Page 37 of Ellie 1

“Take it from your pay,” Warren snapped.

“Why? I’ve been saying these guidelines are bullshit for years,” he snapped. “I refuse to let Fitz or Hastings near my department because of it.Youmight have thought this was okay, but none of this happened in my department.”

“Your department has the lowest number of incidences, but no department is without issue,” I corrected. I nodded when he shot me a surprised look. “Your problem left last year but three people left the hospital because of her.” I sighed when he winced.

Yeah, disgusting assholes were in both genders. We always had to remember that.

“We wouldn’t have to even discuss touching our income if you allowed donations,” Warren sneered. “Your pride doesn’t allow outside money and—”

Alan threw back his head and laughed. He laughed so hard that it was difficult not to smile even if none of this was funny. He stood and gave Warren an amused look. “You’re just going to keep doubling down until we throw you into the ocean. Fine. I can’t wait to get rid of you.”

“Your pridewants to have all the glory of bragging about donations,” Dr. James drawled. “Ms. Reed is fighting against more corruption and bullshit here. Don’t talk to some of the smartest people in the world like we’re morons. We’re not.” He snorted and stood as well. “And we’re smarter than you, Warren. Stop trying to throw rocks while standing in a cracking glass house.”

And with that, all of the department heads left, wishing me luck and making it clear that they would help with whatever I needed.

Which left me with a stunned board.

“I warned you,” I chuckled as I closed my laptop and gathered my things. “No one ever believes me, and you just run your mouths that I’m a paper pusher and so beneath you. Maybe now you’ll finally get it through your heads how things really are before it’s too late.” I finished packing up and smirked at them. “But I doubt it.”

I headed to the interviews next and the one who would become my right hand on the HR side, Beth Hudson, was amazing. She was completely up for the challenge and understood my goals.

Including getting out the current head of HR who was completely toxic.

The problem was when I walked her out and she saw who was waiting… And the man saw her. They both visibly flinched.

“So there’s a problem here,” I drawled, gesturing between the two of them.

“No, not at all,” Ms. Hudson quickly said. “It’s simply a surprise when I heard he was happy in his current role.”

“I’d heard the same, so clearly we put on good faces professionally,” the guy said smoothly. “The HR circle is small at management levels just as with hospital administrators.”

Fair enough. I left it alone and focused on getting done what I needed to. He was great too, but I made it clear that Beth would be in charge eventually and help me fully right the ship and I was expecting him to be the advocate for any male staff. She protected the hospital while he protected the male employees so everyone thrived.

He agreed once he checked female employees would have an advocate too. Of course, I just needed to kick her ass a bit to get her on the same page. She wasn’t part of the problem, but she didn’t jump in to help either.

She normally sat back and ate popcorn while watching the drama which wasn’t the role of HR.

Everything was in place the next morning when the meeting with all the department heads and attendings was to start. My new HR hires joined for the day, but their roles wouldn’t really begin for another week. They had to finish out their jobs and get their lives sorted.

It would be a headache for them, but… They were adults. This wasn’t the first situation like this that they’d been involved with, so they understood better than I did. That was why I’d hired them.

And the head of HR wasn’t happy to find people were added to her department without her consent or approval.

Yeah, okay, bitch. You answered to me, not the other way around.

“As of today, things will be changing at All Supes Hospital,” I said firmly once everyone was settled. “Every department head fully agreed with these changes, and we negotiated what worked with the board. So understand that we are a united front going forward and this is happening. We aretiredof the way things have been going.

“It’s to the point that the owner would rather close the hospital down than continue as the way things have been. It’s gotten that bad.” I gave everyone a minute with that. “It’s gotten so bad that other hospitals now laugh at ASH that we’re a reality spring break gone bad show and our doctors are jokes.” They were less than thrilled to hear that.

And one by one looked at Tommy with hate.

“Don’t even put this all on Dr. Fitz,” I said dryly. “He might be the worst and the reason it all exploded, buteveryonein this room is guilty.” I glanced over at the department heads. “Even a few of you have gotten caught up in the rumor mill. It happens.”

“Not to you,” Alan said firmly. “Not to me. So clearly, there is a way to not get pulled in.”

“True, but a few were dragged there by problems, not the problem themselves,” I said mostly for Joyce. “So let’s all remember the reality before acting like it’s one person we should just get rid of. I knowwaytoo much about all of you and who has slept with whom. It ends. Talking about partners and being unprofessionalends today.”

“Good,” one of the department heads said firmly, the rest of them agreeing. “I’m tired of feeling like a dorm director instead of a department head, and Ireallycan’t stand constantly finding naked people in the on-call rooms when I need to close my eyes. How hard is it to lock a fucking door on top of everything else?”

---