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Eve felt herself smile. If she could read the room right, the attraction seemed mutual. Unfortunately, she really did believe in keeping work and personal separate so she focused on the colourful flyer in her hand. She knew nothing about these courses or qualifications, but in her book, educating employees was never a bad thing.
"I'll ask Dad to do it later tonight. If he forgets, I'll book it for you," she said decisively. Maybe it was foolish to make promises like that but she was sure she'd be able to convince her dad. And if not, it wasn't like he was keeping good track of the accounts. He'd never even notice if she booked this course for Charlie. Not that she'd go behind his back.
Charlie's eyes widened. "Really?"
"Yes. I mean, I'm assuming you'll be putting what you learn at the course to good use here?"
"Definitely. We don't really do body modifications but they can bring in a lot of money. Some of the rich dragon shifters love tuning their cars apparently."
Eve nodded, satisfied with the answer. "Great, then I'll make sure it's booked by tomorrow."
"Wow. Okay, amazing. Thank you." Charlie sounded genuinely grateful and perhaps a little shocked.
"No problem. Now that we've got that sorted, can you help me with something?" Eve said as she picked up the yearly calendar like it was filthy. "Can you explain to me why we're using this to keep track of work hours?"
Charlie chuckled, a lovely deep rumble. "Hey, take it up with the boss. He came up with that."
"It's rubbish. I'm embarrassed. This is supposed to be a serious business." Eve glared at the calendar, her newest nemesis. At least it had cute puppies on it, not sexy babes like she dreaded. That would've been insult to injury.
The door opened with the chime of a bell and her dad entered the reception, whistling a shrill tune.
Eve held out the calendar to the man responsible for all this nonsense. "Why are you using a calendar to keep track of who is working when?"
Her dad shrugged. "Because it's already got all the dates on. Nifty, huh?"
"No, not nifty. This is terrible bookkeeping. You need the employees to clock in properly for fire safety and such. A calendar is not the right way to do it," Eve rambled, genuinely mortified by everything she was discovering. "Does Mum know about this?"
"It's fine. It's a great system," her dad said, cavalier about this just like everything else in life.
"It's not," Eve argued back. "You should be using a program for it, or an app, or at least have the times noted down in a spreadsheet daily."
He shrugged again and ran a hand through his greying hair. "I put them in a spreadsheet when I sort out Christmas bonuses. It's going to be good this year, especially for my number-one worker. That's you, Charlie."
Surprise appeared on Charlie's face, together with a look that said she wished she was anywhere but here. "Umm..."
"Actually, according to the calendar, Jack's clocking the most days. He's here more than everyone, including you, Dad," Eve interrupted, only realising that was dismissive towards Charlie after she already said it.
She gave the mechanic an apologetic smile but Charlie didn't look at all upset. If anything, she was grinning. Eve didn't know what that was about but she decided she could figure that out another time. Right now, she wanted her dad to take her seriously. The way he was running the garage was not acceptable. Maybe he'd given her a job out of pity, not expecting much, but Eve wasn't going to just sit here and twiddle her thumbs. Especially not as she kept discovering horror after horror.
Her dad flipped through the calendar and hummed. "I suppose Jack has been putting in the hours. Good lad."
"Yeah, he's always been a hard worker," Eve said as she sat down behind the desk again. "While I have you both here, you're alright with sending Charlie on that body modification course, right?"
"Oh, yeah, I totally forgot about that." Her dad gave her a thumbs-up on his way out. "Keep up the good work, Evie."
Eve drew a big breath, an attempt to curb the murderous feelings welling up in her. This was not at all what she expected when she agreed to come work here.
She sighed and shot Charlie another apologetic smile. "Sorry you had to witness that, I shouldn't have done that in front of you. And I wasn't trying to dismiss you, you are a really hard worker and you do lots of hours, but not more than Jack."
To her surprise, Charlie smiled. "It's alright. And I'm not upset, I'm well aware that Jack works harder than anyone here. It's just your dad who doesn't see it."
"I think there's a lot he's not paying attention to," Eve muttered as she glared at the calendar. As soon as she had transferred all the data into a sensible spreadsheet, she was going to burn that thing.
With a defeated sigh, she sat down again. "Thank goodness it's Friday."
Charlie chuckled softly, a delightfully distracting sound. "Yeah, I know what you mean. Got any good plans for the weekend?"
"I'm meeting a friend for a drink, but mostly, I'm looking forward to two days of peace." Eve pinched the bridge of her nose as she fought the urge to clock out early. With the stupid calendar system, her dad would never even know. Of course, she wouldn't do that either.
