ask an open-ended question when she was trying to protect a conversation from becoming unnecessarily revealing. Margot filled the silence herself. "I had quite an incident on my flight this morning. It took several airline employees to sort out a woman who decided a premium seat belonged to her. Incredible what people try now."
Eleanor looked toward her with a small frown. They had spoken after the flight, but Margot had not described it that way. She had mentioned a technicality, not a woman claiming another passenger's seat. Eleanor was accustomed to watching Margot's stories become more flattering to their teller with each retelling, and the change made her uncomfortable.
"What happened?" David asked, taking care to sound neutral. Margot turned to him. He was wearing a dark suit and an expression of professional attentiveness, and she took his interest as an invitation to perform the anecdote. "Some woman in a cheap sweater decided she could sit in the window seat I always use. Then she refused to move when I asked her.
The crew had to call security. It's getting ridiculous, David. People act as though buying a ticket makes them entitled to everything." "Did she have a boarding pass for that seat?" David asked.
Margot waved a hand. "There was some mistake in the system. I don't know why anyone would insist on making it an argument. I explained who I was, and eventually the senior attendant understood." "Did she refuse to leave when asked?" Simone said.
"At first. She kept repeating that she'd paid for the seat, as though money were the only issue." Margot smiled, expecting agreement. "You'd be amazed how stubborn some people become when they think they're being denied something they're not accustomed to having."
David felt his pulse quicken. The words fit too closely with the few things Simone had said about Adrienne's experience, but he refused to jump ahead. He had spent too many years listening to complicated disputes become worse because the people involved asked leading questions instead of establishing what had actually happened. He picked up his pen.
"Did you happen to get the woman's name?" he asked.
"No. Why would I?" Margot said. "A Black woman, middle-aged, very plainly dressed. I don't mean anything by that, of course. She was simply an unpleasant person, and the crew had to get her off."
Eleanor looked down. Across the table, Simone's face became almost completely still, the way it did when she was working hard to avoid a visible reaction. David placed his pen on the table and rested both hands beside it. Margot's description had supplied the piece neither of them wanted to hear. "That sounds unpleasant," David said carefully. "For everyone involved."
"I wasn't about to let it ruin my day," Margot replied. "I have a ninety-million-dollar agreement to sign. That puts one little seat dispute in perspective, doesn't it?"
She laughed softly and took a sip of water. The laughter did not find an echo, but she seemed not to notice. She asked about the company's investment timeline, the projected deployment schedule, and whether the photographs for the announcement would be taken before or after the signing. She was eager to move on from the story she had just told, because to her it had been nothing more than proof that she was accustomed to being taken seriously.
David began the discussion with questions about Whitfield Mobility's service operations. He asked how the company handled passenger complaints involving drivers and dispatchers, what escalation procedures existed for vulnerable customers, and whether the board received unfiltered information about patterns of mistreatment. Margot gave the broad answers she had practiced. There was a code of conduct, a complaint portal, and an employee training program, all described in terms that sounded substantial until David asked how they actually worked.