Chapter 24
Reels and Tailspins
Beyond a few curt texts, Angie hadn’t been able to connect with Sam for two days. She sat stunned as she stared at Jenna’s text message.
Jenna: When was Sam traded to NC?
With shaky thumbs, she tapped out a response.
Angie: Where are you hearing this?
It couldn’t be true. Sam would have let her know.
Jenna: Sports radio at the dry cleaners. Checked on X to be sure. Did you know?
“No, I didn’t know,” Angie grumbled to herself. Why didn’t she know? Why hadn’t Sam told her?
Jenna: What are you going to do?
Angie: About what?
Jenna: Sam moving.
Angie: Nothing to do. My job and life are here.
And so was Sam—until now. But Sam hadn’t said a damn thing. Suddenly, she was Past Angie, shaken after he had left six years ago without a word. It was happening all over again, and she was the idiot who had set herself up to have her heart trounced.
Jenna continued prodding, and Angie evaded.
Angie: Have to get back to work, Jenn. Talk later.
“Yeah, later, after I find out what the hell is going on.” Angie dropped her forehead into her palm and stared at the gray speckles on her desk’s surface.
Her phone chimed again. Damn it, Jenna, leave me alone!
When she glanced at the screen, though, a jolt zapped her upright.
Sam: Big news. Traded! Heading to NC. Will call soon.
“Oh gee, thanks for the newsflash,” she groused. How was she supposed to respond?
“Ms. Rossi?”
Angie whirled, feeling heat creep up her neck. Hopefully, Celia hadn’t heard her muttering to herself.
The woman regarded her with a sour face, but that was her natural expression. “HR would like you to report upstairs ASAP.”
Hope lifted her heart. Maybe she was finally getting the full-time hire she’d been waiting for. With a spring in her step, she rode the elevator to the floor that housed HR. This was a welcome distraction from the Sam storm. She could use some positivity.
A receptionist acknowledged her with a nod and directed her to a conference room off the lobby.
Weird, but okay. Maybe they have to spread out documentation for me to sign.
A rail of a woman with short platinum hair and buckteeth stepped into the room and closed the door.
Glasses that were too large for her face sat on a pinched nose.
As she took a chair at the head of the table—leaving an awkward two-seat gap between her and Angie—she placed a file on the polished dark wood.
The woman cleared her throat. “Ms. Rossi, I’ll get right to the point.”
The seriousness in the woman’s tone had Angie sitting forward.
“Your employment is being terminated for cause, effective today.”
Angie’s head snapped back. “Excuse me?” Had she said terminated?
The woman removed a paper with a check clipped to it. “This is your final check through today. Your benefits information and next steps are outlined in this packet. I’ll need your signature acknowledging receipt of payment before you leave.”
“I don’t understand.”
Buckteeth extracted a second paper and slid the document across the smooth surface. “This action follows a confirmed HIPAA compliance violation involving unauthorized access and transmission of protected patient information.”
“What? Which patient? What did I share?” Angie squawked.
The woman calmly closed the file. “The information is summarized in the letter. The determination was made following an IT security review. As I’m sure you’re aware, the clinic maintains a zero-tolerance policy. Now if you would please sign …”
Angie signed and returned the receipt, thoughts bouncing off the walls of her brain like supercharged atoms with no place to go. Nothing made sense.
The woman passed Angie a packet, lifting an icy gaze. “Now I’ll collect your lanyard and any keys. Someone will escort you to your desk so you can gather your personal belongings.”
Feeling like a criminal, Angie fumbled with the lanyard. “My key is downstairs.” A thought struck. “I still have a report to complete.”
“IT has disabled your computer access.”
“But … how … I need to …” Angie fought to quell the quaver in her voice.
A door opened, and the receptionist appeared, eyes darting from Angie to the HR lady.
Buckteeth gave the receptionist a sharp look. “Please escort Ms. Rossi to her desk.”
The receptionist’s expression said she wanted to do anything but that. Right there with you. This had to be a mistake, an accident, a bad dream.
Angie grasped the documents and stumbled after the receptionist. Dazed. Confused. Shredded. She stared at the young woman’s back with a numbed gaze, her thoughts scattering like TIE fighters without a flight plan.
Back in the basement, they marched to PT. Celia looked up when the receptionist cracked open the door. “I’ll take over from here,” the office manager announced.
The receptionist’s relief was palpable as she nodded and scampered away.
Angie shook herself from her shock bubble and let a seething settle in her chest. “You knew?”
“I only now heard you were being terminated and that we had protocol to follow.”
“But … but I don’t understand!” Someone had sucker-punched her and twisted her gut with the other fist. A new thought smacked Angie. “Is this about Sam Durbin?” Her welling rage suddenly lasered in on Attila the Bun.
Celia raised an imperious eyebrow. “Do you mean your personal relationship with him?”
“Yes,” Angie gritted out. No reason to hide it now, was there?
Celia’s face softened. “No, Ms. Rossi. I haven’t been informed of the details behind your termination, but I can assure you it has nothing to do with you and Mr. Durbin.”
“You did know, then?” Angie croaked.
“I knew.”
“Who else knew?” Besides Trevor.
“No one that I’m aware of. I certainly didn’t divulge anything.
Frankly, I saw no harm in it—you both kept up professional appearances—but that’s not for me to judge.
I may run this place, but I don’t make the rules.
The two organizations are quasi-related at best, and you would not have been the first ones to test an arbitrary line. ”
Angie could have sworn one corner of the woman’s mouth tipped up.
“One of the trainers knew,” Angie blurted.
Celia’s other eyebrow joined the first one, lending her a look of genuine surprise.
“Interesting. If management took notice of your relationship, it might have merited a discussion, not immediate termination.” Her mask returned, though it didn’t appear as harsh as it had before.
“Shall we pull together your things and help you get on with your life? I took the liberty of dropping a few boxes at your workstation. I’ll have to stand by—company policy—but you must be reeling, so feel free to take all the time you need. ”
Celia was right. Angie was reeling, and she struggled to get into a headspace where she could separate what was hers from what belonged to the clinic. But she got there eventually, and Celia walked her out, balancing one of the boxes in her arms.
As they loaded Angie’s possessions into her SUV, Celia gave her an awkward shoulder pat. “You are a top-notch therapist. Don’t forget that.”
“Who apparently violated HIPAA.” Angie deflated on a sigh. “What clinic will hire me with that black mark on my record?”
Celia looked to the sky. “We shall see. In the meantime, if I can help by writing a letter about your stellar work ethic, you let me know.”
Angie drove away, her eyes glued to the odd woman in her rearview mirror, her mind searching for answers that weren’t there.
Angie’s face was crusted with the dry tracks of her tears—and flour—as she mixed her third batch of cookies. Return of the Jedi blared in the living room, and she mouthed the dialogue along with the actors. When her phone pinged, she glanced at it.
A new text from Sam, equally short and as unhelpful as the others she still needed to answer.
Sam: Crazy busy. Miss you. Will explain.
Should she answer and tell him she’d been fired for reasons she still didn’t comprehend?
She’d been over her protocols in her mind time and again, then gone over them again with Jenna, but she couldn’t come up with any missteps that would have gotten her fired.
Her plan was to bake into oblivion and go to the shelter, delivering the goodies while she got unconditional love from her fur buddies.
She needed to say something to Sam, but she didn’t want to dump her problems on him, especially not with him whirling like a dervish. Besides, would it matter in the end? He was leaving again. Best to distance herself.
When a second text pinged, she frowned.
Sam: Meetings all day and chasing down a house lead now. Call tonight?
Angie: Busy tonight. Good luck.
It wasn’t a lie. She was hanging at the shelter until it closed, after which she’d pick up a gallon of Rocky Road and use it as a dip for the cookies she’d stashed for herself. This time, she would fix her broken heart with calories.
Sam flopped onto the bed in his friend Cam Blue’s guest room, utterly drained. The last few days had been insane, leaving him in a never-ending tailspin he couldn’t escape. At least the pace had kept him from thinking too much about what was coming.
He had begged off being social tonight, and not only because he had to catch his breath.
He needed to talk to Angie, tell her what was happening.
She was two hours behind, which wasn’t a huge difference, but he never seemed able to connect with her during the few spare minutes he had to call her.
Putting everything in a text was impossible.
Scrolling through their text exchange, he frowned. She wasn’t answering quickly like she usually did—sometimes she didn’t answer at all. The responses he did get were … Well, they left him disappointed. And worried. There was an iciness to them that fueled a bad feeling in his gut.
He stared at the ceiling as awareness slapped him like a wrist shot. Picking up his device again, he reread his messages through her eyes.
Shit! What if she thinks I’m blowing her off again?
A soft knock came, and he sat up. “Yeah?”
Terra, Cam’s wife, stuck her head through the door. “Sorry to bother you, but I forgot to stock your bathroom with fresh towels.”
He scrambled from the bed to take the towels from her. A light floral fragrance wafted around her, making him more homesick for Angie.
Her brows drew together. “Everything okay?”
He stacked the towels on the bed and turned to face her. “Yeah. I guess I’m just overwhelmed.”
“Understandable. You’re going through a lot of changes right now. Cam probably told you he went through the same craziness. Do you have someone at home you can talk to?”
Sam smoothed his nape. “Yeah, except I haven’t been able to reach her. I think she might be avoiding me.”
Terra leaned against the door frame. “Cam and I were on the outs when he got traded.” Sam’s brows shot to his hairline. “I think that made it harder on him, so I get it.” She gave him an understanding smile.
“I didn’t know. You two seem so tight.”
“We are now.” She let out a soft chuckle. “I didn’t want to leave Colorado, but that crazy guy pulled out all the stops to get me to follow him.”
“Obviously, it worked.”
“Sure did. And you know what? I have no regrets. I can’t imagine life without him now.” She fixed him with her blues. “Are you in love with this girl of yours?”
“Yeah,” he blurted. “I am. I didn’t realize that until just now.
” And he missed her like he’d miss an amputated limb.
Somehow she’d become part of him. Maybe she always had been, and he’d never recognized it before.
He had no clue what he would have done these past few months without her, when he’d been on the verge of sinking into depression.
He did know for certain he didn’t want to find out, though.
Angie was the glue that held his pieces together.
Terra tipped her head. “Does she know that?”
He gave her a sheepish look. “I haven’t told her yet.”
“You have a few days before the meet-and-greet media circus at the arena, right?”
He nodded. “But I have two more houses to see tomorrow.”
“You might want to consider a quick flight home instead. Women like to be included in decisions like that. Just sayin’.”
Sam gaped at her. “What if she doesn’t want to move?”
Terra shrugged. “One way to find out.”
“But I don’t even know what kind of contract I’ll end up with.” Or if I’ll end up with one. Herb had reassured him it would happen at any moment. He was still hammering out average annual salary and term with the GM.
“Does that really matter?”
“I’m not sure there’s enough time to get there and back,” he added.
Terra’s smile broadened. “Even better. Then she’ll really know you care. Show, don’t tell. Well, in your case, you really should tell too. Now, any other excuses we need to cross-check?”
Crap! He was so getting in his damn way, wasn’t he? He shook his head, and she gave him a wink and pivoted to leave.
Hope filled his chest. “Terra?”
She glanced over her shoulder. “Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Oh, and if you happen to bring her back with you, you’re both welcome to stay here as long as you need.”
“I’ll tell her.” That and a few other things I should have told her a long time ago.