“Thanks, Hershel.” The woman waved him away. “I have it from here. When I’m done with them, I’ll take them where they need to go.”
Hershel winked and disappeared without having to be told twice.
“Close the door, please?” the woman asked.
I did, and took the seat next to Charleigh when she gestured for me to.
“I got your insurance paperwork last week, and it’s already up and running. They said that you’ll have your insurance cards within the next week or so. It’ll be sent directly to your house,” the woman said. “Oh, and by the way, I’m Nicole. And whatever you do, don’t get anywhere near Hershel. He’s a great guy, but he’s really clumsy and lives with his head in the clouds. He knows his stuff—this is his company after all, but he’s an accident waiting to happen. If you see him coming, maybe duck down a hallway and wait for him to pass.”
My lips twitched at Nicole’s words.
Last week when I’d met with Mr. Shepherd, he’d broken a coffee cup, split open his pants, and caused the food delivery driver bringing in the staff’s lunch to drop every bit of their food on the floor. And that had only been an hour worth of time spent with the man.
“We noticed.” Charleigh chuckled. “We came in at separate times, but when we were comparing our notes afterward, Hershel came up. He did not disappoint.”
She rubbed at her forehead. “When Chris Gates and Hershel Shepherd started this company, I came right along with them from our previous employer. Hershel was bad then, but the older he gets, the worse his attention span drifts. I’m not kidding, y’all. I have done over four workman’s comp claims because of him since we started. I promise you, this is a really great place to work. But the man seriously tries my patience. I can’t wait for Chris to get back.”
I’d told Charleigh all about Chris, and how much I liked him, so she was eager to meet him as well since she’d be working as his assistant and right-hand woman.
She was also assigned partially to me, too, so we’d be sharing her.
“All right, first thing’s first. I’ll print out your papers so you can fill them out, Charleigh. As for you, Birdee, we’ll just type them in as you tell me what to put down. It’ll save some paper. I think I need more, and the last person I’m asking to get me a box of computer paper out of storage is Hershel.”
Five minutes later, Nicole was looking at me expectantly.
“Ummm,” I hesitated.
I mean, it wasn’t a hard question. I did have family I could put down. But did I want any of them to be called in the case of emergency?
I never put one down when I’d taken the job with Stacy.
I had Shade, sure. But Shade didn’t do well with blood, and neither did his mother, Reyelle. They were great people. I loved them to death. But put them in a situation where you had to be calm, cool and collected at a hospital and they unraveled.
Both of them passed out at the sight of blood.
So they weren’t getting put down.
I could put Mable or Cody down, but what would be the point? We were sisters, but we weren’t much more than just in name only. If I put Mable down, it’d be like putting my neighbor, Boone, down.
“Birdee?” Nicole pushed gently.
That’s when I blurted out the name, not thinking at all as I did.
“Creed Daugherty. His number is…”
Nicole clacked away. Meanwhile, Charleigh hissed, “You could’ve put me down. Not the man that yelled at you and called you a bitch.”
Luckily, she’d said it so quietly that Nicole hadn’t heard over her clacking on the keyboard.
I winced. “I could’ve put you, but if it’s a work incident, you’ll be notified anyway, won’t you? What if we’re both incapacitated? Who would we call then?”
Charleigh hadn’t been all that open with her past, but I did know she didn’t have any family.
Her closest friend was me.
Weren’t we just two peas in a pod?
“I guess we know that he’ll take you to the hospital in case of emergency, at least,” she admitted.
