Page 26 of Raymond's Forever

Amelia looked at the woman standing there, and shook her head at her. “Ma’am, I have no clue who you are, but you can bet I’ll be telling Janet in HR about you.” She picked up the phone that had been recording, and snapped her photo, the woman seemed to be in shock, because she didn’t move for a good five seconds before she turned and ran out of the office. She saved the voice recording, and the photo, but didn’t send it to anyone except for her own personal e-mail, and by the time she wasready to head over to the hospital for her exit interview, she’d told her goodbyes to the entire staff. She never saw Ervin again that day, and Perkins hadn’t showed up for work while she was still there.

Amelia sat in the front seat of her car, looked at the clinic, and sighed heavily. She had had her exit interview, and after everything was done, and all the paperwork signed, she turned to leave, then pulled the photo up on her phone and showed it to Janet, asking if she knew who that woman was. When Janet was clueless, that was when Amelia told her what Ervin tried to do at eight o’clock that morning.

“Thank you for bringing it to my attention. Can you send me a copy of that photo?” She gave her phone number, and when she received it, she nodded.

“If I find out anything, would you like me to call you?”

“Yes, please, call my cell phone, not the office one.”

“I will.”

“Thank you for everything, Janet.” Amelia left, and once in her car, she sent a text to Raymond that she was leaving. She saw the thumbs up emoji, and headed for home. She hoped it would be the last time she ever had to see the clinic. Now to go home and see how much work Raymond had done while she’d been gone. At the first traffic light, she reached beneath her, and felt the flash drive in her back pocket, and breathed a sigh of relief that it was still safe. She couldn’t wait to tell Raymond what had happened that day, what she’d learned from Betty, and what Ervin had tried to pull.

CHAPTER 11

Amelia unlocked her front door,paused when she saw a stack of boxes, and no piles, and what looked like tracks in the carpet where a vacuum cleaner had been used. Unable to resist, she giggled as she called out, “Honey, I’m home.” She jerked when Raymond appeared at the entrance to the kitchen.

“Welcome, I made us some lunch.”

“What did you make?”

“Nothing much, just some chicken salad.” They went into the kitchen, and she saw the plates piled high with lettuce, other veggies, and chopped up chicken. Neither of them said a word as she went to the sink, washed her hands, and after she dried them, she settled at the counter.

“This looks good.”

“Thank you, it’s not much, because you didn’t have much in your refrigerator. Though it’s none of my business, is it always that empty?”

“No, I knew my days here were numbered, and I was using things up, but not replacing them. I’ll have to stop at the grocery store on our way out of town tomorrow. You are going to spend tonight, right?”

“Yes, after going through all your piles, I think we can get almost everything in the back of my truck, and your SUV.”

“I won’t have to rent anything?”

“Nope.”

“Good.” They ate in silence until their meals were gone, then she looked at him with a grin. “Did you get the photos I sent you?”

“Yes, and I backed them up in the cloud, sent them to my own e-mail, and put them on a flash drive, I also deleted them from my phone.”

“Good, now, do you want the tea on what I learned today?”

“Sure,” Raymond said with a shrug as he picked up the plates to take to the garbage and ended up dropping them as he whipped around to stare at her in shock. “Come again?”

“According to Betty, Perkins called the clinic five minutes before they closed last night. He informed Betty that she is to call Shay Hall to have him come in on Monday for a consultation for his surgery. He even told Betty to tell Shay that I was let go from the clinic because of being incompetent, and that I missed something vital in my treatment of him, and he’ll need surgery. Once Shay agrees that he will be there on Monday, she is then to call over to the hospital to book the OR for Thursday.”

“Please, tell me you’re joking,” Raymond said with a shocked expression as he picked up his mess, poured them each a cup of coffee, and settled back in his seat. He frowned when she laid her phone on the counter between them, and pushed play. When Betty’s voice came through loud and clear, saying exactly what Amelia had just told him, he stared at her in shock.

“What’s wrong?”

“Right now, with that conversation, I can’t do anything, but start a case against Perkins. I’ll need more from Shay if he goes in to see Perkins.” He shook his head as he tried to think. “Right now, nothing would hold up in court because it’s a he said, shesaid situation. However, if we can get Shay, Clark, or Naomi to record Perkins saying those exact words, about your character, then we have a defamation case, and possibly something else.”

“What else?”

“It’s still defamation of character, but the verbal wording would be slander, and if he writes anything bad about you down, that’s libel. We will need him to say it without any provocation. Normally, it’s one against the other, but I believe we may be able to go after him for that, in addition to the malpractice.”

“What are the consequences of the defamation case?”

“I would demand he make a public apology to you, also, because of your job, I would make sure he tells everyone he misaligned you to get an apology, then I would go after him for restitution. He would have to pay you money.”