28. A Good Person

28

A GOOD PERSON

T wo weeks later, Laurel was back in Stamford.

Last weekend Easton came to her early on Saturday morning and they had a good time going on a sailboat cruise. It was his idea and he’d said he’d never been on one even though he grew up in the area. They went out to dinner that night, slept in on Sunday and he left after lunch to go home.

So far it was working out well.

During the week they did more texting than talking but did chat on the phone at least twice for thirty minutes or so.

She could tell he wasn’t comfortable with it and she found it funny since he was talking to people all day long for work.

Then she realized that it was a different type of conversation he was having.

But when they were together they had so much chemistry and got along so well that she wasn’t going to let it get to her he might not like to chat on the phone.

The truth was, she wasn’t one to talk on the phone either.

“If it’s too much for you to come on Friday nights, you can come in the morning like I did,” he said on Saturday morning.

“It gives us another night together, but if it’s easier for you to have me come in the morning I can,” she said.

“I’m good either way,” he said. “Last week I would have come on Friday if I didn’t get held up in a late meeting. By then it was just easier to wait since I had to get a few things done. But if you’re fine with it, I can come earlier with you at work. I mean, I could work at Abe’s.”

“Nonsense,” she said. “You can go to my place without me there. I’ll give you a key.”

She hadn’t wanted to put the pressure on him like that, but since he was bringing it up it was nicer.

“There, that is solved,” he said. “And since next Saturday we’ve got a wedding to go to, I’ll probably come early on Friday if that works.”

Ivy Greene was getting married next Saturday. Laurel had been surprised she was invited since she hadn’t known Ivy long and knew there would be a lot of other employees invited.

But she got along with Ivy and did talk to her a lot. She’d asked Easton if he wanted to go with her and he’d said yes.

Not many were aware she was dating someone, so she knew it was going to be interesting when she showed up with him.

Poppy knew, and Poppy talked, but since she was on maternity leave, the news wasn’t traveling all that fast and it was fine with her.

“Show up any time you want,” she said. “I mean that.”

“I’ll check out my schedule,” he said. “What time do you go to work?”

“Around seven,” she said, laughing. “Are you thinking of being there that early?”

“I was thinking if I can swing it, maybe I’ll come on Thursday night instead.”

“Even better,” she said. “Is there anything you wanted to do today?”

“I thought we could go to the Mianus River Park and walk or hike a bit if you’ve got sneakers with you.”

“I do,” she said. “I come prepared. I do have hiking boots but didn’t bring them.”

“Sneakers are good enough,” he said. “This isn’t like serious hiking by any means.”

“Let me go put on a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved shirt then. It’s not cold out, but I bet it's buggy.”

“I’ve got spray if you need it.”

“I do,” she said. “I tend to get bit a lot.”

He grinned. “They like how good you smell.”

“Just like you,” she said. “But you don’t bite.”

“I can if you want,” he said.

“Hmmm, maybe later. Just don’t leave marks,” she said, laughing, and then sashayed away.

She went to his room and changed her clothes. She heard her phone ring and then Easton yelled, “It’s just a number and no name, but it looks like a local number.”

She came running out. “Could be work. Hello.”

“Hi, Laurel. This is Michele O’Reilly. I work in the jewelry division.”

“Hi, Michele. I know who you are. What’s going on?”

“I’m sorry to bother you, but two people called in sick today. One in our division and one in the accessories. And two people in the plant are sick too. They are working but want to leave. No one can get a hold of Denise. We’ve been calling for over an hour.”

She ground her teeth. “I’m out of town and don’t have my laptop with me to get names and numbers and make calls.”

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t know what else to do. In the past, we would have called one of the sisters, but Poppy is out, and I don’t want to bother Rose knowing she’s due soon. I don’t know much about what is going on in the plant to call Lily.”

“You did the right thing,” she said. “This is my job. I’ll make a few calls.”

“I’ve got someone coming in in jewelry and someone else is calling over in accessories,” Michele said.

“Good. I’m glad you got that covered already.” She’d make a note and reward those staff for taking the initiative to cover shifts when the supervisor on call wasn’t getting back to them.

She hung up and turned to Easton. “Do you have to go home?” he asked.

“No,” she said. “I’m not doing that, but I need to make a few calls.”

“Take your time. We aren’t on a schedule,” he said.

She called Denise and got the voicemail. “Hi, Denise. This is Laurel. I need you to call me ASAP. You’re on call this weekend and things are going on in the plant and no one can reach you.” She hung up and then texted the same damn message.

“Is she the one you’ve butted heads with before?” he asked.

“Yes. She doesn’t do her job. When she is on call she is never around or waits hours to get back to people. She never gives a reason why either. She’s paid to be on call and then to go in and work if necessary. I don’t want to be a hard ass, but this has to stop.”

“Sometimes that is the way you need to be,” he said.

“I’m learning that. I’ve done it before.” She started to scroll through her phone and got Patty’s number who was one of the other three supervisors and called her. Patty answered on the third ring. “I’m so sorry to bother you, Patty. There are several people sick at the plant and they are trying to reach Denise who isn’t returning their calls.”

“Oh,” Patty said. “I didn’t know Denise was on call this weekend. She told someone she had a family reunion to go to.”

Which didn’t matter. Being on call didn’t mean you had to go into work, just you had to be available for phone calls and to deal with emergencies like this if they arose.

“She is on call this weekend,” she said. Laurel knew who was on call every week as she did the schedule. “Are you able to make some calls and get shifts covered? I’m not sure exactly how many people. I’m out of town right now and don’t have numbers with me.”

“Absolutely,” Patty said. “I’ll go over to the plant now and find out what is going on and get it covered.”

“Thank you so much, Patty. I appreciate it and I’m so sorry. We’ll get this all sorted out and make sure you’ve got this marked in payroll.”

She hung up and turned to Easton. “At least that is taken care of,” he said.

“Yep. One less thing to worry about. Patty is older and on top of things. She’ll get the shifts covered.”

“Before you were hired, the sisters dealt with this?”

“They have the supervisors and only called one of the sisters if necessary, but they are getting so big that my position was needed to oversee it all.”

She loved her job, but this was the second time this had happened to her on the weekend when Denise was on call.

“Looks like you might have to deal with this when you get back,” he said.

“I will,” she said. “Let me just send this text to Patty and then we can go.”

She texted Patty to let her know if all the shifts were covered and if she heard anything from Denise.

She and Easton left and drove to the park. They walked the trails and went to lunch and still no response from Denise.

“You’re distracted,” he said. “What is going on? I thought everything was set at work.”

“It is,” she said. Patty had texted her within twenty minutes that everything was set at the plant and not to worry. “Sorry. I’m just thinking that I can’t believe I haven’t heard from Denise and now I wonder if something happened to her.”

“Do you believe that?” he asked.

“Unfortunately, no. But I don’t want to be that bitch that was getting worked up over being blown off.”

“Which is what makes you a good person on top of a great employee,” he said.

“Sorry that this is ruining our day.”

“It’s not,” he said. “Not sure why you think that.”

“You noticed I was distracted,” she said.

“Just now you were, but you weren’t fifteen minutes ago. Really, it’s all good.”

“Thanks,” she said. “I appreciate your understanding.”

“But in the past other people haven’t?” he asked.

It was so hard to break away from talking about their pasts, but she felt at times they almost needed to.

“No. Philip never understood. To him, at the end of the day, I should be done working.”

“Did his father stop working at five each day, or any other attorney in their firm?”

She laughed. “I doubt it, but Philip ended each day at four and didn’t do much more until he went in at nine the next day.”

“Jesus. I’d love to just work seven hours a day.”

“Not even,” she said. “He took an hour for lunch too.”

She was laughing when she said it. “Guess his father was okay with it.”

“I have no idea. Philip was spoiled by his mother more than his father. Not my problem anymore. What about Rachelle? I’m assuming she didn’t like the amount of time you worked either?”

“Not really. But it’s not avoidable either. It comes with the job and being a partner. You can’t just like half of it.”

“No,” she said. “We both learned that the hard way.”

When they were back at his place, her phone was ringing on the counter and Easton was close enough to pick it up. “Looks like it’s Denise.”

He tossed her the phone and she caught it. “Hello, Denise.”

“Sorry, Laurel. I’ve been out of service and didn’t know what was going on.”

“You’re on call this week. It’s your responsibility to be in service or have someone cover your day for you.”

“I didn’t know I’d be out of service in some spots. I’m at a family reunion and when I was walking around my phone just went off. I noticed all the messages. I’m about three hours away from the plant. I was driving when all the calls came in.”

She ground her teeth. “If you were going to be out of town that far away, you should have covered your shift today.”

“Everyone knows to call me,” Denise said.

“And they tried. But we know how this went, don’t we? I’m out of town too and have no access to people’s numbers.”

“What happened then?” Denise asked after a moment of silence. She didn’t know if it was a concerned pause or the service again.

She got it now. In Denise’s mind, she had a backup plan in Laurel. So if she wanted to take her time getting back to people, someone else would always deal with it.

“I got a hold of Patty who took care of it all.”

“That’s good,” Denise said. “I’m glad it all worked out.”

She knew her eyes got wide. “We’ll talk about it on Monday. Please be in my office at ten.”

She hung up after that. “Wow,” he said. “That was kind of sexy.”

“I was much calmer than I wanted to be.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’ll talk to Lily first on Monday before I meet with Denise and go from there,” she said. She wasn’t one that fired people and wanted to give them a chance. Maybe she’d been too nice with Denise, but she was going to make it known this shit wasn’t happening again.

“And now you can put it from your mind,” he said. “How about a movie tonight?”

“A movie sounds good. An action flick.”

“Has anyone ever told you how perfect you are?”

“I wish,” she said.

“Then I’ll do it,” he said. “You’re perfect for me.”

“I feel the same way. You know what would be even more perfect?”

“What?”

“If you wash my back in the shower. I’m sweaty and need to get out of these clothes.”

He was pulling his shirt over his head. “I’ll beat you in there.”