Strictly Business

Strictly Business: Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Elizabeth put her pen down with a snap, closed her aching eyes and stretched her stiff arms. She has been working at her desk the whole day and had not even stopped for lunch, only having a sandwich at her desk as she plowed through the towering paperwork on her desk. 

She could feel a headache slowly building up on the right side of her head. No, not now, she thought. I can't afford to have a migraine attack now, there's still so much I have to do for this project. She adjusted her position in her executive chair and started doing the familiar breathing exercises to relax her body. A sufferer of migraines since young, they plagued her in times of stress and fatigue. It was a painful ailment she had learnt to live with. And control, she noted with pride.

Control was something Elizabeth knew very well. A young heiress to a large conglomerate worth billions, she could have chosen to not work a single day of her life and followed the lifestyles of the socialites and 'celebrati' whose partying ways are a common feature in the tabloids. Instead she chose to study business management and work in her family's business, even choosing to start low as an ordinary manager. She soon worked her way up to Director of Business Development and earned the respect of her subordinates for her hard-working ways and fair judgement.

She exhaled, completing her breathing exercise and her eyes fell on a portrait of a elegant old woman in a delicate silver frame on her desk.

"Tea time, Grandma", she whispered with a wistful smile.

Elizabeth was a beautiful woman though she doesn't take much heed in compliments. Her deep red chin length hair was cut in a practical yet fashionable style. Her eyes were a beautiful emerald in her porcelain skin. She wore no jewelry except for an emerald ring on her right hand. It was her grandmother's and this ring and a matching necklace was donated for a charity auction a few years ago. Sadly, she had only been able to buy back the ring from the person who had successfully bidded for it. The  necklace was bought by an anonymous philanthropist whom she never managed to find out the identity of.

She walked over to a side table in her spacious office, her slim body moving gracefully. On it, a glass kettle was bubbling merrily. She added tea leaves from a canister and poured the boiling water into a lovely Limoges teapot. While waiting for the tea to steep, she walked over to the large windows overlooking the bustling city below.

She loved this city. It's hustle and bustle and the tall, gleaming skyscrapers. She also loved the wheelings and dealings of the business world. She had been brought into this world at a young age by her grandmother Victoria Westville and fell in love with it immediately. A formidable woman who co-founded the family business together with her grandfather Edward Westville, she was everything Elizabeth wanted to be. Victoria was not only a great business woman, she was also a loving grandmother, both fair and nurturing. The death of her grandmother a couple of years ago was a devastating loss to Elizabeth. There wasn't one moment where she didn't think of her grandmother, of all the memories and lessons she had given her.

She poured a cup of tea and took the delicate cup and saucer to the windows. She lifted the rim to her lips, closed her eyes, inhaled the aroma of the fragrant tea and smiled. Even before taking a sip, she could feel herself relaxing further. Elizabeth had been taught the joys of tea drinking by her grandmother. She remember fondly all the afternoon teas they had at the sprawling family estate just outside the city where she grew up.

Elizabeth gave a sigh and set the empty cup aside. She turned back to her computer, frowning at the screen. The project she was working on was a dream of her grandmother's, which made her even more determined to see it to fruition, no matter the obstacles. Eco-City. She couldn't help but marvel at Victoria's foresight, that 60 years ago her grandmother had the vision of a completely self-sufficient , sustainable environmentally-friendly city. Her grandmother was a lover of nature and dreamt of a city which flourished without damaging the Earth like most urban areas do today. Victoria had not been able fulfill her vision in her life-time but now the technology exists to make this all possible. With everyone proclaiming eco-friendly and green practices nowadays, this project could not have come at a better time. She knew it would be well-received. But Elizabeth has hit a snag. The Eco-City is a massive project; a large city filled with housing options, retail and business, organic farming and clean energy. Elizabeth believed that this could be the first of many eco-cities to come if it were a success. But the biggest problem was the magnitude of the project. It was too large even for her family's conglomerate to undertake on it's own. They need more investors and big ones at that.