Chapter 15 Lacey #2
My words fall heavy on the room. I look at Carla, but she’s always been my assistant.
Never a full wedding planner. Three years ago, when we signed the Acostas, she was still learning the customer relations software we use to manage our contacts.
I can’t expect her to remember the facts if even I didn’t.
I can’t expect her to defend me, to step in and speak up, when she didn’t know the ins and outs of the situation.
What I do know with all my heart and soul is that I did nothing wrong.
“Please understand,” I say quietly. “Dylan Acosta wanted the three-day event. The bride herself signed and initialed the final menu, as well as the final head count just before the ceremony. What could they possibly hope to accomplish by saying I coerced them?”
Sergio sighs and shrugs. “Lacey, they are wealthy people. You gave them a black eye with the people at the club by embarrassing Olivia at her daughter’s wedding.
” I try to interrupt that no one even knew anything happened, and there was no way I embarrassed her, but he waves a hand in the air.
“Buffets are tacky, and the bride says you boxed her into a corner and said there was no time to make any changes. You apparently said that they were getting a buffet because that’s what the contract said they could have. ”
“They are twisting my words.” The truth comes out of me, but it feels like barbed wire getting pulled through my stomach.
“I did say that, but later. After the final contracts were signed. Not to coerce them. What good would it do me to undersell them? Plated breakfasts cost twice what the buffet option costs. It just doesn’t make any sense why I would sell them something cheaper than the most expensive services. ”
“Lacey,” Sergio says softly. “They’re suggesting that because you tried to strike up a relationship with Dylan and he shot you down, that you were in a position to manipulate the event and make them look bad, give them an experience far inferior to what they’d expect from the Lantana.”
I’m speechless at that. The argument has Dylan written all over it, and I just can’t fight that kind of warped logic. Everyone in this room knows that if the bride had given us even three days’ notice, we would have moved heaven and earth to give them a plated brunch.
Look at what we did with the tuxedos. I hired a tailor, dragged two bikers in on their days off, and convinced them, with just a couple days’ notice, to do something we normally never do.
That’s customer service. That’s what I do.
I deliver prestige experiences to my customers. I deliver on the fantasy.
Angry tears burn my eyes, but I won’t cry. “So, you have to take their side because they will complain to their friends,” I say quietly. “And business for the Lantana plummets all because Dylan Acosta twists the truth into something it’s not.”
Sergio looks down at his hands, while Don quietly slides the contract back into its folder.
Only Carla speaks up. “It’s not too late to quit, maybe,” she says softly. “That way, you wouldn’t have to have a termination on your employment record. That would help with unemployment, job references.”
Sergio shoots her a sharp look, but I’m immediately ready to drop to her feet and hug her. Instead, I nod to my boss of eight years.
“Sergio, I’d prefer not to have to hire an attorney to look over the contract I have. There is nothing in the contract that says I can’t sell a customer one product over another.”
“Lacey, you slept with one of our clients.” Sergio slaps his forehead loudly. “What do you expect me to do here?”
“Fine,” I say, standing up. I halfway wish I were wearing heels. I tower over Sergio even in flats, but I wish I could be stronger, bigger, taller than these small people who want to bring me down. It has to be enough that they can’t. That I won’t let them.
“Will you allow me to go to my office and write out a formal letter of resignation?” I ask, my eyes never leaving Sergio’s face. “Will you accept that as a compromise instead of firing me?”
Sergio takes a long, deep breath, the gold ring on his pinkie finger glittering in the reflection of the gilt-frame mirrors that line the conference room. “Fine,” he says. “But Lacey, there’s one more thing.”
I grab my purse and stand. “What?”
“Olivia Acosta says you threw the tablet on the ground at them, at her, and that’s why it broke. I’m going to have to dock your final paycheck for reckless treatment of company property.”
I stand up and cross my arms. “You’re seriously kidding me?
” I ask. “She said that? You know there was a witness? The security…” I let the words die on my lips.
I do not want to drag Eagle into this—not in any way, shape, or form.
“Did you check the security footage? Did you try to verify that what she said was how it happened? Did it ever occur to you that she could have grabbed the tablet and thrown it at me?”
“Did she?” Sergio challenges, sounding angry now.
“Because I don’t see a workplace safety incident report.
And as you’re the director of events, if that did happen, it would have been on you to complete that form, to put a hold on the security footage, and to immediately obtain witness names and contact information so we could investigate that event.
Is that what you’re trying to say happened, Lacey? ”
The owner of the place I have loved for so, so long is now looking at me with contempt. He was annoyed, maybe frustrated earlier. My behavior put him in a bad spot, and I get that. But this? Now, he’s basically accusing me of lying.
“I’m not saying that’s what happened,” I tell him. “But the Acostas had ample opportunity to report any inappropriate behavior or violence.”
“And they did,” Don says, looking grim. “As soon as their daughter’s brunch was over. They said they were afraid of retaliation.”
“But I wasn’t even at the damn brunch. How could I retaliate?
” I want to scream, throw something. How could one bad decision—okay, I dated Dylan for fourteen months, so hundreds, probably thousands of bad decisions—spiral to this point?
I hardly know what’s happening, which end is up.
All I know is in the space of a single weekend, everything I love has been taken from me.
My job.
My dignity.
My professionalism.
My reputation.
Instead of fighting with Sergio and Don, I gather my things quietly. I take a soft breath and look over the beautiful room, the pink marble and rich wallpaper now cloying in its ostentatious colors.
“Given that we aren’t seeing the situation from the same perspective, I feel as though I’ll need to get a lawyer to protect me, my reputation, and my future employment prospects. I’d appreciate if you’d wait to take any final action until you hear from that person.”
Don nods. “You have five days left of accrued vacation,” he says.
It weighs heavy on my heart that he came prepared with that information. Even I don’t know how much vacation time I have accrued. I hardly ever use it.
Don continues, “You can use that time to sort out your next step. If we don’t hear from your lawyer by Monday, we’ll issue a formal letter explaining what we’ve decided.”
I look over the faces of these people I’ve loved, worked with, laughed with for years. “May I clear out my office of my personal effects?” I ask, tears threatening to spill from my burning lids.
“They had me take care of that yesterday.” Carla sounds so apologetic. She slides a plain brown banker’s box from under the conference room table. “This was everything I could find, Lacey. But if you think of anything I missed…”
I swipe a single tear from my cheek then silently take the box. “Thank you, Carla,” I say. It’s not her fault. None of this is anyone’s fault except my own. No matter how pure my intentions may have been, every road I took over the last two years has led me to this moment.
I made this bed. And now it’s time to lie down in it.
I turn and walk slowly through the building, acceptance and guilt flaming my cheeks beet red.
I can feel the heat radiating off them as I pass Bob at the front desk.
I want to say goodbye, to wish the sweet man all my best, but feeling the heavy eyes of Sergio Lantana, Don, and Carla following us, Bob firms his lips and turns his back to me.
He’s an old man who needs his job just as much as I needed mine.
I swallow hard, then exit for what will probably be the last time through the glass doors. I don’t let myself look back. I walk to the employee lot just like I did Saturday—dejected and confused. Only this time, I have no hope of going back to my dream job.
Leave it to one shitty man and a truckload of stupidity to ruin a girl’s dreams.