Seeing the Love (8 page)

Natalie thought she had a good handle on everything as she settled back at her desk. First day back at work since her surgery, but she’d kept an eye on her e-mails while she’d been away, and had caught up with some of her colleagues at the conference. There should be no surprises.

Remembering the conference led her right back to Lucas, as if she’d been able to think of anything else. It had been the perfect weekend and the best night of her life.

Their tender goodbye when she left his apartment had brought tears to her eyes. She’d watched him through the cab window until the cab turned the corner and he was lost from sight. He’d offered to go to the airport with her, but the idea of an emotional goodbye in public was more than she could cope with.

As to what would happen next, she’d no idea. They hadn’t made plans beyond another weekend together at some point, and now she was kicking herself for leaving it so vague. Not seeing him again was unthinkable. Was there any way she could transfer to the Wellington office? They didn’t have such a large sales team there, but it was worth making enquiries.

Grand-mére would be here in a few weeks, and Natalie knew she and Lucas would hit it off. Who could fail to love Lucas?

Caution settled on her shoulders. One weekend didn’t make a relationship. But they’d been friends for months. She brushed her cares away, fired up her laptop, and connected to the network.

The first message that popped up was from Lucas.

Lucas:
missing you already x

“Natalie.”

She swung around in her chair to see Trev, one of the other account managers. He was a huge gossip, and she fumbled to minimize the chat screen before he saw it.

“Didn’t see you at the closing party last night,” he said.

She fought to keep the blush from her cheeks. Failed. “No. I had other plans.”

“Didn’t see you on the flight this morning either.”

She’d seen him. “I was on the seven-thirty, same as you. I caught a ride to the office with Clare and Tina.”

“Oh, right.” He perched on the edge of her desk. “Good to have you back, by the way. Shame about Bryce, though.”

Her annoyance at his sitting so close had to be quashed. “What about Bryce?”

Trev quirked his eyebrows. “Oops. Maybe I’ve spoken out of turn, but I thought you’d be keeping up with the news—you know—while you were incapacitated.”

“I was having surgery on my ankle, Trev, not my brain. I wasn’t told about any issues. What have you heard?”

He jerked his thumb at her screen, at the minimized chat window with Lucas. “Maybe you should ask him. It was his fuckup.”

Natalie glanced at her screen. He had to be talking about Lucas. Before she could ask anything more, he’d answered his phone and was walking away.

She reopened the chat window but hesitated over the keyboard.

Natalie:
Missing you too. Just had a weird convo with Trev. Is something going on with Bryce?

Her question hung undelivered, and she realized Lucas was currently offline. There were always rumors of their biggest customers going elsewhere, and it would be typical of Trev to hear something innocuous and blow it up into something else entirely. She’d have a better picture when she’d gone through all her e-mails.

*

Lucas wavered between a state of blissed-out chill and encroaching panic, whenever he thought about Natalie. About their weekend together. About their future.

Was it possible that he might
have
a future with her?

He’d be completely blind soon. Totally dependent.

And so was her grandmother. Natalie was used to living with blind relatives. She didn’t treat him as though he was handicapped.

Surely she could do better? She was beautiful, inside and out. She deserved someone whole.

She said she wanted Lucas.

The thought of her with another man made him want to beat his head against the desk. The thought of her throwing away her future on him made his chest tight.

They couldn’t have children. There was no risk of passing down his defect to a child, since he wasn’t a carrier, but it wouldn’t be fair to Natalie when he wasn’t able to be a proper father. Would Natalie want a family? They hadn’t talked about that. The ache in his chest eased a little when he thought about everything else they
had
talked about, all the things and loves they shared.

Before he could change his mind, he sent her a chat message, and then tried to focus on his job.

He was partway through reviewing a backorder listing, when he heard someone walk up to his desk. “Lucas.” It was Sian. “Do you have a few minutes, please? Mark Ellidge wants to speak to you. In his office.” She cleared her throat. “I can walk you there, if you like.”

Lucas knew where Mark’s office was. What he didn’t know was why the Branch Manager wanted to speak to him. “I’m good, thanks.” He stood and reached down for Molly’s harness. “Any idea why he wants to see me?”

“I don’t know. Dave’s in there at the moment. Maybe he’s summoning everyone.”

He found his way to the manager’s office without mishap, and knocked on the closed door. Seconds later, it was opened.

“Lucas, come in. There’s a seat right here.” The manager grabbed his elbow and all but dragged him forward. Lucas’s knee bumped into a chair frame. God damn it, he
hated
when someone assumed that was what he wanted. This was his boss though, and Lucas had to be polite.  Biting down his sharp retort, he sat, and made sure Molly was settled next to him.

The door closed again, and Mark brushed past him, to return to his desk. “Right.” His voice boomed out. “Dave’s here with us, Lucas, and Verity from HR. We need to talk to you.”

Well they hadn’t invited him here to have a dance. Lucas forced a pleasant tone to his voice. “I’m visually impaired, Mark, not deaf. You don’t need to shout.”

Silence greeted his words. Why have a Human Resources rep? Was he in trouble? Or was Dave?

“This is a difficult situation for all of us.” Verity had a sharp edge to her voice, and that put Lucas on his guard right away. “There’s no need to be worried, but we’d like to take the time to see how you are coping.”

Coping? With what? It had to be his disability.

“The modified equipment I use is working just fine.” He didn’t want to sound ungrateful, so he added, “Thank you.”

“That’s good to know,” said Verity, “but I didn’t mean the equipment, per se.”

His blindness in general? Lucas was at a loss how to reply. He ran his tongue over dry lips. “What
do
you mean?”

“Your workload.”

Lucas worked the same number of hours as everyone else. He took the same breaks. His sick-leave record was better than several of his colleagues’. He scratched the back of his neck and tried to decide how to reply. “Is there a problem?”

“I’m afraid so.” Mark’s voice was still overly loud. “I’ll get to the point. We’ve lost a major account, and we’re following the audit trail to determine why.” He gave a short cough. “We’re trying to find out why they’ve gone elsewhere.”

Blind, not stupid.
Lucas bit the inside of his cheek as he swallowed down his sarcasm. They seemed to be waiting for him to speak. “Which account?”

“Bryce Electronics.”

Natalie went through the rest of her e-mail, searching through the non-urgent messages for any mention of Bryce. Sales updates. Newsletters. Team briefings. Deema, to whom Natalie had delegated most of her work, was away for a few days and hadn’t left a detailed handover. After spending half an hour sifting through e-mail, and with no reply from Lucas, Natalie decided to take the bull by its horns.

She placed a call with the Procurement Manager at Bryce, a charming woman she spoke to on a weekly basis.

“I’m sorry,” said the receptionist. “Ms. Stafford no longer works for Bryce Electronics. May I connect you to somebody else?”

That was unexpected, but Natalie didn’t let her concern leak into her voice as she asked for whoever was covering that role now.

“I’m sorry, but he’s not available for calls today. Would you like to leave a message?”

Natalie left a polite greeting, and hung up. Still no reply from Lucas, and she had no missed calls on her cell phone. Anxiety prickled down her spine. If this was a jigsaw puzzle, she was missing a few pieces but she knew how to find them. She set off for her manager’s office. Jeremy would know.

“Hi, Natalie. I was just coming to find you.” Jeremy closed the door behind her and gestured toward a chair. “Grab a seat.” He sat behind his desk and gazed at her, his expression serious. “Good to have you back. How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine, thanks. My ankle is healing well.”

“That’s good.” His smile was polished and slightly fake. “How was the conference?”

“Fine too. I’ll be doing a debrief with the others this afternoon.”

He nodded. “Great. Thing is, Natalie, we’ve got a problem with Bryce. We’ve lost them.”

Shit. Trev hadn’t been messing after all. “I tried to catch up with the Procurement Manager, but she’s left the company. I’ve not spoken to her replacement yet.”

Jeremy’s mouth twisted. “He probably won’t return your calls. He’s not a big fan of ours.”

“Is that why we’ve lost them? The new manager has a preferred supplier?”

“That’s part of the reason, but they’re citing mistakes and errors as the main driver. Late shipments. Incomplete orders.”

“Wow.” Natalie was at a loss for words. “I’ve only been away a few weeks.”

“I’m afraid that plays a big part.” Jeremy reached across his desk, to fidget with his fountain pen. He paused and looked directly at her. “I must stress this is not a criticism of your work, Natalie. It’s the opposite.”

A cold hand crept into her chest and began to squeeze. “What do you mean?”

“We’ve grown too reliant on you going the extra mile. As an organization, we should be able to cover for anyone who’s absent, not fall apart without them. As the manager, I take the culpability for us losing the account.”

She considered his words. They didn’t make sense. “I don’t understand.”

“The new Procurement Manager at Bryce was annoyed when we couldn’t function without you. He suggested that it showed inherent flaws in our management and delegation systems. That without you on the account, we handled them badly and paid no attention to their orders.”

Natalie rewound his words in her head. “You said there were problems with some orders. What happened?”

“The warehouse team was sloppy. They downgraded the priority of a major order, shifted stock to one of Bryce’s competitors—Masons—and then dispatched an order with only half the kit allocated. Frankly, it’s a clusterfuck we’re just untangling now.”

The warehouse team. He couldn’t mean Lucas. The breath jammed in her lungs. He knew how important the Bryce orders were. Lucas wouldn’t let that happen to her shipments. He’d have warned her if he was aware of any issues on her accounts.

It had to have been his colleagues that messed up, but the end result was the same. “Is there any chance of keeping them? Bryce? Have they withdrawn all their pending orders from the system?”

“We get to fulfil their backorders, but there won’t be anything new coming in.” Jeremy sighed. “It’s frustrating, but such is the world of IT sales. The hard reality is that your relationship was with the previous Procurement Manager, and short of sendng you to see the new guy and trying to win him over in person, our hands are tied.” His smile was sympathetic. “I wouldn’t ask you to do that.”

No, he wouldn’t. Jeremy knew how much she hated visiting customers and why she conducted all her accounts over the phone. Her skin crawled at the thought of introducing herself to the new Procurement Manager at Bryce. No. She wasn’t going there.

Natalie forced herself to nod and smile. “Now that I’m back, I’ll start calling up my contacts. See if I can drum up any new business.”

*

They’d lost Bryce? Lucas immediately thought of Natalie. They were her biggest customer and would contribute the most to her bonus. She, more than anyone, would feel the loss directly in her wages. He pulled his focus back. “I’ve handled a lot of the Bryce orders. How can I help?”

Mark cleared his throat. It was an ominous sound. “We have a record of the Bryce orders and what decisions were made at each step. There have been several key reallocations that delayed their shipments, and they were all either logged by you or approved by you.”

Wait. “What?” Even as he spoke, he knew. Dave’s fuckups. His stomach lurched. “Let’s just back up a moment. Did you say Dave is here too?”

“Um, yeah. I’m over here.”

Dave was rattled; Lucas could tell from his voice. Anger flashed through Lucas, hot and energizing. Dave would be more than rattled by the time Lucas had finished. “Would you mind walking me through the audit trail, so we can both explain our actions?”

“I’ve just e-mailed you the log, so you can see it for yourself,” said Mark. “It’s pretty self-explanatory, and Dave was able to fill in any gaps.”

“I’m sure he was.” Lucas couldn’t hold back his sharp retort. “Do I get a chance to comment too?”

“Of course. When you’ve had a decent opportunity to review the log.”

Lucas glared at where Dave’s voice had come from. This was a set-up, and he had no intention of taking the blame for his colleague’s mistakes. “I’ll give you my feedback today.” He stood and reached for Molly. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do.”

“Should I take it from here?” That was Verity again. “I can see you’re upset, Lucas, but we haven’t quite finished yet. Perhaps you’d like to sit again?”

He wasn’t a fucking performing seal. “I’m happy to stand.”

“Very well. Mistakes of this magnitude hurt everybody, and when we lose a major customer, it’s usual for us to review our practices, engage in retraining, and so on.”

“And that means?”

“We’re taking the opportunity to move you sideways, into another role, to broaden your experience.”

Lucas held onto his temper, but it took effort. He clenched his fists, and then released them again. “I’m sure I don’t need to point out that I’ve been working here for six years. I’m pretty experienced in the entire warehouse operation.”

“Yes, but with your current”—Verity hesitated—“restrictions, there are a limited number of positions open to you.”

Restrictions? “You mean my sight?”

“Yes.”

Lucas
knew
there was nothing wrong with his work. This whole situation stunk worse than a barrel of rotting fish. His only chance to clear his name was to review the audit log, and that meant getting out of here. “What are you proposing for me?” He bit the words out.

“Order processing.” Mark’s voice was cheerful, as though he sensed the finish line was in view. “It may be a more junior role, but we’ll maintain your remuneration package as it stands.” He coughed briefly. “That means—”

“No loss of income,” snapped Lucas. “I do know what you mean by remuneration package, Mark.” He dragged in a short, furious breath. “You may recall I
ran
the order processing team a few years ago, before I transferred to customer support.” When I still had my sight. “And now you want to transfer me to the team I used to manage?”

“We’d hate to lose you, Lucas.” Verity was clearly trying to make sympathetic noises, but was failing badly. “Your experience is extremely valuable to us, and this might not be a permanent transfer. Think of it as a secondment.”

If he had to stand here and listen to any more of this garbage, he was going to spontaneously combust. “I haven’t done anything wrong, and I have no desire to leave my current role. Do I have any choice in this?”

The silence was deafening.