Irina’s POV

"What are you doing?"

The voice cut through the chaotic buzz of the lobby like a heavy blade.

I turned my head slowly, my heart hammering a frantic, sickening rhythm against my ribs.

It was a woman.

She was middle-aged, dressed in an impeccably tailored, dark grey suit. Her hair was pulled back into a severe, tight twist at the nape of her neck. She held a sleek digital tablet in one hand. Her eyes were sharp, calculating, and entirely no-nonsense. She radiated a strict, demanding authority that made my stomach plummet.

I shrank back. My hand went instinctively to Luka’s carrier, shielding him from her intense gaze.

Before I could stumble backward, before I could apologize and run for the revolving glass doors, Asher stepped in.

"Hey," Asher said smoothly.

He stepped right between me and the strict woman. His voice didn’t have a single trace of fear or intimidation. In fact, he sounded entirely relaxed. Familiar, even.

He closed the distance between them and lowered his voice. He leaned in, speaking to the woman in a hushed, rapid tone.

I stood a few feet away, practically paralyzed.

I couldn’t move. I couldn’t run. My trembling fingers automatically found the frayed hem of my oversized sweater. I twisted the cheap fabric. I wrung it so hard my knuckles turned stark white. I stared at the polished marble floor, my chest rising and falling in shallow, panicked breaths.

I strained my heightened hearing, but the ambient noise of the massive lobby—the clicking heels, the ringing phones, the echoing corporate conversations—made it impossible to focus. I couldn’t hear clearly what they were saying.

I only caught vague, muffled fragments.

"...told you about..."

"...hard worker..."

"...the new estate..."

"...needs a chance..."

The strict middle-aged woman frowned. Her thin lips pressed together into a tight line. She glanced past Asher’s broad shoulder, her sharp, evaluating eyes landing directly on me.

Asher turned his head slightly. He looked back at me and gave a quick, reassuring wink.

The woman stepped around Asher. She didn’t look angry, but she was intensely serious. She stopped a few feet away and looked me up and down.

She took in my pale, terrified face. She took in my worn, scuffed sneakers. She took in my baggy jeans and the cheap, broken canvas backpack slung over my shoulder. And finally, her gaze lingered heavily on the baby carrier strapped to my chest.

I held my breath. I braced myself for the cruel laughter. I waited for her to tell me I was a joke, to order me out of her pristine, billion-dollar building.

"Follow me," the woman said flatly.

She turned on her heel and began walking toward a bank of private elevators.

I stood frozen.

Asher stepped up beside me. He nudged my shoulder gently. "Go on," he whispered, offering that same warm, golden smile. "You got this."

I swallowed the heavy lump in my throat. I forced my trembling legs to move. I followed the woman.

Every single step felt like walking through thick mud. The lobby was huge, but we quickly reached a set of sleek, silver elevator doors. The woman swiped a black keycard. The doors slid open silently. We stepped inside the glass-paneled car.

The doors shut, sealing us in.

The elevator shot upward. My stomach completely dropped. My heart started to beat faster and faster.

*Thump. Thump. Thump.*

It was so loud I was terrified she could hear it. The numbers on the digital display above the door climbed rapidly. Ten. Twenty. Thirty. We were going so high. I was moving further and further away from the street, further from my escape route.

Luka shifted warmly against my chest, letting out a tiny sigh in his sleep. I placed a trembling hand over his back, silently praying he wouldn’t wake up and start crying. Not now. Please, not now.

My wolf hummed faintly in the back of my mind. She was trying to lend me her strength, pushing a sliver of calm into my racing blood. *Stand tall,* she urged. *We are surviving.*

The elevator chimed a soft, electronic note.

The silver doors slid open.

We stepped out into a quiet, heavily carpeted hallway. It was much less frantic up here than the lobby, but the atmosphere was just as intimidating. Everything was sleek wood and frosted glass.

The woman led me down the hall and pushed open the door to a pristine, well-lit office.

"Sit," she instructed, gesturing to a heavy, black leather chair positioned across from a wide mahogany desk.

I walked forward carefully. I sat down on the chair, but I didn’t lean back. I kept my spine totally stiff, hovering right on the edge of the cushion. I kept my arms wrapped securely around Luka.

The woman walked around the desk. She set her tablet down and took a seat in her high-backed executive chair. She folded her hands on the polished wood and looked at me. The silence in the room was heavy and absolute.

"I am Mrs. Gable," she said smoothly, her voice crisp and deeply professional. "I manage the domestic staffing and human resources for the company’s private residential estate."

I nodded quickly, my heart hammering violently in my throat. "Hello."

She didn’t offer a warm, comforting smile. She just watched me. Her gaze was clinical. Searching.

"Asher told me you want to apply for a position on the estate staff," Mrs. Gable said. Her sharp eyes didn’t leave my face for a single second. "He speaks very highly of you. He tells me you are diligent and in need of stable employment."

I nodded again, afraid to speak and ruin it.

"However," Mrs. Gable continued, leaning forward slightly, "I do not hire based solely on the recommendations of others. Especially not for the private residential estate. The standards there are incredibly high. The work is demanding."

She paused, letting the weight of her words sink in.

"I need to ask your own opinion first," she said, staring directly into my blue eyes. "Are you really willing?"

The question hung in the air.

*Are you really willing?*

I looked down at the floor. I thought about the tiny, cramped apartment with the clanking radiator and the leaking pipe. I thought about the exhausting, terrifying struggle to pay for diapers and textbooks with the meager wages from the convenience store. I thought about the cruel girls on the campus quad kicking my bag into the dirt.

I was eighteen. I had a baby. I had absolutely nothing else in this world but my own two hands and my sheer will to survive.

If this job meant a safe place for Luka... if it meant a steady paycheck so I could keep going to school... I would scrub floors until my knuckles bled. I had done it before in the werewolf pack. I could do it here in the human world.

The fear slowly began to recede. The panic drained from my veins, replaced by a fierce, protective determination.

I lifted my chin. I looked Mrs. Gable right in the eye.

I took a deep, steady breath.

"I am willing. Please interview me."