They called my outfit ridiculous before I even reached the reception desk,

The conference room air grew so thick and still that you could almost hear the hum of the fluorescent lights overhead. Vanessa Cole remained frozen halfway out of her chair, her mouth slightly parted, her eyes darting nervously between Alexander Alder and me as if trying to calculate how a girl in a thrift-store skirt could possibly command the attention of Alderstone’s reclusive billionaire CEO.

Alexander Alder didn't look at Vanessa. He didn't look at my shoes, my blouse, or my faded portfolio. His dark, sharp eyes remained fixed on the architectural sketches spread across the mahogany table—drawings of a multi-family housing complex designed specifically to maximize natural light and communal green spaces on a tight urban budget.

"Ray Carter," Alexander repeated, his voice low, gravelly, and carrying an unexpected weight of history. "You’re Ray’s girl. The little one who used to leave charcoal smudges all over his toolbox."

My chest tightened. "You knew my father?"

"Knew him?" Alexander let out a dry, humorless breath, resting his knuckles against the edge of the table. "Ray Carter poured the concrete foundations for the very first residential tower my father built in this city forty years ago. When other foremen cut corners to save a dollar, Ray would halt construction and fix the rebar himself because he said people deserved a roof that wouldn't shift in a storm."

He straightened up, his tall frame casting a long shadow across the polished floor. He turned his attention back to Vanessa, whose face had gone from startled to utterly bloodless.

"Vanessa," Alexander said quietly.

"Yes, Mr. Alder?" she squeaked, grabbing the back of her chair for support.

"How long have you been filtering out candidates based on whether their clothes meet your personal boutique standards?"

"I—I wasn't filtering—"

"I was standing at the reception desk fifteen minutes ago," Alexander interrupted, his voice dropping into a register that made the room temperature feel like it had plummeted ten degrees. "I watched a young woman get mocked for wearing her mother's blouse, and I watched you look at her résumé with open disdain before she even opened her mouth. Is this how we scout talent at Alderstone now? Do we hire tailors, or do we hire architects?"

Vanessa looked as though she wanted the floor to open up and swallow her whole. "We look for presentation, sir. It’s about client relations—"

"Client relations," Alexander scoffed. "Ray Carter's daughter just laid out a structural efficiency model for affordable housing that could cut our municipal construction waste by eighteen percent. Not a single person in this building has managed that in five years."