James Cooke returned to his desk and picked up the completed employment request form for InterBank Switzerland. He rattled the paper nervously.
Half-day, phones and light typing. How hard could it be?
“James!”
He started guiltily. His boss, Ginger Wainwright, was leaning against the doorframe. An officious, brassy redhead of a certain age who dressed down in an effort to mask her obsessive personality, Ginger had a habit of sneaking up on her staff. She always claimed to be “just passing by,” but she passed by an awful lot. After a week, James still wasn’t used to it.
“How’s it going?” Ginger asked.
“Fine. It’s all good.”
“The young woman who was in here earlier. Potential employee?”
He blinked away an image of Isobel’s long ponytail smacking her in the face and nodded. “Could be.”
“Good. Okay. I was just passing by.”
“Uh, Ginger, just out of curiosity—I mean, for future reference—what do we do with candidates who are smart and well-educated, but have no practical experience?”
Ginger sniffed dismissively. “Send them to Temporama or Sally Nelson and let them get some training. Then if they’re any good, we’ll poach them.”
“We don’t ever take a chance and send them out? If they seem to have a lot on the ball, I mean.”
She gave him a stern look. “We don’t take chances at Temp Zone. That’s why we’re tops. Right?”
“Right,” James answered, forcing his mouth into a deferential smile. “That’s what I thought.”
He listened as Ginger’s heels clacked away down the hall, and her voice echoed into the office of another recruiter.
“Anna? How’s it going? I was just passing by.”
James got up and closed his door quietly. Then he returned to his desk and looked at the request form again.