Series: Paige Michaels
Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 44612 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 223(@200wpm)___ 178(@250wpm)___ 149(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44612 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 223(@200wpm)___ 178(@250wpm)___ 149(@300wpm)
Aria gasped. “What? I don’t know about any complaints.”
He frowned. “I didn’t either. It is mandatory for HR to inform you when there are complaints and allow you to add a letter of response. I don’t see those here. Maybe you didn’t think it was necessary?”
“But…” She licked her lips. “I’ve never had a single altercation with anyone I work with and no one has ever notified me that there were any problems.”
Mr. Lambert sighed and opened the file. He picked up the first piece of paper and held it so that only he could see it. “This one says you’re careless with numbers and have underestimated several projects because you didn’t doublecheck your spreadsheets.”
All the blood ran from Aria’s face. “That’s never happened. My estimates are always within five percent accuracy. That’s one of the best averages in the department.”
“If it were isolated, I would ignore it, but there are two others.” He lifted the next one. “This one says you leave your desk every day for several hours and no one can find you.”
Aria slowly shook her head. Who would say such things about me? She’d never done that either.
He set that one down and picked up one more. “The last one accuses you of spending an inordinate amount of company time dealing with personal issues.”
She started shaking. “Mr. Lambert. None of that is true.”
He sighed and closed the folder before leaning back in his chair and meeting her gaze. “Like I said, I was surprised, but all of these complaints were filed properly and signed off by HR. I have no choice but to freeze your salary and put you on probation.”
Her mouth went totally dry, and she thought she might faint. She blinked several times. “Someone in HR signed off on those?”
“Yes.” He opened the folder and glanced back down at the three complaints. “I don’t know who filed the complaints. It could have been three people or all one person. But they followed protocol, and Cameron Ferguson signed off on all of them.”
Aria’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head. She struggled to form words. “Wh-wh-when?”
He glanced again. “They are all dated in the last few months.”
The last few months? She hadn’t even been dating Cameron yet. And…he hadn’t been her Daddy. But he’d known. He’d signed those papers and presumably met with those people. It didn’t matter that he’d done so before they’d been dating. He should have told her there were complaints being filed against her.
Aria rose from her seat, surprised her legs held her up. Without a word, she turned and left the room. She heard her supervisor calling out her name, but she didn’t turn back around. She managed to make it to her desk where she grabbed her purse.
Shaking like a leaf, she stared at the surface of her desk. The room was empty. Everyone who worked in her department had gone home. For that she was thankful.
On instinct, she opened her oversized purse and started grabbing things off the desk. The small silly bobblehead, a framed picture of her on vacation with her parents last year, her favorite ink pen her father had gotten her for Christmas. As she dropped all of it in her bag, she caught a glimpse of the pouch of magnets she’d earned throughout the day today. Three of them. She took them out and set them on the desk. She didn’t care that they were obviously babyish. One had a gold star. One said good girl. And the last one had a stuffed bear on it.
She had no idea what she was going to do next. She wasn’t entirely sure she was actually quitting her job and not returning, but she wasn’t positive she would get up tomorrow and come back either. And she sure wasn’t going to talk to Cameron.
Shit. Cameron. He’d known she was meeting with her supervisor. He’d told her to come find him after the meeting. He’d driven them to work today. She didn’t even have a car.
Aria pulled out her phone and ordered an Uber, relieved to find out one was in the area and would pick her up in five minutes. She rushed out the front door and kept walking down the sidewalk to get closer to where the Uber would pull into the parking lot.
She held her breath until she was inside the car and it was pulling away from the curb. A glance back at the building showed no signs of Cameron. Good. He hadn’t come looking for her yet.
Ten minutes later, the driver dropped her off at her apartment. Aria was shaking as she found her keys in the bottom of her bag. It took her several tries to get her door open, but finally she was inside. She locked the door, dropped her bag on the floor, and started crying.