Page 57 of Sunset Beach
“Drue?” Wendy brandished a handful of papers.
“What do you need?” Drue responded.
Wendy jerked her head in the direction of her office. “Let’s do this somewhere quieter.”
As she trailed behind Wendy’s cloud of Miss Dior perfume, Drue experienced the same inescapable sense of doom she’d once felt on her numerous trips to the principal’s office in high school.
She already knew what was coming. The “you’re not living up to your abilities,” the “you need to try harder” and, worst of all, the dreaded “we are very disappointed.”
“Close the door, please,” Wendy said, not looking up from the document she was reading.
She absentmindedly reached in a cut-glass jar on her desk and tossed abiscuit to Princess, who was lounging on an orange Hermès blanket on the only other chair in the room.
Drue stood glowering down at the French bulldog, who kept right on chewing and ignoring her.
“You can sit,” Wendy said, looking up.
“Where?”
“Oh for God’s sake,” Wendy snapped. “Here, Princess. Come here to Mommy.”
The dog hopped down and trotted over to her mistress.
“Move that blanket, please,” Wendy said, before Drue could seat herself. “She’s very sensitive, and it confuses her when she smells other people’s scents on her things.”
Drue folded the blanket and dropped it to the floor.
“What did you need to see me about?” she asked, wanting to endure as little time as possible in what she considered the Chilean chamber of torture.
“This,” Wendy said, tapping a computer printout on her desktop. “I’ve been looking at your leads sheet, and frankly, I’m appalled. Do you realize you’ve been here for four weeks and the only case you’ve referred is this?”
“Yes,” Drue said eagerly. “You’re talking about the client from Sunshine Inn—the extended-stay motel on U.S. 19?”
“Bedbugs?” Wendy said shrilly. “Three weeks and all you have to show is a bedbug case?”
“It’s legit, I swear,” Drue said. “The poor man just moved down here from Pennsylvania to take a job at a hair salon. He was staying at the motel while he looked for an apartment, but after three nights he had to check out because the place was crawling with bedbugs. They just chewed him alive! He went to one of those doc-in-the-box medical clinics and they sent him to the emergency room. I’ve seen his discharge papers. He had to have cortisone shots and they prescribed him some expensive ointments for the infection.”
“Stop!” Wendy began scratching at her arms. “Just what do you think this firm is going to be able to recover in damages in a case like this? The cost of a tube of Neosporin?”
“No,” Drue said. “The client hasn’t been able to work since he got here. The salon took one look at the scabs on his arms and hands and withdrew the job offer. He was so desperate to work he went to one of those Kwik-Kut franchise hair salons, but the first time he shampooed a client’s hair, he had a horrendous allergic reaction to the chemicals because of his infection. The man can’t work, Wendy. I really think Dad could help him.”
“We are not wasting our time on a bullshit bedbug case,” Wendy said, taking the report, balling it up and throwing it into her trash basket.
She leaned back in her chair and Princess hopped up and began licking her chin.
“I told Brice this wasn’t a good idea, but of course, he has such a soft heart, what could I do?”
“You’re firing me?” Drue was incredulous.
“I wish. But Brice won’t hear of it. You must have really laid a guilt trip on him when he came over there to move you into that cottage. He was really upset when he got home.”
“If you’re not firing me, why are we having this talk?” Drue asked, knowing she wasn’t going to like the answer.
“Because I need you to get with the program,” Wendy said. “You have the most dismal numbers of anybody—either here or in the offsite call center. Drastic measures are called for.”
Drue waited.
“Starting now, you’re in retraining. I want you to take your headset and plug into Jonah’s console. He’s our top producer, so my hope is that you can learn something from his technique.”
