Page 67 of Tuned To Break
Then José starts to snicker.
“Holy shit,” he says, trying and failing to cover his mouth with an oil-stained hand. “Stella, you look like you’ve been dunked in chocolate sauce.”
That breaks the dam. Asher starts laughing so hard he has to put down his spray gun and lean against the bench for support. Parker doubles over, clutching his stomach like he’s in pain from laughing. Even Robert, usually the most professional, is chuckling behind his welding mask.
“Oh my God,” Chase says, emerging from his office with a stack of invoices. He stops dead when he sees me, mouth falling open. “What happened?”
“Boss lady decided to take a swim in the oil tray,” José manages between giggles, face red from laughter.
I sit there for a moment, feeling the oil seeping into places oil should never go, watching these grown men laugh at my misfortune like schoolboys who’ve just seen the class clown slip on a banana peel. The absurdity of the situation isn’t lost on me. Here I am, the supposedly competent operations manager sitting in a puddle of motor oil like some sort of slapstick comedy character.
I plant my palm on the nearest bench, jaw tight, and push to stand.
“Are you quite finished?” I ask coldly, my voice cutting through their laughter like a blade.
“Not even close,” Asher wheezes, wiping tears from his eyes. “This is the best entertainment we’ve had all week.”
“Stella looks like she’s been tarred and feathered,” Parker adds, voice pitched high with hilarity. “Minus the feathers.”
That’s when my temper snaps.
The professional façade I’ve been maintaining—the careful balance between being one of the guys and being their boss, the patient understanding I’ve cultivated for months—evaporates in an instant, replaced by the kind of righteous fury that could power a small city.
“ENOUGH!” I roar, struggling to my feet without slipping again. The oil makes everything treacherous, and I have to grip the edge of Jake’s bench to haul myself up, leaving black handprints on the metal.
The laughter stops immediately, cut off like someone flipped a switch. The workshop goes dead silent; suddenly I have everyone’s undivided attention.
“Right, you lot think this is hilarious. Let me explain something.” I stand there dripping oil—probably looking like a swamp creature that’s crawled out of a primordial bog—and channel every ounce of authority I possess. My voice is steady, controlled, deadly.
“José, why was this drip tray sitting in the middle of the floor instead of properly positioned under a vehicle where it belongs?”
His laughter dies instantly, and he has the grace to look ashamed. “Uh... I moved it to clean under the Mustang and forgot to put it back.”
“And Parker, why wasn’t this spill cleaned up immediately, in line with the safety protocols we implemented to prevent exactly this? There’s a spill kit and floor signage within ten metres.”
“I... didn’t notice it?” he says weakly, all amusement gone.
“Asher, what does our workplace safety manual—the one we all reviewed and signed—say about leaving hazardous materials in walkways?”
“That... that it’s a safety violation?” he says weakly, suddenly very interested in the paint on his hands.
“Exactly. And Robert, as our most experienced team member, shouldn’t you have noticed and corrected this before someone got hurt? You know the SDS and incident-reporting process as well as I do.”
Robert has the grace to look genuinely ashamed. He pulls off his welding mask and meets my eyes. “You’re absolutely right, Stella. I’m sorry. I should have been paying better attention.”
“So instead of laughing at me slipping in oil that shouldn’t have been there in the first place, maybe you should be asking yourselves why proper safety procedures weren’t followed. Maybe you should be wondering how many other hazards you’ve overlooked while you were too busy being entertained by your boss landing on her arse.”
They stare at me with varying degrees of guilt and chastened embarrassment. The silence stretches, broken only by oil dripping from my hair onto the concrete.
“Now,” I continue, glancing at my ruined shoes and the small environmental disaster around my feet, “I’m going home, showering with industrial degreaser, and burning these clothesin my backyard. When I get back, I expect this workshop to be clean enough to eat off the floor. And if I find one more safety violation—one loose bolt, one unmarked spill, one improperly stored tool—you’ll all be staying late to complete mandatory safety training. All eight hours of it. Do I make myself clear?”
A chorus of “Yes, boss” follows me as I squelch toward the exit, my heels making wet, sticky sounds with every step. Oil slides down my back, pools in my shoes, and probably stains everything I touch.
I’m almost to my car when I hear Jake’s voice behind me.
“Stella? What the fuck happened to you?”
I turn to see him standing by his ute, a box of parts balanced in his arms, staring at me with a mix of concern and barely contained amusement. His dark hair is slightly mussed from the wind, and he’s wearing overalls that somehow make him look both professional and incredibly sexy.
