Chapter 4 - The Receipts
Table four had left two hundred and six dollars in tips. Emily knew because she had cleared the table herself, and because the man had said “keep the change” in the loud, generous way of a man who wanted the room to hear him.
The register showed thirty-eight dollars.
She stood at the terminal with her finger on the screen. She scrolled up. Table two: forty-five dollars in tips recorded, eleven dollars entered. Table seven: ninety dollars left, twenty-two entered.
She opened the report drawer and took out the receipts.
“Emily.”
She turned.
Vanessa was standing at the end of the bar with her hands folded.
“Those reports aren’t your responsibility,” Vanessa said. “Put them down and get back to your tables before Richard notices.”
“I’m not accusing anyone,” Emily said. “I just want to understand why the tips recorded don’t match what the guests paid.”
Vanessa glanced toward the office. “Management adjusts those figures under our internal policy.”
“What policy?”
“It’s not my policy.”
“Whose is it?”
Vanessa didn’t answer.
“Vanessa.” Emily lowered her voice. “Trust me. I’m not trying to make trouble. I’m asking a question about money that doesn’t belong to me and doesn’t belong to you either. It belongs to the people who worked those tables.”
“Questioning it about money never ends well,” Vanessa said. “Trust me on that.”
The office door opened.
Richard Collins came out with his glasses in his hand, and he saw the receipts in Emily’s fingers, and his face changed.
“Emily,” he said. “Hand me those immediately.”
She did not move.
“I’m only asking where our tips went, Mr. Collins. We worked for that money and we deserve an explanation.”
“You don’t get to question management.”
“I’m not questioning management. I’m questioning a number.”
“You’ve already challenged my authority tonight,” Richard said, “and I won’t tolerate another incident.”
Vanessa stepped between them. “Richard. It’s late. Let me handle this.”
“Put those papers down,” Richard said to Emily, “and return to your tables before I make this permanent.”
Emily looked at the receipts in her hand.
Richard signed these adjustments himself, she thought. This isn’t a simple mistake.
“Something is happening to everyone’s tips,” she said. “And I need answers.”
Richard took the receipts out of her hand. He did it carefully, without snatching, and that was somehow worse.
“Go home,” he said. “We’ll discuss this in the morning.”
She should have gone home. She knew that afterward, in the way people know things they cannot prove. She should have walked out the staff door and gotten on the bus and done the arithmetic and let it go.
Instead she went to the back office to get her bag.
The office was empty. Richard was still in the dining room. The cash drawer was open, because it was always open at closing, and the receipts she had been holding were sitting on the desk where he had set them down.
Emily stood in the doorway for one second.
That was all it took.
She stepped inside, picked up the top receipt, and held it under the desk lamp to read the adjustment code written in the margin. She did not touch the drawer. She did not even look at the drawer.
The office door opened behind her.
May you like
Richard stood in the doorway with Vanessa behind him, and on his face was an expression Emily had never seen before—not anger. Relief.
“Emily,” he said quietly. “Step away from that drawer.”
