“Good. I’m doing good.” Her former service manager fidgeted and avoided her eyes.
“We all miss you at Peyton’s, but I’m putting everything in place for when you feel like coming back.” she said, smiling. “In the meantime, you’ll be happy to know things have worked out good once I promoted someone to be temporary service manager.”
“Who?” Papa Carrington asked.
“Derek Johnson. You know, the man Earl had hired a few months ago. He’d been working in the maintenance area for a while, and now he’s turned out to always be on top of everything as the service manager."
“Did you know about this, Millerton?” Papa C asked, agitation clear in his tone and his blatant stare.
“Yeah. He came highly recommended.”
“By who?”
“The people at the…uh, the poker game.” Earl shot Papa C a direct narrowed eye look and held.
“I don’t think I like?—”
“You weren’t available, so I needed to do what I thought was in everyone’s best interest.” Earl stood and walked to the window. Stared outside. “And Betsy offered me a desk job promotion when I’m back on my feet. So, I’ll still be there to keep an eye on everything in the service center.”
“Is there a problem?” Betsy asked, turning toward Papa C.
“No. No problem. It’s just that the people at the poker game aren’t always the best ones to rely on.” Clearing his throat, her father-in-law reached out for her hand. “You be careful out there. Always check your references.”
She felt the concern in his demeanor. “Don’t worry, I do. In fact, this time, Earl had done a background check before he hired Derek, so I had all the info I needed.”
The room quieted once again, so she took that as a sign to leave. She’d come to show concern and now it was time to go. The vibe felt off, but with everything that had happened in the past couple of days, she was probably just imagining the feel.
Glancing at her watch she pretended to be shocked at the time. “Oh my gosh. I’m about to be late to my meeting with the insurance agent. Mr. Crestfall’s coming by the dealership to help me file the claim.”
“If you wait a couple days, I can do that once I’m released from the hospital,” Papa C said. “That’s a lot of extra work on your shoulders.”
“Don’t worry about Peyton’s. You just need to focus on your health right now.” She leaned over and gave him a slight hug. “Besides, Cain said he’d stop by to help me if I had any questions.”
“I don’t know if I’d trust him.” Papa C narrowed his eyes and set his jaw as he pushed up on one elbow and pointed his finger at her. “Some things are better left to those in charge.”
A threat? Had he just threatened her? No, he’d meant it as intimidation. The tone had been the one he’d always used to bully people. Evidently this time he felt it would make her change her mind on filing the claim herself.
She’d seen Phillip bullied by his dad. Sometimes he’d even stood up against him. She’d been bullied by a lot of people in her life, too. The lessons had stuck as she learned to stand up for herself.
“You seem to forget, I am the one in charge.” She smiled her sweetest smile as she opened the door to leave. “Cain will be my advisor. I trust him with my business. I trust him with my life.”
Carrington slid back on his pillow. Tried to stare her down. Lifted his phone as if to call some unknown entity. “You might want to reconsider what you just said.”
Now that was an all-out threat.
“You don’t scare me, Papa C. Never have. Never will.” Stepping out the door, she glanced back once again. No smile in her expression this time. “You don’t scare me in the least.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Standing amid the yesterday’s destruction in the service center, Betsy felt the same chaos in her life that she’d felt the day, years ago, when her uncle had stood at their front door to tell them her dad had been killed. Throughout her life, anytime she’d faced change or catastrophe, her own reaction had always been the same. Sadness. Disbelief. Anger. Then perseverance. Always perseverance to move forward.
For just this reason, Betsy had deliberately arrived at the dealership thirty minutes before the appointment with Mr. Crestfall was scheduled. She hadn’t entered the main building which housed her office. That she couldn’t face yet. Instead, she’d gone to the service center building.
Her instinct was to reach out and begin cleaning up the mess, but she knew the insurance adjuster would need to see everything just as it had been left. Of course, there were also remnants of the yellow crime scene tape still draped around the interior of the building. Around the entire Peyton’s Dealership lot, also. She’d leave that until the police gave her permission to remove it.
With nothing she could really do at this point, she wished she hadn’t arrived early. Depending on the time of the year, the service center was always noisy with conversation and music and machine noises—fans whirling, a/c whooshing or heat humming. Today there was utter silence.
She sighed. The building’s empty loneliness was almost overwhelming. The past couple of days had been filled with activity, but Cain had been by her side all the way. And after all her doubts about his possible involvement in drug dealing, she’d come to realize that half of her doubts had been due to her past paranoia. The other half were because she’d always had a hard time trusting people
