Page 28 of Ellie 1

“I am notjealous, Dr. Fitz. I’m disgusted,” I told him honestly. “I’m disgusted that you speak of women in such a manner and degrade them down to such superficial parts and blab about it like you do a damn car. I’mdisgustedthat I can’t fire you and make an example of you that this has to stop and this toxic behavior is over.”

“I did go too far,” he accepted, studying me and getting he couldn’t spin this around or gaslight me this time.

Asshole.

“I can accept that and apologize for—”

“Oh, we’re beyond that,” I chuckled darkly. “We’re so far beyond that, you blink funny and even the department heads and board will demand you get booted.” I grabbed the right file and handed it to him. “You’re suspended for a week without pay and no bonuses for a month.Yourdepartment head demanded that if he’s to keep you in trauma.”

“Dr. Carpenter did?” he whispered, taking the file with a shaky hand.

“Yes, he did, and this is not the first time he’s voiced his disgust on how you behave, but apparently it will be the last time because the board will be changing the rule. Because of you. Because of how far you went over the line and who you stepped in it with this time. Finally.”

He went pale. “You’re serious.”

“You alone have cost us at least two dozen good staff because of your behavior. Not just your conquests, but decent people who were disgusted this behavior was allowed at ASH. But maybe we can get them back now that it won’t be allowed anymore. Because you went too far and pissed off enough people now.”

“Wait, there has to be a way to roll this back or handle things so this isn’t the outcome.”

“Probably.” I snorted when hope filled his eyes. “You are not hearing me that this is a change Iwant. I have wanted. You are part of the reason. Your behavior is disgusting and toxic, and I will not help you put the problem back in a box to be ignored.”

“Look, I get that, and okay, I’ve gone too far—I’m not the only one, and changes do need to be made,” he agreed. “But everything after the disaster was too volatile, and we were all—”

“No, everyone wasn’t, Dr. Fitz.Youwere. You behaved this way and it finally broke people who have tired of it and they kicked over the first dominoes that I won’t get in the way of.” I sighed when he started to argue again. “You’re not even sorry.”

“What?” he asked, doing a double take at the change of direction.

I shook my head, completely disgusted I’d ever touched this man much less for years. “You’re not even sorry or bothered to ask if she’s okay.” I met his gaze and knew mine was hard. “Do you seriously have no shame? You want to put the cork back in the bottle so you can still have your rotating door sex life and don’t care at all about what you did.”

He sighed, giving me a look like I was being too much. “She’s a tramp who wanted to jump into bed thinking she could get a doctor husband out of it and—”

“She’sa tramp? Are you kidding me? You knew that was what she wanted and used her for sex. Do you not hear yourself?” I pushed to my feet because I had to move before I exploded. “I can’t even keep up with your numbers and you dare to call anyone else a tramp? Disgusting.”

“Fine, that was a poor choice of words,” he muttered. “But the point—”

“The point isyouare a cancer on this hospital, Dr. Fitz, and others are tired of it. I couldn’t be fair on the topic and let a lot of it buzz past my ears because it was you, but now people are making it clear this stops and you should go. So I suggest you take the week to get your head on straight and realize you are the problem if you are to continue to work here.”

He stared at me for a full minute.

“You may leave,” I finally told him. “Sign the write- up that you got it, take what you need, and turn in your security everything over since you’re suspended for the week.” I reached over and tossed him a pen.

He moved like a robot, not even looking at what was in the folder, but finding the place to sign. That was fine. I’d make sure he got a copy of the complaint later.

It wasn’t until he was almost to the door that I dropped the last bomb on him and why I hadn’t wanted HR to be here for this part.

“And Tommy? We’re done,” I told him firmly. I nodded when he slowly turned to look at me with even more shock in his eyes. “I won’t even screw someone who talks about women like that and can’t remotely be professional. I also told you the next time that I saw you that you better have an apology for how you behaved about Clark and whatever he said.

“Instead, you came in here and blasted me like I answer to you and you haveany rightto judge me. You have to have a screw loose to get all over my case about anything when evenHastingsmade it clear you’d gone too far and didn’t want to be buddies with you anymore. Seriously, get your act together because I’m not even your friend anymore after this.”

He left. He stared at me until my phone rang and I answered, ignoring his presence, and after a few more moments, he just left.

Good.

I let out a long slow breath that at least things were over with Tommy before giving the call my full attention. Security sent me a message when Tommy turned over his ID and keys.

Even better. He left without a fuss.

Sadly, it wasn’t anything I’d said, but it was the fact Dr. Carpenter had been one of the complaints. Tommy idolized Alan and wanted to take over for him one day.

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