“I took pictures.”
Owen watched the adults.
He had thought Mr. Kent screamed because of one dropped container.
Now he understood that making him look incompetent had been useful.
Claire scrolled through the photographs.
Then stopped.
One image showed something beyond the bakery trays.
Something on the restaurant manager’s desk.
Claire zoomed in.
Her expression changed completely.
“Where did you take this?”
“His office.”
Kent lunged toward the phone.
And whatever Claire had just recognized was clearly something he was far more afraid of than a few fraudulent refunds. 👇
Claire held Lucy’s phone in both hands and enlarged the corner of the photograph until the pixels blurred.
“That is my signature,” she said.
Owen looked at the screen. On Mr. Kent’s desk, half beneath a stack of restaurant schedules, was a bakery invoice. Across the bottom was a handwritten approval: C. Mercer.
Claire’s last name was Mercer.
But she had not written it.
Kent stopped moving toward the phone. “You cannot tell anything from that picture.”
Claire zoomed back out. Beside the invoice was a restaurant reimbursement form with the heading VENDOR LOSS CREDIT. The amount was almost four times the value of the bakery delivery shown on Claire’s receipt.
Lucy looked from the photo to Kent. “That is why you kept the damaged-delivery forms in your office?”
“You have no idea what you are looking at.”
Claire’s voice went quiet. “I know I never signed that paper.”
Owen stood behind her holding the same box Kent had refused. Ten minutes earlier, he had thought the entire disaster was his fault because one container slipped from his hands. Now the spilled bag seemed almost irrelevant.
Kent pointed toward the restaurant entrance. “Both of you need to leave. Lucy, clock out. You are done for the day.”
Lucy folded her arms. “Am I fired?”
“I said leave.”
“Then put it in writing.”
Kent’s jaw tightened.
