The room waited. Kuroda folded her hands.

"Miss Price's answer was accurate and complete under the terms you signed. I judge that she has won."

The first sound came from Caleb Sloan, a small, shocked breath. Then one of the servers outside made a noise that might have been a cheer. Evelyn felt nothing like fireworks. She felt the corner of the red notebook against her palm, and a strange exhaustion, as if years of holding one breath had made her forget how to release it.

"One million dollars," Emi said, looking at the agreement. "Payment within ten business days."

Voss leaned back. "Sue me."

"That may not be necessary," Kuroda said. "The issue is witnessed and documented."

Orton rose, gathering his laptop. "I'm going to consult with our legal department."

"Leave the computer," Emi said.

He laughed. "You can't confiscate private property."

"No," she replied. "But I can tell you that destroying records after receiving a preservation notice creates problems much larger than tonight's disagreement."

He paused, then set the laptop down. It made a soft, humiliating sound against the white tablecloth.

Evelyn's phone rang. Her brother's name lit the screen. She stepped aside and answered.

"Hey, Ev," Isaiah said. "Dad's all right. But somebody just called our house asking if you were home."

Her pulse accelerated. "Who?"

"Wouldn't give a name. Said you should stop telling stories about Kobe."

Evelyn looked through the glass partition at Miles Orton. He was already watching her.

"Lock the door," she told Isaiah. "And don't tell anyone where I work."

She hung up. For the first time that night, she was frightened not of losing the wager, but of winning it.

Chapter 6 — The Price of Being Right

By the time Evelyn finished her shift, strangers had seen the video. Not all of it: a woman at the neighboring table had posted only forty-three seconds, starting with Graham Voss saying a waitress could not understand Japanese and ending when Reina Kuroda declared the answer correct. Online, forty-three seconds was long enough to turn a person into a hero and far too short to make people understand why she was afraid.

The clip reached eleven thousand views before midnight. It reached three hundred thousand while she was riding the bus home. By the time she climbed the stairs to her apartment, her phone was too hot in her pocket and someone had created an account claiming to be her.

Her father sat at the kitchen table in a faded Seattle Mariners sweatshirt, his walker beside him. Walter Price had once climbed cargo cranes with the absentminded ease of a man crossing his own living room. Now he counted steps between rooms and pretended the counting did not matter.

"You look like you've met a ghost," he said.

"I met an old manager. Close enough."

Isaiah appeared from the hallway. Nineteen, tall and thin, he had spent the evening repairing a neighbor's broken laptop. He held up his phone, already open to the viral video.

"You did that? A million-dollar bet?" His voice cracked between disbelief and excitement. "Evelyn, this is ridiculous. You're all over the internet."

"It's a bet," she said, dropping her bag. "Not a wire transfer. Don't spend it."

Walter studied her face. "You know the look I had when a piece of equipment failed? The look when I knew somebody had seen a warning and turned it off? You've got that look."

She sat down beside him and explained about the untranslated safety condition, the old company, the forged certificate. Isaiah stopped smiling. Walter took her notebook when she offered it and read his own words on the first page. He did not speak for a long time.

"I worried that I pushed you too hard," he said finally. "Be exact. People will build things from your words. I wrote that like a father giving advice. Didn't understand how much it could cost you."

"You were right," she said.

"Being right shouldn't make you unsafe."

Evelyn told them about the anonymous call. Isaiah had saved the number and the voicemail. They agreed to forward it to counsel in the morning and to document anything else that happened. Walter insisted on changing the apartment door's faulty lock immediately; Isaiah found a screwdriver. In their small kitchen, doing one practical thing felt better than rehearsing worst-case scenarios.

At 1:16 a.m., Evelyn received a message from a number she recognized as Kuroda's hotel suite. It contained only a brief request: We need to speak tomorrow. Come with someone you trust. Our legal counsel will be present.

She slept for three hours. At breakfast a reporter had parked outside the building, and another waited by the bus stop. Evelyn made Isaiah walk to class by a different route. On television, commentators framed the event as a morality play about a businessman humbled by a brilliant server. None mentioned the altered safety condition; the video had ended before that.

"They've got the wrong story," Isaiah said, standing beside the screen.

"They've got the easiest story," Evelyn replied. "That isn't always the same."

Sloan called to say reporters were calling the restaurant. He offered her paid leave for the week. She wondered if he was trying to protect her or the dining room, then decided both intentions could exist together. She asked for the employee time log and the names of staff who had witnessed the signed bet. Sloan promised to send them.

At noon she went to the hotel with her friend Danielle Brooks, a public-interest attorney who had lived two doors from Evelyn through high school. Danielle had once defended a tenant against a landlord with three lawyers, and she brought the same unfussy determination into the hotel's marble lobby.

"I'm not your formal attorney yet," Danielle said. "But I can stop someone from convincing you that a handshake is a contract amendment."

"I don't think they'll try to trick me," Evelyn said.

"You met one of them last night."