Chapter 223

After thinking long and hard about it, I decided to try one more person. I knew I was setting myself up for disappointment, but I was running out of options. Everybody else already rejected me. What was one more rejection?

I sat outside her office for thirty minutes, listening to the muffled conversation within, until the door opened and somebody stepped out. Standing, I poked my head into Mrs. Foster’s door and mustered a weak smile. “Hi, Mrs. Foster.”

The older woman looked up in surprise. “Aria. What are you doing here?” “I was just wondering if you might need some help around here.”

The longer she stared at me, the worse I felt until her expression softened with sympathy, and she gestured for me to take a seat. “I take it the past few days have been rather rough on you.”

Just hearing her acknowledge that made me want to cry, but I’d already spent all my tears for the day. I was back to feeling empty inside like a void existed where my heart should. Sitting across from Mrs. Foster, I accepted her look of sympathy as one made out of necessity. She probably didn’t care any more than anybody else did.

“I hate to give you more bad news, but I’m not authorized to give you any work,” Mrs. Foster said. “It was different when you were training to be the

Alpha Female. But now that you’re unranked, the civil reports department and branch funding management are above your access level.”

Unranked. That was a nicer way of saying I was basically an Omega. “Besides, Mara has taken over most of what you were trained for.”

Just hearing her name was a punch to the gut. I resisted the urge to frown, keeping my face neutral, my eyes attentively on Mrs. Foster. “That’s okay. Maybe I can be your assistant or something?”

She sighed and shook her head. “I’m afraid I don’t need an assistant.”

Maybe she was lying, pushing me away like everyone else. The betrayal from her cut deep, too. We’d spent so much time together in this office— her teaching me, explaining finances and accounting and bookkeeping, giving me projects and assignments, getting to know me. She knew what I was capable of, possibly more than anyone else. “Is there… anything you can recommend for me? Please, Mrs. Foster. I just need something to do. Somewhere to belong.”

The older woman held her tongue, but I could sense she was building up to another rejection. She averted her eyes to a bookshelf, and I followed her eyes out of habit. There, I saw two books piled up on the edge of the shelf, looking like they’d been placed there absent-mindedly. The two books I had checked out of the library were stolen from me last night. “Those are my books.”

“What?” Mrs. Foster blinked, confused.

I stood up and took the books. “I checked these books out of the library, and someone took them from under my cot last night in the Omegas’ quarters!”

Opening the books, I scanned for the pocket at the back of the books, confirming the library stamp they’d received when I checked them out. “Where did you get them?”

“Oh, I met with our IT manager this morning. He found them in a trash can on his way to my office and left them for me to drop off at the library. I didn’t even check the names on the check-out card. We just assumed somebody stole them from the library,” explained Mrs. Foster.

Now, embers crackled to life in my chest. Whoever had stolen them was planning to make me look even worse by making it look like I’d just thrown the books out! I clutched them close to my chest and shook my head. “I need to return these to the librarian.”

Mrs. Foster gazed over at me, then her eyes brightened. “Actually, Aria, I have an idea of something you could do. You know I visit the library nearly every day to take out records and files regarding Shadow Manufacturing Industries,” she began. “I’m not the only one who has to visit the library for these things. That poor librarian runs himself ragged, trying to keep everything organized in the archives while watching the library. Maybe you can give him a hand.”

The way she lit up gave me hope for a new purpose, but as quickly as my embers were ignited, they fizzled out. “I don’t know. Nobody wants to even look at me, let alone give me a job. Besides, I’m not supposed to really be in the Lodge.”

“The archives are all the way in the basement. Nobody’s going to give you a hard time, and he’d be foolish to say no. Why don’t I come with you?”

I wanted to tell Mrs. Foster not to waste her time on me—respectfully, of course—but she was already standing up, walking around her desk for the door. And because deep inside, I really did want that job at the library, I followed her.

It already felt wrong for me to approach the Lodge. Earlier that morning, I had excused it, but coming back here again with the intention of ignoring the security guard’s warning was a whole new level of insubordination I wasn’t sure I wanted to embrace. I hovered close behind Mrs. Foster as we stepped through the front door, only for me to make eye contact with the very security guard that had dragged me out last night. I froze, wide-eyed.

He took a step forward before Mrs. Foster stopped him. “Miss Gunn has been authorized for work placement in the archives,” she said.

“Has Alpha Moore approved this?”

Mrs. Foster glanced at me in her periphery. “Yes.”

The guard grunted. “As long as she doesn’t go anywhere other than the archives, then.”

My heart raced as Mrs. Foster delivered immaculate lie after lie, leading me into the forbidden terrain of the Lodge. I scurried up beside her, asking under my breath, “What are we going to do if Oswald finds out?”

“You were only banned from the living quarters, weren’t you? You have every right to be here. It would be wrong to ban you from accessing the Lodge’s public amenities—the entire pack depends on them.”

She was right. The café, the library, and even the common room were supposedly free for all pack members to use. Although there was an

obvious stigma against Omegas using the common room since many believed they took advantage of the pack, taking a place to eat and sleep without giving anything in return—as far as I was aware, there was no law saying that lower status packmates couldn’t be there.

Entering the library, we found the librarian running back and forth from one end of the counter to the other, trying to sort through a cart of books that some youngsters had left in disarray. When he heard the door open, he paused and smiled at Mrs. Foster, then grimaced at me. I was prepared for a snarky response before he then noticed the books in my hands, and his grimace vanished. “You found the books.”

“I did,” I said, tentatively placing them on the counter.

The librarian flipped them open, scanning them for any damage before nodding in satisfaction. “Very well. I’ll remove the mark on your record.”

“Actually, Jonathan, I was hoping you could do a bit more for Aria today,” said Mrs. Foster, clasping her hands politely on the counter.