Her Royal Escapade

Chapter 1

Noelle Vaughn O'Byrne or Elle as what her family calls her but they call her Vaughn in her workplace just got into their company's parking lot when her friend and also her teammate Sam called.

"Vaughn, san ka na? We're so nervous we need you here ASAP!"

Samantha is a filipino so its natural for her to blurt out some random filipino phrases and she knew that Vaughn can understand her well since she's also half-filipino. Her mother is a filipino nurse in Chicago, Illinois when she met her dad who has an Irish-American descent. They got along really well so after 8 months of dating, they got married and had 4 children. She's the youngest and the only girl so she's pretty much spoiled but definitely not a brat.

"Vaughn? Hello?"

"Yes, nasa parking lot na. Will you relax a bit? We still have an hour left before the meeting ok. We got this."

"Thank God! I thought you're gonna be late again."

"Nope, not this day." She grinned, feeling excited and a bit nervous for their project presentation later.

"Good. Everything's ready here, we already printed the furniture catalogues to be handed out later. We're just waiting on you."

"Thanks! Tell the team to just chill or else you're going to make me nervous too. I'll end this now I'm looking for a space to park."

"Copy." Sam replied.

She ended the call and drove her car to the nearest parking space.

Vaughn and Samantha were both working in an international architectural firm based in San Francisco, California. But Vaughn volunteered to transfer in its Singapore branch when there's an open position for her because it's more convenient for her to travel back and forth to the Philippines to visit her parents. Her mom always convinces her to live with them but nah she loves her independence too much.

Anyway, she's still one hour early for her project presentation. That means they still have time to go over her presentation and practice what she's going to say when asked about her design. She can't mess up this one, her teammates are counting on her.

This will be Noelle Vaughn's biggest break so far if she will get the client's approval. The project involves a collaboration with their client's engineers for a condominium tower project. She will be the project architect in-charge with the architectural design and interior specifications of its fully-furnished units. The building's contruction is not yet complete but it's on the last phase of construction. It consists of 70 floors and has around 150 condo units. But the company is planning to offer 100 fully-furnished units to customers. Her team was instructed to present 10 design proposals as prototypes and if the client's COO and other board members will approve it, they will be responsible for the design and overall specifications of the 100 units.

Vaughn and her team prepared some floor plans and design presentations that will fit their target customer's taste, which are the middle-income earners. Since the tower is near universities, they also prepared a design fit for students. They also made a catalogue for all the furnitures from partner suppliers that will blend well with their designs. If they're lucky, she'll be signing a contract today.

But it seems luck isn't on their side.

As soon as she got to the conference room, everyone's unnaturally silent.

"Cheer up guys, let's do this."

Silence...

Okay that's weird.

"Vaughn, Sir Drake talked to us awhile ago." Sam said.

"And? What did he say? Will he be at the presentation?" She asked continuosly.

"He said the presentation's cancelled."

"What? Why?!"

"He said its a done-deal." replied Sam.

"That's BS! We haven't even presented our proposals yet!" she exclaimed.

"Apparently, Jake's team got the deal yesterday. They presented their proposal in the client's office." Alana, one of the interior designers in the team said.

"What the f*ck? We are in-charge with this project's proposal. They can't do that, it's sabotage!" She couldn't help raising her voice now.

"I suggest you talk to Sir Drake about it."

Noelle is beyond pissed-off. She walked out of the conference room fuming mad! They can't just do that to them. They've been working hard in this proposal for weeks!

She stormed inside the office of their senior manager.

"Is it true?" She asked.

"Unfortunately, it is." Drake replied.

"But they can't do that! We're not even aware that they'll do a presentation, you said our team is in-charged of that!" She's aware that her voice is louder with each word but she couldn't care less about politeness now, of all times.

"I'm sorry Vaughn, but I was only informed yesterday after the contract-signing. I had to confirm it again with our partner and he said they have his go-signal to do the presentation." Their senior manager explained.

"Damn! They didn't even have the decency to inform us about it! How could they do that?! It's unethical and unprofessional!" She is so mad that she's almost shouting in front of her senior manager.The worst thing is Jake, her boyfriend did not even inform her. Damn that a**h**e!

Drake looked at her with sympathy.

"I know what you and your team feels right now but we both know that it's done. We can't do anything about it since the contract is already signed."

"We've worked hard for this Drake, we didn't even have decent sleep for weeks!" Suddenly, all the exhaustion and sleepless nights for the past weeks came to her at once, draining all her energy.

"I know that. And as much as I would like to help, we both know that I can't. I'm sure there will be other opportunities for your team Vaughn."

"Yeah right." She scoffed sarcastically. "Anyway, thanks drake and sorry for the outburst."

"It's fine. Honestly, If I were you, I would have done something far worse."

Vaughn gave him a small smile before walking out of his office. She couldn't understand why this happened and why was it allowed by their Partner-in-Charge. Vaughn can probably accept it if they were sabotaged by teams from other firms. But from their own Company? And what's worse is that the project team was led by none other than her boyfriend. He knew that this project means so much to her so how could he just take over like that and not inform her at least?

So this is what she gets for dating a colleague huh?

Vaughn knows that it is not advisable to date any of her collegues but Jake is persistent so she gave in eventually. Besides, she's so f***ing tired of being asked why she's still single at her age of 25 like common?! It's already 2021, women nowadays have a lot more things to achieve besides getting a man!

They have been exclusively dating for four months now but they recently had a misunderstanding because Jake is demanding more time with her which she couldn't afford to give. It started when she and her team were tasked to prepare a presentation for the Condominium project. Jake always invites her for dinner dates on weekdays but since she's almost at the office 24/7 she would always say no. On weekends, Jake visits her in her condo but would eventually go home pissed after an hour or so because she couldn't entertain him. He knew very well that career is her first priority and he couldn't seem to understand that.

It's true that they were not on speaking terms for the past days but why can't he at least inform her that his team was tasked to do a proposal for the same project? As a colleague, that's the least thing he can do.

The fact that they were shunned out of this project without any further notice makes her feel like there's something fishy going on. And it's very unusual for Jake's team to present a proposal in the client's office, it almost looks like they are sneaking to get the contract signed. She needs to talk to Jake and ask him who gave them the go-signal to proceed with the project proposal. He better have an acceptable reason or else.. Or else what? The least thing she could do is break-up with him and that's not enough with her! She wants to report their team for sabotage and unethical work behaviors but how can she do that if they have the go-signal of the upper-boss? 

This would've hurt less If only she and her team were given a chance to present their designs. Even if they'll get rejected after, it would still be an acceptable defeat. At least it's a fair fight.

"I guess my luck is running out today huh?" she sighed feeling defeated.