Never Judge

"Madams, I brought some friends, I hope you don't mind." Marivic De Dios said, referring to her companions. Marivic was the ultimate social climber. She had started as the assistant to a CEO who at the time was married. When the CEO's wife eventually died she became his shoulder to cry on, soon he began giving her gifts and spending more time with her. However in an interesting twist the CEO passed away in a car accident and Marivic ended up marrying the CEO's son. Now she was Mrs. De Dios, and everyone knew how she got the name.

Marivic often tried to spend as much time with the Madams to help her young husband. He was new in business but she wasn't. She had been by his father's side for years and knew how important a role wives played when it came to business partnerships. ​​

"Where is Amy? Is she late again?" Rebekah Sebastian asked her friends as she blatantly ignored Marivic De Dios.

"Please introduce your guests to us Marivic." Priscilla Reyes said, ignoring her friend.

"Oh." Marivic was quite surprised that Mrs. Reyes had noticed her after Mrs. Sebastian had just ignored her.

"This is my friend, Janine Hernandez and her cousin in law Celine Heron-Hernandez, Celine's husband is the president of Island's Inc. If I'm not mistaken Mrs. Reyes, Elisia Malls has just started a project with Islands Inc." Marivic introduced the older women first making sure to say what Celine's husband did for a living.

"I don't meddle with Elisia Corp., that's my husband's and my children's business." Priscilla Reyes said with a smile, making sure that Marivic and her friends understood that if that was their reason for being here then their trip was in vain.

"Oh it's actually not my husband that handles that partnership." Celine Hernandez immediately said. Priscilla just nodded back in reply.

"And this is Asia Hernandez, Celine's only daughter. She recently got engaged to Mark Chu." Marivic De Dios paused waiting for one of the Madams to recognize the name. When she just got blank stares she just decided to continue.

"And this is her niece, Adrianna Hernandez, she works at Island's Inc." Marivic announced quickly. Even if Adrianna was the reason the Hernandez's had come over to Nationalia, Marivic wasn't too fond of the quiet girl. She saw more of herself in Asia rather than Adrianna.

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"Hello Adrianna." Priscilla Reyes said with a big smile.

"It seems Mrs. Reyes likes my niece." Janine Hernandez said.

"She looks like a strong and pretty young woman, she reminds me of my Ayanna. And I met her once, at the Mor Co. launch. It was just a quick introduction though." Priscilla said.

"Ladies look who I bumped into at the entrance!" A Chinese looking woman in her fifties appeared dragging a well dressed young man in a face mask and glasses.

"Mother, aunties." Cedric said in a cold demeanor.

"Don't tell me you're not happy to see all your aunties. Come, sit." His mother commanded.

When Cedric took his seat he suddenly froze, what was Adrianna doing here.

Their eyes locked and Cedric didn't know what to do. Adrianna suddenly looked elsewhere, but it was too late. Janine Hernandez had already noticed the tension between them.

"Mr. Reyes, is it true that you find my niece pretty?" Janine Hernandez asked.

"Ummm… yes. Pretty." Cedric managed to say.

Adrianna wanted to slap the man the moment he called her pretty. In her head only her husband had the right to call her that.

"Then, Mr. Reyes, could the rumors be true that you have a crush on our Adri?" Janine Hernandez said as she patted her niece on the back.

"Miss Hernandez, I don't think my friend's personal life should be any interest of yours." Ram Abad and Veronica had just arrived when he noticed the awkward conversation.

"I didn't mean to pry, sir." Janine Hernandez was afraid of insulting anyone from this group.

"Adrianna, you seem uncomfortable." Veronica said as she approached Adrianna.

"I'm fine." Adrianna said with a smile.

"I know what will make you feel better, why don't you come with me and Ram, I'm going to show Mr. Reyes the designs for his house. He's gonna move in there with his eight year love." Veronica said with a giggle.

Adrianna just nodded and followed Veronica to another table.

"Are Mr. Ram Abad and the designer Veronica dating?" Asia asked, she had always dreamed of having a home designed by Veronica but just getting a meeting seemed impossible for her.

Cedric suddenly burst out laughing. The Madams as well had an awkward look on their faces and Ram himself had a disgusted look.

"Miss, Veronica is my sister. That's disgusting. Come on,Ced. She's got something good prepared." Ram said, dragging his friend to the other table.

"Is Mr. Reyes' real name Ced?" Janine Hernandez asked, quickly picking up on what everyone else missed.

"No, it's just a pet name." Priscilla said.

In the other table Ram made Cedric sit next to his wife as Veronica opened the files she needed to present to Cedric.

"Now Adrianna, I want you to voice your opinion as well. You see, my client here has no taste and this whole house is supposed to be a give to the love of his life!" Veronica accused.

Cedric only grunted.

"What, my sister said is true. I think my friend here will lose his wife if he doesn't let a woman judge this house first." Ram said, liberally taking a jab at Cedric who couldn't fight back.

"But, Miss Veronica, I think whatever you make is beautiful." Adrianna had heard of Veronica in the past. When she first met Veronica she was shocked to find out that the legendary designer was from her country and was actually the sister of one of the 5 princes.

"Did you have her in mind?" Cedric asked, making his voice a bit rough and cold. Because of that Ram accidentally spit out his drink.

Veronica just nodded. Luckily she had met Adrianna a couple of times and more or less had an idea on what she would want.

"I didn't want this house to be another "Veronica" creation. I wanted it to be Anna. I wanted it to be as someone who knew you and her, even if I barely know her." Veronica began.

"So knowing you I did a light design with traditional local materials. You'll have a main room for entertaining guests, I'm looking at this to be one of the bigger areas. To the left you'll have your public study and to the right your dining room. Behind you'll have a hallway that will lead to any place in the house that's more public, two guestrooms with their own bathrooms, the cinema will be behind that on the same floor you will have the game room and a meeting room, in case you need it. And then it opens out to a patio that runs the almost width of the mansion, as requested some showers on the side if you have guests that swim in the pool but would like to just dress up out there. In the basement we have the wine cellar, the bowling alley, and a gym. On the second floor, you'll have rooms for all members of the family, your parents, in laws, and your sister, should they choose to stay over. Each room is a suite, so it has its own entertainment area, bed room, walk-in closet, bathroom, and balcony. I made each room design to fit into the whole but still match their personalities, don't worry Ayanna's has her own office to the side, we know that girl tends to be a workaholic. On the third floor, we have the master bedroom that takes up half the whole floor, same with all the other rooms, it has its own entertainment area, a large main room for sleeping, of course. Then there are his and hers walk in closets, I placed a make up studio for her and a hidden jewelry closet. On the same floor I placed two offices that are connected by a secret door, and five other rooms, in case, you know." Veronica laughed at the last comment.

"Wow this looks amazing!" Adrianna said as she studied the plans Veronica had just shown her. For some reason she felt like this house was built for her.