Chapter 04

Emery Quinn

He walked behind his desk, didn't shake my hand, didn't smile. Just picked up a file that materialized from somewhere, flipped through it, and said nothing for a full minute.

The silence crawled under my skin like needles, each second an eternity. I fought the urge to speak first, to fill the emptiness with nervous chatter. That, I sensed, would be an immediate failure.

I watched him instead. His movements were precise, economical. No wasted energy. No fidgeting. His presence dominated the room in a way that had nothing to do with physical size and everything to do with sheer force of will.

Then, finally: "Why do you want to work for me?"

His emphasis on the last word made it clear—this wasn't about ValeCorp. This was personal.

I opened my mouth. Closed it. Then opened it again. "Because I'm good under pressure."

He looked up slowly, his gaze pinning me in place like a butterfly to a board.

"That's not a reason. That's a trait." His tone was flat. Cold. Like I'd failed a test I didn't know I was taking.

The room seemed to constrict around me. I could walk out now. Just stand up and leave. Apply somewhere else. Anywhere else.

But then I thought of my apartment, with its leaky faucet and unreliable heat. Of my brother's medical bills, piling up on my kitchen counter. Of the tired resignation in my own eyes when I looked in the mirror each morning.

I straightened in the chair. "Because I want the job. I need the job." My voice grew steadier with each word. "And because I don't care how rude or difficult you are, I'll still show up every day and do what needs to be done. You don't have to like me. You don't even have to talk to me. Just give me the chance to prove that I can handle it."

A beat of silence.

His eyes narrowed—just barely. A microscopic shift that somehow changed his entire expression. "And if I fire you within the first week?"

I met his gaze, trying not to flinch under the intensity. "Then I'll walk out with my head high and a better understanding of what kind of monster runs this company."

The words escaped before I could filter them. They hung in the air between us, irrevocable.

His lips twitched.

Not a smile.

But something.

A crack in the ice, perhaps. Or just a shifting of the glacier.

He looked down at the file again, flipping a page with long fingers. "Start Monday. 7 a.m. Don't be late."

My breath hitched, caught somewhere between shock and relief.

"That's it?"

His eyes flicked up, and for a moment—brief as a heartbeat—there was something almost like amusement in them. "That's more than most get."

He closed the file with a soft snap and set it aside, his attention already shifting away from me, dismissal clear in the set of his shoulders.

I stood, smoothing my pants with damp palms. "Thank you for the opportunity, Mr.—"

"Vale," he supplied, not looking up again. "Killian Vale."

Of course. The Vale in ValeCorp. I'd known that, had read about him in preparation, but hearing him say it—claiming his name, his company, his power—made it real in a way nothing else had.

"Mr. Vale," I repeated, my voice steadier than I felt. "I won't disappoint you."

He didn't respond, already absorbed in whatever document had appeared in front of him. I turned and walked to the door, each step carefully measured, aware of his presence behind me like a physical force.

The door hissed open, then closed behind me, sealing him away in his fortress of glass and silence.

The blonde assistant glanced up, her expression unchanged. "HR will contact you with paperwork," she said, as if my getting the job had been a foregone conclusion.

I nodded, unable to form words just yet.

As I walked back to the elevator, legs trembling slightly beneath me, I didn't know whether to cry or collapse or laugh.

But one thing was clear.

I had no idea what I'd just gotten myself into.

And yet... a tiny, stupid part of me wanted to walk right back in and ask him what he saw when he looked at me with those glacier eyes.

Because it wasn't just judgment.

It wasn't just cold assessment.

It was interest.

The kind that sets things on fire.

And as the elevator doors closed, carrying me back down to earth, I wondered which of us would burn first.

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