Oh Stupid Heart (17 page)

Trent frowned. While
he sure as hell didn’t want black laminate shit, he still couldn’t understand why
Grant’s comment outraged the man.

Carrie leaned
forward. “I’m so sorry. Mars’ office is proof you take great pride in your
work. I can only imagine how insulting you found his request.”

“Yes, thank you. My
furniture is handcrafted from carefully selected woods. It is the heart of what
I sell. We offer full renovation only so I can hire subcontractors who will not
damage the wood while doing their job.”

“And your dedication
is exactly why we wanted you.”

“Thank you, but I’m
still not doing black laminate.”

“Thank God,” Trent
said. “Because then you
would
have an unhappy customer. All I want is
two offices built like Mars’.”

“So you’ve returned
to your first request?”

“I never left it!”

Carrie pushed his
food towards him. “Eat. I think Mr. Monroe and I can handle matters from here.”

She picked up the
phone. “We are no longer on the speaker, Mr. Monroe.”

Trent opened his
sandwich and bit into it, forgetting he’d ordered healthy. He frowned at the
spongy leafy thing in his mouth, but he kept chewing as he listened to Carrie’s
side of the conversation.

“Oh! Trent did not write
anything of the sort. No, the young man has evidently learned how to change the
name on an email…. No, I assure you, he didn’t. In fact, Trent hates the stuff.
He has his heart set on your beautiful furniture.”

Trent nodded. He
wanted the beautiful wood furniture, and the guy would find out how much when
Trent sued him to get it. But eyeing the smile on Carrie’s face, he didn’t
think he’d have to do a thing. Once again, she had managed to make his problems
go away. What an amazing woman.

“Oh, yes, well, I
understand. If you could. To be honest, our offices are a shamble due to an
employee riot…. No, not Grant. We had a problem with our staff, but we are
getting better employees.”

His forehead crinkled
with annoyance. Why would the furniture man need to know about his god-awful employees?
The facts were simple. The furniture was his, he’d ordered it, and he wanted it
installed…now. Maybe he should stop eating spongy leaves and take over the
conversation.

He set down his
sandwich and held his hand out for the phone.

She shook him off.

“Would you? Wonderful.
Yes, I will. Whatever time is good for you. Excellent, I look forward to
meeting you.” As she hung up the phone, she wore her proud-of-herself smile.

“Mr. Monroe is coming
right over to assess our desperate need for furniture. Grant told him to eat
the cost of ‘the other shit’ so Mr. Monroe has been searching for a customer
who would buy the furniture. He had already found someone who wanted part of
the order.”

“Our order?” Trent
failed to understand why she smiled.

“Well, in his
perspective, we had retracted our order and left him with sixty-thousand
dollars’ worth of furniture. If somebody broke a contract with us, we’d sell
the chairs to someone else.”

Trent grudgingly
agreed. “I wished he’d talked to me first.”

“He thought he was
communicating to you. Grant sent him emails under your name.”

Trent’s jaw clenched.
“I want to go out there and beat the shit out of the kid.”

“He’d love it if you
do. Coco would probably give him a bonus if you go to jail.”

Damn. Carrie knew how
to bring him back to sanity.

“So what do we need
to do to get our furniture back?”

“Be nice when Mr.
Monroe arrives. From his perspective, we’ve put him through hell.”

By two in the
afternoon, Carrie had convinced Thomas to retire once he trained in DJ; called
maintenance and reported the clog in the men’s room; convinced Mr. Monroe they
needed their offices more than the other customer; scheduled sales meetings
over the next two weeks for Trent and Jenny, their Macy’s sales girl; and last
but not least, managed to get their fulltime college student/payroll person to
come in and wire her expense money directly to her bank account.

Before the world
turned crazy again, she hurried into Trent’s office to discuss her brilliant
idea for the systems manager job.

Poor Trent, he stared
at the plywood covering his windows, his brow furrowed, his eyes pained. Wanting
to ease his stress, she massaged his shoulders. “Want to hear a brilliant
idea?”

“No.” He slammed a
file onto his desk. “I don’t think the company will survive another one of your
brilliant ideas.”

Ouch! She withdrew
her massage and took a seat on the other side of his desk. “What’s wrong?”

He leaned back and
stared up at the ceiling. “Your fabulous ‘Just-in-Time’ cost savings implementation
in Taiwan has destroyed the quality of my chairs.”

“Impossible! Just-in-Time
only determines how long a part stays in inventory. There should be no quality
difference at all.”

He glared at her.
“Well, there is! And Taiwan assures me the only changes made were at your
insistence. I’ve told them to return to their former operational procedures at
once.”

She jumped up from
her chair, as rage surged through her body. How could he destroy a month of her
hard work without even giving her a chance to prove him wrong? “Trent, I worked
my butt off getting the process properly implemented. Call them back and tell
them to leave everything as it is!”

When he didn’t pick
up the phone, she did.

Chin Lo answered on
the first ring. She took a deep breath. “Mr. Chin, this is Carrie….Yes, he told
me. Do not do anything until I have time to investigate the matter. I will call
you back in five hours.”

Trent tried to grab
the phone, but she hung up and held it behind her back. “You owe me five hours
to prove to you the problem has nothing to do with inventory management.”

He slammed his fist
with such force she jumped back a full foot. “Fine, and when I prove it does,
then your phone call just cost you your job.”

The seething anger
inside her almost made her bellow in return, but she willed herself to speak
calmly. “
If
I caused this problem, Mr. Lancaster, then you have just
cause to fire me.” Her eyes narrowed. “Tell me what has happened so I can
figure out what is going on.”

In response, he threw
a file at her. “I found the problem in your desk drawer!”

The file hit her in
the chest, sending the papers inside flying. She spent her next minutes yanking
up papers and another ten minutes skimming the contents.

A letter dated three
days ago, from a customer who had recently ordered their top-line chairs wanted
to cancel his order. He had discovered them to be of poor quality.

Trent’s his glare exuded
I-told-you-so smugness. Right this minute, she disliked him as intensely as
Jack did. The excuse of channeling his father no longer cut it. Yes, he’d had a
bad day, but no worse than hers. These tantrums had to stop.

“Did you have some
extra inventory in the warehouse? Otherwise, I don’t see how this order could
have been filled yet.”

His brow furrowed as
he reached for the phone. “What’s his number?”

Instead of being
helpful and reading it off, or dialing it for him, she slung the folder at him,
hitting him in the chest.

Her response revived
his fury, but she didn’t give a flying leap. She had thirty thousand dollars in
her bank account and could pay her bills, which she intended to do when she
went home
alone
tonight.

As he slapped at the
papers, she activated her cell phone and called the customer. “Mr. Edwards, we’ve
received your letter concerning our chairs. What has happened to make you think
they are of poor quality?” Trent pushed to his feet and headed around the desk.
She rose as well and kept the major block of furniture between them so the
bastard couldn’t steal her phone.

“Well, it only has
two legs, for one thing,” Mr. Edwards replied.

“Do you by chance
still have it?” She continued her ring around the Trent blockade. As she got
confirmation, Trent tried to stretch across the desktop and snatch away her
means of communication. She jumped back. “Great, may I come over and see it?”
When the customer agreed, she met Trent’s glare with one of her own. “Thank
you. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

She closed her phone
and headed out the door. While she walked her fastest, he still caught her at
the elevator.

Neither of them spoke
as they entered. Tension screamed with angry silence in the sluggish box. When
it opened, they both stormed out. Carrie took the time to ask Thomas how he was
feeling, while Trent stomped out the door.

Outside, Sam leaned
against the limo, yelling into the phone while Trent bellowed at him. A giant
yellow wheel clamp hugged the limo’s back tire.

She took a right turn
and hailed a taxi. As a cab swung to the curb to pick her up, Trent continued yelling,
acting as if Sam had put the boot on the car himself. While she would not have
refused Trent entry into her taxi, she was in no mood to invite the monster
inside.

Sam’s chiding about
her blindness to Trent’s flaws came back to her. He was right. Her boyfriend/boss
was a real asshole. Why the hell had she fallen for him? She deserved better.

When Carrie arrived
at Mr. Edward’s office, his secretary led her straight in. A well-dressed man
in his early thirties rose to greet her. “Is Trent not coming?”

“He’s had a minor
transportation issue. He sent me ahead.” With any luck, she could resolve the
matter before he arrived. Her gaze fell upon a two legged chair propped against
the wall. She walked over and knelt down.

“You see my issue?”
Mr. Edwards said. “If the leg went out on one of my board of directors, they’d
probably have fired me.”

She recognized the
chair from hell. One of these had almost killed her when she first joined
Lancasters. She faced him. “The chair is a low-cost, economy line we
discontinued two years ago due to quality issues. We had a recall, but since you
never
bought
any of these chairs, you wouldn’t have received the letter.”
She studied him, trying to understand the game he played. “So where did it come
from?”

He grimaced as he sat
down on the couch and looked her in the eye. “Your former sales manager stopped
by earlier this week. He brought the chair with him so I could see the
difference between Econoline’s quality and yours. Said Trent was robbing me
blind, selling me shit for silver.”

“Former? Do you mean Hal
Jacobs?”

He nodded.

She sighed. “Well, he
forgot to tell us he quit. But more to the point, he purposely deceived you. I
am very familiar with Econoline’s products. They have nothing close to the
chairs you ordered.”

He scrubbed his face
with the palms of his hands for a moment before meeting her gaze again. “Ummmm.
It’s possible my order with you doesn’t exist. Hal assured me it didn’t, but I
sent you a cancellation letter all the same. Didn’t want to end up with two
sets of chairs.”

Carrie thanked God
Trent hadn’t arrived yet. “Well, besides the illegality of what he did, he also
lied to you. Would you like to sit in the actual product you ordered?”

“Honestly, I don’t want
to be anywhere around Trent when he discovers what his salesman tried to pull.”

She grimaced. “I’m
kind of glad he missed it, too. However, Kindels, on the floor above you have out
premium line. I can make a call and see if they wouldn’t mind letting you sit
in one.”

“I’ll take your
word.”

“No, I think you need
to experience the difference.” She called her contact for Kindels and the woman
agreed to allow them up.

The EA who had purchased
the chairs waited for her and Mr. Edwards. She bragged on its comfort and
strength all the way to the main conference room. They had the maroon version
which looked glorious with the cherry wood and dark cobalt walls.

Carrie left Mr.
Edwards talking to Miss Nye while she stepped outside and called Trent.

He answered at the first
ring. “Where the hell are you?”

She moved the phone
from her ear so he couldn’t deafen her. “I’m with Mr. Edwards, and we are going
to need a new contract. Can you calm down and get one, or should I send Jenny with
it tomorrow?”

“You can’t send Jenny
because she’s not officially a sales person yet. Hal will quit if he discovers
I hired her.”

“Since Hal is selling
Econoline products to your customers, and proving their quality is better by
giving them the prone-to-be-two-legged chairs we recalled years ago, I don’t
think hiding Jenny is a priority anymore.”

“He did what?” The
roar of his voice threatened to blow out her eardrums.

“Your head of sales
is using our recalled chairs to prove Econoline is superior quality.”

She cringed as
something crashed on the other end of the phone.

“You can bring Jenny
here tomorrow when you are sane. However, you need to call Taiwan immediately
and reiterate they are to stay the course on Just-in-Time inventory and if you
ever again unravel all my hard work just because your brain ceases to work when
you’re angry, I will not be around to fix the fallout. I’m calling it a day and
going home. You are not welcome in Denville tonight.”

“Where am I to stay?”

She rolled her eyes.
“You’re a grown man with two homes. If you can’t figure it out, sleep in your
office. Just don’t come to Denville, because if you do, I’ll call the police
and have you removed.”

She hung up and
returned to Mr. Edwards and Miss Nye sitting close together, chatting. Given
their laughter, she suspected they had moved onto ‘non-chair’ issues.

“I need to be going.”
She expected him to accompany her, but they both remained seated.

Mr. Edwards did
manage to momentarily tear his attention away from Miss Nye. “Well, thank you
for clarifying the situation. If Trent wants to press charges against Hal I’m
willing to testify. To be honest, I’m pissed as hell for the trick Hal tried to
pull on me. These chairs are far superior to the top Econoline chair.”

Carrie smiled. “Trent
and a new salesgirl should be here tomorrow with a new contract. And this time
the order will be processed in a timely fashion.”

“Yeah, I’m guessing Hal
held on to it so he could pull this bait and switch.”

“Looks like it.” She turned
to Miss Nye. “Thanks for letting us sit in your chairs.”

The woman laughed
softly and smiled at Mr. Edwards. “My pleasure.”

Carrie finally got
the message: She was so not needed here.

“Have a good night.”

She snared a taxi and
arrived at Penn Station within five minutes. Luck liked her for once. The
monitor showed her train had just arrived. Hurrying down the narrow escalators
and onto the dreary concrete platform, she weaved her way around the people bunched
up trying to enter the nearby doors and hurried to the front of the train. Once
nestled into a window seat, she let out a heavy breath, relieved she’d escaped
New York without running into Trent.

Turning on her iPad,
she listed in Notes her accomplishments and what still remained opened.

Grant.

Needing a better
understanding of exactly how stupid Trent had been when he blindly signed
Grant’s employment contract, she called David. Her boss’ idiocy still pissed
her off. He had the audacity to kneecap her because he presumed she had somehow
mucked up quality by improving inventory management, yet he forgave himself
entirely for his blatant stupidity. If she had signed a contract without
David’s approval, there’d be no roof on their building.

Finally, his lawyer
picked up. “I have no good news,” he warned. “I’m afraid you are stuck with Grant
for five years. Even a felony wouldn’t get you out of paying the bastard. The
only good thing about the debacle is Trent won’t sign a cocktail napkin without
my review in the future.”

Carrie could not
accept five years with Trent
and
Grant. One ass was more than enough.
“There has to be some way to get rid of him.”

“If he dies, the
police will be all over Trent. So pray he quits, but why the hell would he? In
three years, he’ll be pulling in $500K.”

Needing to change the
topic before she had an aneurism, she told him about the sales manager’s treachery.

“There, I can help
you. I did review and modify his contract. He has a no-compete for one year,
and he’s not allowed to talk to your customers for three. His act of libel and
theft of inventory might even get jail time.”