Chapter 5
Daisy looked deathly pale.
Two security guards had already made their way over to me.
They looked at me, then at Daisy and Oscar, looking completely at a loss about what they were supposed to do.
"What are you waiting for?" that Aguirre guy barked, his cool finally shattered.
"Throw him out!" Oscar snapped, rage and humiliation twisting his words.
The security guards exchanged glances, then reached out to grab me.
I didn't resist.
I stared at that guy and said, "Mr. Aguirre, right?
"Isn't it a bit disrespectful to lay hands on the owner here, in his own venue?"
His face froze at my words.
"What did you say?" he demanded.
I ignored him.
I lowered my phone and made a call.
It rang once before someone picked up.
I said, "Is this Mr. Ferguson?
"This is Randal.
"Yes, the Randal who designed the Azure Hotel ballroom.
"I'm here at the Azure Hotel right now, and I've run into a little trouble.
"There's a Mr. Aguirre here who's trying to have me thrown out.
"Yeah, could you come over for a moment?"
I hung up.
The whole process took less than thirty seconds.
The whole place went dead silent.
Everyone stared at me like I were a monster.
For the first time, that Aguirre guy's face was filled with genuine confusion and disbelief.
Daisy looked at me with a completely unfamiliar expression that I had never seen before.
It was like she had never known me at all.
Less than a minute later, the doors to the banquet hall swung open.
A middle-aged man in a hotel manager's uniform strode in, with two assistants in tow.
He was the general manager of the hotel, Simon Ferguson.
We had dealt with each other many times during the project handover.
Simon spotted me right away, and his face lit up with a warm, respectful smile.
"Mr. Morales. What brings you here? You should've let me know you were coming," he said.
He hurried over, reaching out with both hands, eager to greet me.
He completely ignored the security guards who were about to grab me and didn't even glance at that Aguirre guy, whose face was now dark with rage.
I reached out and shook his hand.
"Just popped in for this little 'launch event,'" I said.
I motioned to the crowd.
Simon, ever the sharp one, caught on right away.
He turned to that Aguirre guy, whose face was now dark with anger.
"Mr. Aguirre, Mr. Morales is not only our hotel's top design consultant but also a close friend of mine," Simon said.
His voice was polite, but there was a clear edge to it.
"I think there might be some kind of misunderstanding here," he added.
That Aguirre guy's face was thunderous with rage.
Simon's arrival churned up unrest that had already been simmering beneath the surface.
The vibe in the banquet hall got even weirder.
No one dared to whisper anymore.
Everyone stared at me, their eyes filled with curiosity and shock.
To them, I was just that quiet nobody in the class.
I was the kind of pushover they could ignore or even gang up on to fool.
Yet now, I had suddenly become a distinguished guest of the general manager of this top-tier hotel.
The shock from this twist hit way harder than exposing an affair.
Daisy stared at me, her mouth slightly open in disbelief.
She probably couldn't wrap her head around why I was on such good terms with the general manager here.
In three years of marriage, I had never revealed the connections or resources I had to her.
I always felt there was no need to flaunt that kind of thing between husband and wife.
All I ever wanted was a peaceful life, building a lovely home together.
Now it seemed that my "low profile" was nothing but a synonym for "incompetence" in others' eyes.
That Aguirre guy's face shifted between shock, anger, and confusion.
He never imagined that the guy he dismissed as some waiter would turn out to be someone important.
He tried to flex his authority but ended up slamming right into a wall he never saw coming.
"Mr. Ferguson, this is a personal matter between him and me," that Aguirre guy said.
He kept his tone cold, clearly wanting to drag things back to being between the two of us.
"It has nothing to do with your hotel," he added.
"You can't say that, Mr. Aguirre," Simon replied, stepping forward with a friendly smile and quietly putting himself between Oscar and me.
This small gesture already made his stance clear.
"Mr. Morales is an honored guest of our hotel. If he's been wronged here, in his own venue, then that's our failure as a hotel," Simon said.
"His own venue." These three words were spoken with remarkable skill.
Simon was letting everyone know I was the designer here and that I had a unique relationship with the hotel.
That Aguirre guy's face grew even darker.
"Mr. Ferguson, so you're really going to cross Aguirre Group for some outsider?" he said.