the truth,” Leah said.
Rina took a breath.
“Yes.
I have.”
“How often?”
“More often than anyone wants to admit.”
Graham interrupted.
“Careful, Rina.
You know how these things are handled.”
Leah turned toward him.
“Captain, you’re going to stop addressing her as though she’s on trial.”
Rina looked almost startled by the protection.
She walked toward the galley and returned with a folded sheet of paper.
“I’ve kept a record of the incident numbers,” she explained.
“Not the passengers’ private information.
Just the dates, flight numbers, and references to the reports I submitted.”
Leah accepted it.
There were three entries from the previous month.
“All three were reported as involuntary downgrades,” Rina continued.
“The passengers didn’t agree.
One cried.
Another asked for a supervisor.
The third wanted the airline to call her daughter before she moved.”
“What happened to the reports?”
“They were closed as voluntary exchanges.”
“Who made those changes?”
Rina pointed to the approval initials recorded beside each reference number.
Owen Price.
Leah slowly raised her head.
“Owen, do you recognize these?”
He stared at the paper.
“Those are operational closure codes.
They don’t necessarily mean I personally altered the reports.”
“Then the audit records should clarify who did.”
His silence was immediate.
Leah felt a cold heaviness settle in her stomach.
When she acquired Northwind Atlantic, Owen had assured her that employee morale was improving and that customer complaints had fallen dramatically.
She had interpreted those numbers as evidence of progress.
Now she wondered whether the complaints had fallen or merely stopped being counted.
Rina spoke again.
“There was one passenger I can’t forget.
An older woman named Ruth Mullen.”
Leah looked up sharply.
“Tell me what happened to her.”
“She was traveling to her husband’s memorial.
Her son had purchased her a premium seat because she was anxious about the trip.
The captain’s guest wanted it, so Ruth was told to move.”
“Did she agree?”
“No.
She asked why someone else’s plans were more important than her ticket.
A supervisor told her she could cooperate or leave the aircraft.”
Rina’s voice became unsteady.
“She apologized before she moved.
She kept saying she didn’t want to cause trouble.”
Leah remembered Ruth’s letter.
One sentence had stayed with her for weeks: I paid for a quiet place to grieve, and they made me feel ashamed for needing it.
She had assumed the company had misunderstood the complaint.
Now she knew it might have deliberately concealed what happened.
Leah folded the paper and handed it back to Rina.
“Thank you.
You did the right thing by keeping the references.”
Graham suddenly spoke.
“Look, I’m willing to apologize for the misunderstanding.
We can put everyone back where they belong and depart.”
Leah faced him.
“This wasn’t a misunderstanding.
You understood exactly what you were asking.”
For the first time, the captain lowered his gaze.
The aircraft remained at the gate.
With the cabin dispute unresolved, Leah asked Owen to contact the airline’s duty executive and chief pilot immediately.
She did not attempt to assume operational command of the aircraft.
The chief pilot reviewed the preliminary report and arranged for Graham to be relieved of that flight pending further assessment.
A reserve captain would take over after the appropriate checks and crew handover.
The passengers were informed that departure would
