Sweet Surrender (14 page)

“I’m sure Jared found you beautiful.”

“Good thing it was dark or he would have thought he was proposing to a raccoon.” She shook her head. “Despite that, it was a beautiful moment that I’ll remember for the rest of my life.”

“That’s so sweet. I’m happy for you, Stace, for both of us. Marc asked me over champagne and strawberries, and bubbly 102-degree water.”

“Then he had you in bubbly 102-degree water, I bet.”

Jessie couldn’t keep the pleased grin off her face as she remembered what came after the proposal.

“Lucky girl, I had to wait for naked celebration until we got back to the hotel.”

They lapsed into silence, each lost in thought, wistfully gazing at the sparkling diamond on their finger.

“Marc wants me to move in right away.”

“Jared too, but Jess, you should see his house.” She grimaced and a shudder shook her petite body. “It’s on the lake and gorgeous on the outside. The inside, though… Oh, my stars! Would you believe mustard yellow and battleship gray walls?” She feigned putting a finger down her throat to gag.

“You’re kidding.”

“No, it’s the color of… well, baby poop is the best way to describe it. You’ll have to see it to believe it. The only livable room is his bedroom. I demanded a complete redecorating as a wedding present. Want to help?”

“Sounds like fun. Marc’s house is perfect already. His sister decorated it.” She wrinkled her nose at that thought.

“Yeah? Which rich bitch, or is it witch? I’d think it’d be dark and gloomy with cauldrons and cobwebs all around.”

Jessie laughed, although she didn’t feel like it. “Don’t make me laugh. Renata, the middle sister did it. She went to design school and it’s quite tasteful. I’ll probably never hear the end of it. ‘I had such a time getting the perfect Italian marble for the kitchen,’ or ‘you’re so lucky to have had it professionally done, so you don’t have to worry about color and texture, Josephine.’”

Stacy blinked. “Who the heck is Josephine?”

“I am. It’s some game for them to call me by the wrong name.”

“Really? You’ve been seeing him for months.”

Jessie nodded.

“Definitely bitches. I’d gut the place.”

“That would really tick her off,” Jessie giggled. “But no, it’s really quite tasteful, and expensive.”

“You should redo something, at least, like the bedroom and put your stamp on it.”

“Yeah, but I’d have to hear about that too. I’m on eggshells around these women, Stacy. They are all awful and once they hear about the engagement, I’m afraid it’s going to get worse. I dread it.”

“Praise heaven that Jared’s an only child.”

“You said it, sister.”

They chatted about weddings and dresses, Stacy wanting to go small or just simply elope, if possible; Jessie hoping for a big to-do if she could swing it. Before they knew it, their hour was up. Full of happiness for each other—or as Stacy said, like two ticks about to pop—they parted ways, heading back to work.

* * *

With a budget meeting at two, Jessie had less than an hour to check her figures one more time before meeting with Gwen, the chief nurse, and the CFO, Elliott Doyle. The finance man was known for being a hardass when it came to capital expenditures, so she wanted to be prepared. She was punching figures into her calculator when she heard a knock.

Glancing up, she smiled, seeing Jenna Eldrige, her old college roommate and a fellow nurse at the hospital, peeking through the open door.

“Hey, girl.”

“Got a minute, Jess? It’s important.”

“Sure, come on in, but all I have is a minute. I have a meeting in thirty.”

“I’ll be brief.” Jenna closed the door and took a seat across from her. Jessie could tell by the way she was cracking her knuckles and fidgeting that she was worried or upset. “I usually don’t carry tales, but…”

“Jenna, obviously something is bothering you. Tell me.”

“Gina Slemp, you beat her out for this job, didn’t you?”

Tensing as a knot formed instantly in her stomach, Jessie braced herself for trouble. “She had more experience but they wanted a manager with an advanced degree. Why?”

“Have you had any problems with her?”

“She’s not the bubbliest nurse on the floor, but nothing major.”

Biting her lip, Jenna’s brows gathered into a worried expression.

“Just tell me.”

“Okay, I just got back from lunch and I heard her telling a bunch of people in the cafeteria that you slept your way into your new job. She said some other things that weren’t very nice too. I thought you should know so you could watch your back.”

The knot twisted, forming a heavy, leaden lump. “What were the other not very nice things?”

“Petty insults I’d rather not repeat.”

“Jenna…”

“Oh, all right. She said you were fresh out of school and too young to have earned the job so you used your huge ta-tas to lure the assistant department chair into your bed and
voila
—instant promotion.”

“That’s ridiculous, who in their right mind would sleep their way into this nightmare of a job?” She fumed silently for a moment. “Marc and I were dating long before I even got my Masters, when I was still in surgery.”

“Yeah, someone pointed that out. She said you were planning this all along. That you knew Dr. Trent was good friends with Gwen and the chief of staff and that you cozied up to him, knowing it would help you get ahead.”

“Who else was there?”

“One of your new nurses, Chris or Christine—”

“Krista?”

“Yeah, that’s it. The others were from different departments.”

“That lying bitch!” Jessie pushed to her feet, her eyes darting to the clock on the wall. She needed to go soon. “I get sick of this crap. I worked my butt off to get my degree, but all people see is hair, tits, and ass, then two plus two equals me spreading my legs because that’s the only way a bimbo like me can get ahead. It makes me so mad I could spit.”

“That’s why I came to tell you.”

“Is that it?”

Jenna grimaced. Jessie knew there was more.

“Just get it all out while you’re at it.”

“She said something else that got a big laugh, that it’s true what they say.”

“What?” Jessie braced herself for the rest.

“It’s not what you know, it’s who you blow and how hard.”

Jessie’s heart constricted. She’d worked at another hospital where there had been gossip. Never had it been as vicious as it was at St. Joe’s, and as far as she knew, she’d never been a target. Was it her promotion or jealousy over Marc? Or possibly, they just didn’t like her.

“Stacy warned me before I started here that the gossip mill was like nothing she’d ever seen before. I found out firsthand the first week I was here. Do you know they were taking bets in the OR about how many days it would take for Marc to get in my pants?”

“Yeah, who won?” Jenna deadpanned.

“Jenna!”

“Sorry, I was just trying to lighten the mood. But the bet wasn’t so far off, was it? That’s a new diamond ring flashing on your finger, isn’t it?”

Jessie blushed, looking down at her left hand. “It was several weeks, not days like they were betting, I’ll have you know.”

“You don’t owe me or any of them an explanation, Jess. I’m happy for you, girl.”

“Thanks,” she said vaguely, as she began to pace. “That bet was more about Marc than me. But when I started dating him and when we got engaged, it became about me. I’ve heard the rumors. I knew being involved with a good-looking, eligible young doctor would make me a target. When Stacy started dating Jared, they did the same to her, including a titillating rumor about them having sex in a mop closet. Can you imagine? What’s wrong with these people? Where do they think they are, the set of
Grey’s Anatomy,
for Pete’s sake? Things like that only happen on TV, especially having sex in a mop closet… seriously! Obviously, none of them has ever looked in one of those closets. Ew, no freakin’ way! Not even with Marc, if I was sex-starved and desperate.”

“Oh, Jess.”

She looked up, seeing that Jenna’s eyes were wet and she was biting her lip.

“Are you upset, or are those tears of laughter? I can’t tell.”

A chuckle burst free. “A little of both, I think. I hate to burst your bubble, Jess, but some of those women… They
are
sex-starved and desperate enough to do it with Marc anywhere, the loading dock, the biohazard room, the morgue table—”

“Gross.”

“Seriously, honey. He’s wealthy and handsome. This is all about petty jealousy and in Gina’s case, on top of being jealous she’s ticked off because you beat her out of a promotion. Don’t take any of this crap to heart. I just told you because you need to be careful around her.”

“You’re a good friend, Jenna.”

“Always, Jess.” She smiled. “I gotta get back to the floor, those babies aren’t gonna birth themselves.”

“Thanks for the heads up.”

“Are you gonna be okay?”

“Yeah, but I think I’ll start being careful around Gina right now. I’ve got time for rounds on her patients before my meeting.”

“Thatta girl, I’ve worked with her before. Make her toe the line and she’ll move on. That’s one woman who doesn’t pull her weight.”

“Thanks again, Jenna.”

“I got your back, Jessie. Count on it.”

After she left, Jessie stood there trembling with equal parts hurt and anger. She stared distractedly at the nameplate holder on her door, still blank. The turnover was so great for nurse managers they seemed to be dragging their feet before ordering and mounting a new one. Marc’s words rang in her head. “That place will suck the life out of you if you let it.”

Be assertive, delegate, set limits, he’d said. Damn if he wasn’t right, with one correction. It wasn’t the place bleeding her dry, nor the work, or even the patients, it was the people… her people and other staff who made up what was supposed to be her team. Anger churned in her gut. No way in hell was she going to let a bunch of malicious gossips run her off and sideline her career goals. She was going to put an end to it on her unit, now.

Finding the nurse’s station empty, Jessie followed the sound of muffled voices to the chart room in back. As she approached, their conversation became clear.

“Did you see that huge rock on her finger? She’ll probably quit as soon as she says ‘I do.’”

Jessie stiffened. The easily recognizable nasal voice belonged to Gina. She saw red. Obviously, she hadn’t gotten enough trash talking at lunch; she had to bring it upstairs with her too.

“I know I wouldn’t come back if I had access to his bank account.” The second woman’s voice was low and on the raspy side. It was Krista.

“I don’t know what he sees in her,” Gina complained. “She’s so…”

“Fat?” This suggestion came from yet another woman and it really stung. Curious as to her identity, she wasn’t yet ready to step in, planning to give them enough rope to hang themselves.

“I wouldn’t call her fat,” Krista replied.

The third woman added, “Yeah, she’s more like voluptuous, like Dolly Parton, only in a cheaper, more floozy-looking kind of way.”

“And with bigger boobs,” the other two answered at the exact same time.

Their laughter rolled out the door, the crude joke weighing heavily. She’d had enough. Moving into the doorway of the chart room, she stood there until the three gossipmongers, who had moved on to trashing someone else, noticed her. Krista was the only one who had the decency to blush. The other two she stared at steadily, a technique she had learned from Marc on the occasions he’d taken her to task. She didn’t say a word until they were all squirming uncomfortably.

“Karen, Mrs. Walter’s discharge order was written at nine a.m. Why is she still here?”

“Um… we were waiting on delivery of her hospital bed and home oxygen.”

“When was that supposed to happen?”

“At noon.”

Jessie looked pointedly at the clock on the wall. It read 1:45. “Don’t you think you should follow up on it so we can get her out? There are four patients in recovery and housekeeping will need to clean the rooms before we can receive any of them.”

“I’ll do that now, Jessie.”

She waited silently as the woman scurried off to do her job. Her eyes swept to the two staff nurses, her subordinates. “I’m glad you two had some down time. I have meetings all afternoon so you’ll be on your own. Four post-ops pending and six more to discharge, I’m sure you can handle it though. You must be caught up since you’ve had time to sit around and chat.”

Krista, the younger of the two with less than six months on the floor, popped out of her chair, murmuring, “Yes, ma’am.” With a blush suffusing her face, she rushed from the room.

That left Gina. “I expected you to be a better example as a preceptor, Gina. Gossiping and wasting time isn’t quite what I had in mind. Maybe we need to reconsider your role as mentor for the new hires.”

“No, Jessie. I really need the extra money.”

“Then please demonstrate that you can do the job appropriately.”

“Of course, I’m sorry.” She then rushed out with a murmured, “I’ll just go make my rounds.”

After Gina left, Jessie leaned heavily against the counter. It was unbelievable that grown women who were supposed to be professionals were acting this way. It felt like high school all over again, and she the vice-principal. Sighing, she glanced at her watch. She had a job to do and it didn’t include her staff liking her, although until today, she thought that they had. Not BFF, ‘let’s have drinks and get mani/pedis together’ friends, but she thought they at least liked and respected her, and her position.

Management sucked, especially middle management, which squeezed you from both sides. It was either the staff needing something constantly or upper management breathing down your neck about budgets, inspections, or staff retention rates. She had been told this when she chose the administrative route in school, but it paid well and with some experience, she could rise through the ranks, become a chief nursing officer, like Gwen, and make the big bucks. Then she’d have the financial security and be able to build the safety net she needed to rest easy.