He Let Her Take My Award, I Exposed Her

Applause thundered through the conference room. I stood at the door and stared at the pale ivory high-end couture gown on the presentation screen. A chill went through me. Silver-blue koi curved across the skirt. A structured capelet collar overlapped the waist sash, and the hidden inner seams were stitched with three strands of silk thread. It was my Return to the Tide. I had spent three months creating it. I revised the structure seven times and went to the fabric district 12 times before I finally made it work. But now, the person standing onstage and explaining it was Vivian Blake. She was Daniel Vaughn's childhood friend. She wore a white dress, her eyes faintly red at the corners. "This piece is called Moonlit Sea. It was inspired by the soft, flowing strength of women in hardship." The senior executives in the room nodded along. Daniel stood beside her, lowering his head slightly to turn the pages for her. When Vivian stumbled over the waist sash structure, Daniel took over so naturally it looked rehearsed. "What makes Vivian's work so clever is how she turns traditional motifs into a younger, more modern expression." I gripped the folder in my hands until my fingers hurt. Three months earlier, Daniel himself had watched me draw the first koi motif. Back then, he had said, "Maddie, this is going to be your best work." But now, he had handed it to another woman. I strode into the conference room and threw stacks of sketches and sampling records onto the table. "This isn't Vivian's work. From the first sketch to the final fabric, I made all of it." The room fell silent. Vivian froze for a second. Then tears slipped down her face. "Madeline, I know you want the promotion. But you can't steal my work." As soon as she said that, her body swayed, and she pressed one hand to her stomach. Daniel's expression changed at once. He hurried over and steadied her. His fingertips brushed her forehead, and his voice softened in a way I knew too well. "Does it hurt again?" The scene was painfully familiar. When I used to get low blood sugar, Daniel would touch my forehead the same way. He would press a piece of candy into my palm and frown. "Maddie, these hands of yours are made for couture. Don't work yourself sick." He was still gentle now. Only the person receiving that gentleness had changed. I looked at him. "Daniel, you know whose design this is." He raised his eyes to me. Those were the same eyes that had once coaxed me through countless hard days. Now they were ice cold. "Madeline, stop making a scene. Vivian worked so hard on this project that her stomach trouble flared up. It was bad enough that you were jealous of her. Now you're trying to destroy her in front of senior management?" I opened the encrypted original sketches. "Look closely. Creation time, revision history, fabric codes. Everything is here." Daniel glanced at them. For one brief second, his face changed. But the next moment, he reached out and snatched the printed sketches from me. "Enough. Do you think throwing around fake evidence and causing a scene makes you look good?" Before I could react, he tore the sketches apart. Pieces of paper scattered from his fingers and fell across the table. One scrap drifted down to my feet. On it was the hidden fishtail motif I had spent four whole nights drawing. I looked down at the torn scrap. My ears rang. Vivian hid behind Daniel, crying so hard her shoulders shook. "Daniel, let it go. Madeline probably just lost control for a moment." Daniel shielded her. His voice was cold. "At tomorrow's morning meeting, you will apologize to Vivian in front of the whole company. If you don't apologize, our engagement party will be postponed indefinitely. Madeline, I don't need a vicious woman as my wife." I looked at the torn paper scattered across the floor, and suddenly I laughed. So he did understand me. He understood me too well. That was why he knew exactly how to cut deepest. I bent down and picked up a torn scrap. The edge sliced my fingertip, and a bead of blood rose from the cut. Daniel instinctively reached out, just like he used to, as if he wanted to check my wound. I stepped away. "Daniel. What you tore up wasn't my sketches. It was the only chance you ever had to stand on my side." His face stiffened. I picked up my laptop and turned to leave. Behind me, his voice was tight with anger. "Madeline, if you walk out today, don't expect this to end well tomorrow." I didn't stop. "Then let's all stop pretending to be decent." When I returned to the Design Department, I found that someone had already gone through my workstation. My markers, fabric books, and sketch folders had all been dumped into cardboard boxes. Vivian's diffuser, insulated mug, and a brand-new drawing tablet had been arranged on my desk. The young admin assistant looked embarrassed when she saw me. "Madeline, Mr. Vaughn said Vivian is the lead designer for Moonlit Sea now, so she needs to be closer to the sample room." I stared at the drawing tablet. It was the exact model I had requested three times and never been approved for. Now it was sitting on Vivian's desk. So she hadn't just stolen a sketch. She had stolen my place too.