Once upon a time, in a castle overlooking the city, sat a beautiful and lonely princess with flaxen hair locked in a room, high in the tallest tower. In the spirit of honesty dear reader, you should know that The Castle was actually a ritzy hotel. And the city it overlooked was Sin City - Las Vegas. The room the princess was locked in, was really her office but it was in a turret...of the hotel. Reader, you should know that the princess locked herself in her office - she wasn't locked away by someone else. And the princess truly was a princess - she just didn't know it yet. This, dear reader, is where our story begins.

Audrey Carroll sat at her desk, resting her hands on her arms as she stared at the small blue box in front of her. The small blue box, like the ones from Tiffany's. Only it wasn't like the ones from Tiffany's, it was one from Tiffany's. The box contained an exquisite engagement ring. Audrey slowly exhaled a puff of air, blowing a stray tendril of her blonde hair. Decisions. Decisions.

There was a knock at the door. Audrey immediately sat up in her chair, nearly falling out of it in the process. She ran her fingers through her hair and tucked the loose tendrils behind her ear before she stood up and walked over to the door. After rolling her shoulders back and forcing a smile on her face, Audrey opened the door. She released a sigh of relief when the person on the other side of the door turned out to only be her secretary. Yes, at twenty-seven years old Audrey Carroll had her own personal secretary. She'd had since she'd been given an executive position at The Castle Hotels Inc. following her graduation from Stanford.

"Oh thank god, it's just you," Audrey said before she pulled her secretary Jillian inside and locked the door behind them.

Jillian pushed her thick-framed glasses up with a pen. "Have you made a decision yet?" the secretary, who was a few years Audrey's senior asked.

"Do you think I'd be locked in here if I had?" Audrey retorted before slumping her shoulders in defeat.

Jillian smiled sympathetically. Everyone in the entire company had heard of Audrey's predicament. Not only that, but their jobs could be on the line depending on how Audrey decided. Audrey rubbed her face in frustration, smudging yesterday's makeup even more.

"It's a good thing I stocked your mini-fridge then," Jillian said as she walked over and opened the door to said mini-fridge. "You can stay locked away in your tower until it's ultimatum time."

Audrey smiled. "You're an angel, you know that?" She walked over to the mini-fridge, bent down, and pulled out a Coke and a few mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. "Absolute angel."

"Hand me a Coke and I'll accidentally redirect all of Mr. Carroll's calls to the mailroom," Jillian smirked.

"Done." Audrey pulled out another Coke and handed it to Jillian before she stood up, almost rolling her ankle. "I hate these stupid shoes," she muttered before she kicked her pumps into a corner. She wiggled her toes on the carpeted floor. "Much better," she told herself before she walked back over to her desk and plopped onto her chair.

Audrey opened her Coke and took a sip before she looked at Jillian. "So, what's on the agenda for today?"

Jillian pulled up Audrey's schedule on her tablet before she bit her lip. "Just give me a second here," Jillian said a bit apprehensively as she began furiously tapping on her device. "Oh."

Oh. Audrey thought her tone sounded a bit ominous.

"It looks like your schedule has been cleared for the day," Jillian said rather timidly, looking at Audrey over the rim of her glasses.

Audrey's brow furrowed. "What do you mean it's been cleared? Who cleared it?"

Jillian cleared her throat and then looked at Audrey above her thick glasses frames. "Mr. Carroll."

It was obvious what he was up to. He would say that he wanted her to pamper herself for tonight's special occasion. But Audrey saw it for what it was. He wanted to make sure that she understood what her decision needed to be. She needed to accept Dominick King's proposal. If one could really call it that.

After a sigh, Audrey ran her fingers through her hair. "Well, can you please get my meeting with the mayor back on the agenda?"

Jillian bit her lip again and refused to meet Audrey's glance.

"What now?" Audrey groaned.

"It looks like Mr. Carroll has put the meeting on his schedule." Jillian flipped her tablet toward Audrey. Audrey looked at it and rolled her eyes. Very much like her father to do something like that.

"Can you take it off his and put it on mine?"

"I would, but he's meeting with the mayor now and it looks like he brought a representative from Dulcinea with him."

"You've got to be kidding me," Audrey groused as she leaned back in her chair while Jillian quietly excused herself from the room.

Dulcinea was the company Dominick's family-owned. The company that her father was trying to merge with. It also meant that her father was likely telling the mayor that she had accepted Dominick's proposal, even though she had done no such thing. She was a twenty-first-century woman and she would make her own damn decisions, not let others make them for her.

Audrey didn't have a problem with Dominick. He was a nice enough man, close enough to her own age. But she didn't love him. Truth was, she hardly even knew him aside from a few remarks across a long business table. His proposal had come as a complete shock to her. Audrey was sure that he only did it to please his father. And as a daughter who loved her father, she was expected to do the same.

But the man she had known to be her father, wasn't actually even her father. She had found that tidbit out the night after Dominick proposed. For twenty-seven years, her parents had kept the fact that she was adopted a secret. A damn secret. Who does that?

Audrey loved her mother dearly. Her father had always been a bit distant, but he had never been cruel. She had grown up privileged. She had always been given the best of what money could buy. The best clothes, the best schools, the best everything money could buy had been Audrey's. She knew she should be grateful, but it always felt like something was missing from her life. Like a puzzle missing one piece - so it could never be complete. That was Audrey.

But it now seemed like the puzzle that was almost put together was suddenly going to be pulled apart. As her father had put it, her time as career woman Barbie was over. It was time for her to settle down so he could have a few grandkids. He had also not-so-subtly mentioned that when the merger was complete, her job would be Dominick's anyway. The only way to keep her life resembling the one she currently led was to marry Dominick.

Time. What she wanted was more time. More time to make her decision. More time to find out more about Dominick. But she was nearly out of time. Her decision seemed more of a formality at this point. She had overheard her father talking with Dominick's father about announcing the engagement at her twenty-eighth birthday party, which was a little less than a week away. For living in modern times, this seemed awfully old-school. But it was her role as a dutiful daughter, especially given all that she had been given. To her father, this partnership seemed a small way to show her gratitude.

Honestly, Audrey wasn't sure what she wanted out of life, but she knew this wasn't it. She closed her eyes and wished a solution would somehow show itself.

Seconds later, her office phone began to ring. For a moment, her heart began to beat rapidly and she felt like she was going to throw up; but when she realized the caller ID said the number was from Maine, she knew that the call couldn't be from her father. Audrey composed herself emotionally as the phone rang for a second time. She took a deep breath as the phone rang for a third time before she picked up the phone and brought it to her ear.

"Hello, The Castle Hotels, this is Audrey Carroll speaking. How may I help you today?" Audrey said using her best customer service voice.

"Oh, my God. You actually answered. I wasn't expecting you to answer. I told Henry not to get his hopes up, but you answered. Wow." The voice belonged to that of a woman. But who was this Henry from Maine? None of the Henrys in her acquaintance lived in Maine. At least none that she could recall.

"How may I help you?" Audrey repeated again, unsure of how to respond to the woman's ramblings. Redirecting the conversation usually worked in circumstances such as this.

The woman didn't respond right away. After a few moments, she said, "This is a call verifying you received the information packet we sent regarding your prize."

Audrey's brow furrowed. "Prize? What prize?"

"The free weekend stay in Storybrooke, Maine - all expenses paid."

"Where?"

"Storybrooke. Maine."

Audrey hugged the phone between her shoulder and ear as she tried to Google Storybrooke, Maine. There really didn't appear to be much about the place on the internet. A little suspicious. She wondered if the place even existed. "What exactly did I win?" Audrey asked.

"Well, it would end up being a stay at Granny's Bed & Breakfast. You would have your choice of a forest view or square view. All meals will be provided by Granny's. Shop our local stores and see the sights. A chance to get away from the hustle and bustle of the big city."

"Uh-huh," Audrey replied skeptically. "And how exactly did I win this?"

There was a slight pause and some unintelligible whispering on the other end of the phone. The woman then responded, "You won our contest, of course."

"I didn't enter any contest."

Another pause. Again, suspicious. There was something off about this whole thing, but Audrey couldn't place her finger on it.

"Someone must have entered for you and look at that, you won! Congrats! Now, did you receive the information packet?"

"I'll have to check with my secretary. Now, if you don't mind, I really ought to get going. You know, business stuff."

"Right. Of course. Well, we look forward to seeing you, Audrey."

"Bye."

Audrey didn't even wait for the person on the other line to return the sentiment. She hung up the phone. The whole thing sounded like a scam. But what didn't make sense to her, was why her? But that didn't really matter. She had far more pressing matters to deal with than that.

Her glance fell on the blue box again. Who knew one little box could cause so much trouble? This was the twenty-first century, it shouldn't be like this. She should be able to make her own decisions about who she wanted or didn't want to marry. This wasn't fair.

And just when Audrey thought things couldn't possibly get more complicated, they did.

Jillian burst through the office door, out of breath. "You need to come here," she panted.

Audrey was taken aback by her secretary's behavior. She had never seen Jillian act so wildly, aside from that one time out on the town for her bachelorette party. But those were completely different circumstances and much alcohol had been imbibed.

"Now," Jillian said sternly, making eye contact with Audrey. Something was up and judging from Jillian's behavior, it was big.

"Okay, okay. I'm coming, I'm coming," Audrey said as she walked across her carpet in her bare feet.

Jillian led Audrey to her own desk outside Audrey's office. The secretary offered Audrey her chair and pointed to her computer screen. Audrey sat down on the chair and rolled closed to the desk before focusing on the screen.

Your presence is hereby requested tonight for the wedding ceremony of Audrey Carroll and Dominick King.

Audrey didn't read any farther before she fell off the chair and landed on the floor with a yelp.

"Please tell me I read that wrong?" Audrey asked timidly. Any sense of confidence had been stolen from her.

Jillian sighed. "I'm afraid not," she said looking down at Audrey sympathetically. "It appears your father means for you to marry Dominick tonight."

Tonight. Tonight? Tonight! Either her father knew that she knew about his original timeline and rushed things up or he had purposely laid a false trail. The latter seemed more like her father. To force her to appear at her own wedding knowing that she would play the part of the dutiful daughter and wed Dominick, not wanting to make a spectacle. He knew her all too well.

Audrey sat there, rather pathetically on the floor, tears beginning to cascade down her cheeks. How was she supposed to get out of this? The one thing she needed was time and now it seemed that she was all out.

Unless…

Something dawned on Audrey.

"Jillian," Audrey asked, still sniffling away the unwanted tears. "Have you taken out the junk mail recently?"

"No," Jillian responded, completely confused as to why Audrey would be asking her about junk mail at a time like this. "The box isn't full yet. I like to wait until the box is full before taking it out. I like to think of it as my own little way to help the environment."

Audrey wiped the tears, dreadfully smudging her makeup. "Where is that box?"

"Behind you." Jillian pointed to the box Audrey had nearly fallen on.

Quickly turning around, Audrey began to furiously dig through the box of junk mail.

Jillian looked at Audrey like she was having some sort of mental breakdown. She tried to offer her some small comfort. "Miss Carroll-Audrey, I know you're in a bit of a rough spot right now. But I'm sure you'll figure it out. I mean, I'll do whatever I can to help you. But I don't see how digging through junk mail is going to help."

Audrey didn't hear what Jillian said. She was too focused on her mission. So Jillian continued to prattle on. Something about how at least Dominick was handsome if Audrey couldn't manage to wiggle out of things.

But that was just what Audrey intended to do - wiggle out of things. "Ah-ha! Got it!" Audrey squealed as she pulled out a manilla envelope. The envelope from Storybrooke, Maine. She quickly got to her feet and tore the envelope and poured its contents onto Jillian's desk. Audrey must have looked crazed, judging from the look on Jillian's face.

She picked up the voucher for her all-expenses-paid trip to Storybrooke. This was it. It was her ticket to freedom, at least for the time being. Audrey's mind then began to run a million miles a minute as she started piecing her escape together.

First, how was she to get there? While a plane seemed the simplest option, her father would expect her to make an escape that way. He might have even paid off some of the TSA to be on the lookout for her. It wouldn't surprise her. He was a very powerful man. No, she needed to get out the way he wouldn't expect her to.

"Jillian, we need to buy a bus ticket."

Jillian's eyes nearly bugged out of her head. "Come again?"

"A bus ticket. He'll never expect me to get on a bus. Of course, we'll need to buy some Dramamine first. But I'm gonna have to pay for everything in cash so he can't track me." Audrey then ran back to her office.

Jillian was beginning to worry about her boss, so she ran after Audrey. She found Audrey kneeling in front of the safe in her office, digging through it, shoving wads of cash in her purse. "You're starting to scare me," Jillian said.

Audrey stopped. "I can't do it. I can't marry Dominick. It's better if you don't know all the details so that when my father asks, you can tell the truth. I just need a trip to the bus station." Audrey paused. "And some clothes. We look about the same size. Probably a baseball cap too."

Jillian didn't say anything. She just blinked at Audrey.

"Will you please help me?" Audrey asked.

"How long will you be gone?" Jillian questioned with her arms folded across her chest.

"I don't know," Audrey answered honestly, giving Jillian a knowing glance. Jillian was the one person who knew more than she should about the situation. She knew of Audrey's desire for freedom rather than being tied down in a marriage.

Jillian sighed. "Yeah, I'll help you. What do you need me to do?"

It was then Audrey quickly went over the parts of her plan that she was willing to share. Audrey was thankful she carried an oversized purse. She was able to shove the cash she had been saving, in case of such an event, in her purse. While most of her precious keepsakes were at home, where she couldn't possibly go without getting caught, she did have a picture of when she was little with her mother. She grabbed the frame and put it in the pocket of her purse.

Audrey then looked around her office. This was it. This was goodbye to the life she had known.

After a small sigh, Audrey put her pumps back on and walked out of the office with Jillian, never looking back. They entered the elevator and Audrey pushed the button for the ground floor. She impatiently tapped her heel against the floor as muzak played in the elevator. Audrey was nervous something would go wrong, but she was also a bit excited to have a taste of freedom.

But she should have known it wouldn't be that easy.

The elevator door opened, revealing her father standing there. Preminger Carroll wasn't a tall man, but he carried himself as if he were one. He was balding and a little round in the midsection. He knew how to intimidate people - but Audrey knew him and grew up learning to not be intimidated by him. But to imitate him.

Audrey tried to play it off as smooth as she could, like she wasn't possibly plotting to betray him. She smiled at him.

"Where do you think you're going?" Preminger Carroll asked.

In the corner of her eye, Audrey saw Jillian jump a bit. But Audrey just smiled and raised her hands, wiggling her fingers. "I'm assuming there are going to be pictures and I'd rather my nails look nice in the ring pictures," Audrey lied. "Jillian booked us a mani-pedi."

Preminger Carroll smiled. "I see you've come to your senses."

Audrey nodded. Preminger kissed his daughter's cheek. All Audrey could think about was this was likely to be the last time she ever received affection from him. She felt herself choking up a bit. He wasn't a bad man - but he was a very stubborn man, who could not be swayed from his opinion on matters. And in this matter he was wrong. Very wrong. Audrey gave him a quick hug in return, as to not arouse suspicion.

Preminger Carroll then walked on the elevator. He turned to face them as the doors began to close. "You're a good girl, Audrey," he said before the doors completely shut.

After a few seconds, Jillian heaved a huge sigh of relief. "I thought he was going to figure us out."

"We're not out of the woods yet."

The two women walked out to Jillian's car. While Audrey hated the gym, today she was thankful for it because Jillian kept a bag of clothes in her car when she went to the gym after work. Jillian just gave Audrey the bag because it also had some toiletries. Audrey attempted to refuse the generous offer, but Jillian wouldn't hear of it. Truthfully, Audrey was glad for all the essentials because it would be a long bus trip.

When they got to the bus station, Audrey changed into the t-shirt and athletic pants from Jillian's gym bag while Jillian bought the bus ticket. She threw her hair up in a ponytail and pulled it through the baseball cap. Audrey couldn't remember ever being so dressed down in public before. It felt strange - her own sort of rebellion. It seemed such a pathetic rebellion, but Audrey had always been the good girl and done what she was told. She was finally breaking free of that.

"Aud, your bus leaves in five minutes. You gotta go. Now," Jillian called from outside the stall.

Audrey had been expecting a longer wait time. But it was probably better this way - to get out before her father could even suspect anything so that by the time he did, she would likely be in another state.

Jillian and Audrey ran to her bus. They quickly hugged and said their goodbyes. Audrey gave Jillian her cellphone so that if her father traced it, she never left Las Vegas. She then promised to call when she was safe and able to do so. They hugged one more time and Audrey boarded the Greyhound bus.

And so dear reader, our dear princess was bound for Storybrooke, Maine, where her life would forever be altered.

Author's Note: Yes, another plot bunny - and I'm not gonna apologize for it. The last year I've struggled with anxiety, depression, finally getting things in an okay place and then COVID happened. Might I post only plot bunnies? It could happen. I'm the author, if you don't like it you don't have to read. Last time I posted a plot bunny, I took a lot of heat and I'm not gonna lie, it affected me negatively a lot. So much that it's been like four months since I posted anything. But this is NANO, I'm gonna write what I want to write. Again, if you don't like - don't read. I don't need your negativity.

Sorry for the rant. I appreciate any kindness or support. I've wanted to write an OUAT OC for YEARS! But could never come up with anything. But now we have Audrey!

Also, there were a BUNCH of Barbie Princess and the Pauper references - catch them? ;)