They Left Me Out of Their Group So I'll Leave Them Out of My Life novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: One Star

I read the first review standing up.

It said I had been rough with a client's dog and had laughed about it.

The second said I'd lied about a bill.

The third said I took things out of the supply room.

By the seventh I had stopped reading the words and was only counting the names.

"None of these people are clients," Nate said. "I checked every one against the system."

"I know."

"Do you know them?"

"Two of them."

I pointed at the screen.

"Two women who sit behind my mother in church."

Nate leaned his hip against the desk and folded his arms.

He had been in the clinic since five, and his sleeves were pushed up to the elbow, and there was a long pink scratch on his forearm from a cat.

"Your mother," he said.

"Yes."

"Sunday dinner didn't go well."

"My father believes a piece of paper over me."

I hadn't planned to say it.

It came out flat, and then I stood there with it in the air between us.

Nate waited.

He is very good at waiting.

It's the thing he does with a frightened animal.

"I can take my name off the schedule," I said. "I can work in the back. Or I can quit, if it's going to cost you clients."

"No."

"Nate."

"No," he said again, not loudly. "You've run my back room for four years. If I lose clients over fourteen reviews from people who never walked through my door, I'll make my peace with it."

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