Eunseo was absent when Chef Lee let the other employees know about his little event for Mingyu, but she had some participation in it, too. They made sure it was like any normal day at the Avenue, with Eunseo being the "indicator" for Mingyu's mood because it just happened that she was always complaining about his orders first thing in the morning. When they didn't hear any complaint from her, Jeonghan brought his actress friend Xiyeon to the Avenue and got the plan in action.
Seokmin explained to Mingyu about the reason of Xiyeon's arrival at the Avenue, trying to sound as convincing as he can for him. Mingyu wasn't suspicious about it and announced it to his employees shortly after Chef Lee notified him.
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Eunseo greeted Xiyeon like any other customer, and kindly took her to Mingyu's office when Xiyeon mentioned about her transfery. She next saw Xiyeon when Mingyu brought her to the kitchen with him to meet the other employees, and just as she expected, Mingyu picked her to teach Xiyeon the basics of her job.
There was not a moment that Mingyu took his eyes off of Eunseo and Xiyeon as the former explained and demonstrated tasks to the latter. He wanted to make sure Eunseo was teaching the right things to the younger employee, but he only watched them and kept a serious look on his face the whole time. Eunseo felt the pressure he was effortlessly and unintentionally exerting towards her, and she hated it a lot.
Towards the end of the day, Jeonghan and Seunghceol came to visit the Avenue to secretly monitor how their secret event was going. There was little progress, and Jeonghan was getting bored of not seeing any action happening, so he decided it was time for a few "bombs".
He signalled Xiyeon to drop a plate when Mingyu was around, to find out how he'd act in the situation. The boss was obviously surprised, but kept his composure and helped clean up the mess and apologized to the customers for the inconvenience. He even offered the customer's meal for free, and didn't reprimand Xiyeon in public (unlike he did to Eunseo before).
Jeonghan's second "bomb" was to create the wrong order and have a customer complain about it. But just like earlier, Mingyu apologized for it and quickly cooked the right menu himself. Mingyu was a great cook, and he was lucky the food made up for Xiyeon's clumsiness.
The last and the worst "bomb" was to steal money from the cashier. Mingyu always counted the money with the employees before they close for the day. Today, they were short by quite an amount of money that it made Mingyu recheck the receipts. The cashier and the waitresses were certain all the customers had paid for their meals and it also reflected on the receipts, so it must mean that somebody might have stolen the missing amount.
Obviously, the cashier and waitresses were suspected, but they all made the same statements. They said Eunseo and Xiyeon were the ones responsible for bringing the payments, so it must be either of them who took the missing amount. They first accused Xiyeon because she was a newbie, and when Eunseo stood up for her the employees started blaming her instead. In the end, Mingyu checked everyone's lockers and bags, only to find the money in Eunseo's stuff.
Eunseo swore it wasn't her even if the money was already found, but again she was called to his office while the rest of the employees go home. Eunseo received her third warning from Mingyu that night, and she felt so frustrated it made her tear up again.
When Eunseo got home, she received a message from Seokmin asking her to come to a nearby coffee shop to talk to him. When she arrived there, she found him, Jeonghan, Seungcheol and Xiyeon waiting for her on a booth. They all apologized to her firsthand before explaining to her about their little secret event for Mingyu. She was relieved it was all set up, because she couldn't afford to lose her job twice for something she didn't do.
Meanwhile, Mingyu wasn't totally convinced that it was Eunseo who took the money. There was absolutely no way -- he had his eyes on her and Xiyeon the whole time, so it was impossible that she could take the money to her locker that quickly. He thinks it was strange, Eunseo was probably framed, and he wanted to get to the bottom of it.
Mingyu stayed an hour more in his office and thought he should watch today's CCTV footage. He wanted to prove that something was off and that Eunseo was innocent despite the money being found in her locker. He patiently watched the recordings until he noticed something that made him clench his fist and facepalm himself.
He found out it was Jeonghan who broke into the cashier and took the money straight to the employee lockers. It was clear in one of the recordings that he trespassed and shoved the money in Eunseo's bag, even facing the CCTV camera and flashing a note that read:
Sorry, Mingyu, we didn't mean anything bad when we planned this. Please don't get mad. I can explain everything to you, so please don't fire anybody~ Hyung loves you!
Jeonghan even got the guts to flash him a wide grin and a few finger hearts. Mingyu sighed very deeply and started dialing Jeonghan's number on his phone.
***
The next day, Jeonghan and others formally apologized to everyone for making a huge fuss at the Avenue, especially to Eunseo who had absolutely no idea about the event. Mingyu also showed them that he was a nice and considerate CEO after he proved Eunseo's innocence with the CCTV footage.
Eunseo came into Mingyu's office a little later with a cup of vanilla latte she made herself as a token of gratitude towards her boss. She knew everything was planned, but the fact that Mingyu tried to prove her innocence was admirable for her. She knew she wasn't on Mingyu's good side ever since they met and picked on her for everything, but he still did something like that. The young lady approached her boss with a friendly smile and a positive aura as she gently placed the warm cup on his desk. And exactly like the last time she expressed her gratitude, he gave her a glance and a slight nod to acknowledge her gratefulness.
"Thanks again for earlier, sir."
"Yup. I had to do it anyway. By the way, please inform everyone that I've scheduled a Team Building activity on Friday and everybody is required to attend."
"Ah, I see. Um... Required?"
"Yeah, any problem with that?"
"No sir, but what if some of the employees have important prior commitments and they couldn't make it?"
"Then they're fired."
"What?!"
"Just kidding, but they have to make time for it. It's important, I want to know how I can trust my employees. I can't afford if something like yesterday really happened in my business." Mingyu nodded, and glanced at Eunseo again. "Why?"
"Oh, nothing sir. I'll let them know." Eunseo smiled a little and bowed politely before she left Mingyu's office.
"Important prior commitments? What is more important than building trust in the team?"
Mingyu began to feel like Eunseo was up to something, and he was afraid that if he let those employees attend their agendas, nobody would even come to his Team Building. He can't let that happen just because he let Eunseo put her matter first before his. Mingyu quickly pressed on the intercom and called Chef Lee into his office.
