Chapter 160
Veronica was walking ahead with Xavier following her.
.
They were walking and chatting when they suddenly heard a scream behind him. Instinctively, they darted their eyes sideways, only to see a black van with its headlights off speeding toward them. Instead of slowing down, the van sped up toward them!
“Watch out!” The danger was so sudden that Xavier had his heart in his mouth. However, just as he was about to pull Veronica aside, she kicked him away instead.
Xavier didn‘t have time to realize what had happened. Even though the kick sent him staggering a few steps to the side, his eyes were constantly fixed on Veronica, only that he no longer had the opportunity to save her, even if he wanted to. His mind went blank in the face of sudden danger; he only felt that Veronica might leave him just like that.
However, just as he was worried sick about Veronica, he saw her bend down sharply to gain momentum. Estimating the time when the van would hit her with absolute precision, she jumped up at the critical moment and landed gracefully on the hood of the van, using it to gain momentum before doing a front somersault. Just as she was about to land on the roof of the van, she placed her hands on it right away and took the opportunity to somersault off the van, landing on the ground steadily.
Astonished by her fluid movement, everyone gasped repeatedly, and they were fascinated by her cool action.
“Oh, my God! What quick reflexes she has!”
“Not only does she have quick reflexes, but she must be skilled in self–defense. Otherwise, if she had been a bit slower, she would‘ve died with the van speeding so fast toward her.“.
NTT
“What a race against death in real life this is…”
“Oh, my gosh! She‘s simply terrific.”
“Is she alright?”
The onlooking crowd couldn‘t help speaking of Veronica in laudatory terms as they
talked about what had happened.
Rushing toward Veronica in big strides, Xavier grabbed her arms and checked on her from head to toe. “How are you? Are you alright? Do you feel unwell? Want me to send you to the hospital?” He was so worried about her safety that there was a slight . quaver in his voice as he spoke.
“Oh, I‘m alright. I‘m perfectly fine.” Veronica shook her head with an understanding smile. “Are you kidding me? It was no big deal. There‘s no way I‘d let the van hit me,” she joked with laughter while turning to stare at the black unlicensed van that was disappearing into the distance. That van seemed to be coming at me. Who wants to kill me again this time? Who else could it be other than the Larsons? In some cases, it‘s easy to figure out the culprit behind the scenes without even thinking about it. But now that Tiffany‘s already about to get married to Matthew, why would she still not let me off?
“What are you looking at? I’m talking to you.” Still in a state of shock, Xavier went limp with fright. God only knows how horrifying the scene just now was.
“Huh? Oh, nope, nothing.” Veronica shook her head with a chuckle. “Why the hell was that van speeding so fast? It was like it was in a f*cking hurry because of an emergency or something,” she chided with a casual air. She only said so deliberately because she didn‘t want Xavier to think that the van was coming at her. Xavier has helped me a lot ever since I came to Bloomstead. I can‘t get him in trouble anymore.
“An emergency, eh?” Xavier placed his hands on Veronica‘s shoulders while turning to look at the disappearing van with his head tilted to one side. For an instant, his eyes narrowed slightly with a murderous gleam. Just an accident? No way. The van was coming at Veronica, but this silly girl didn‘t realize it at all!
“Yeah, of course. Otherwise, it wouldn‘t have been in such a hurry.”
“Well, that makes sense.” Xavier‘s handsome face contorted into an awkward smile. Playing along with Veronica, he continued, “Glad to hear that you‘re alright, but… that was a pretty nice spontaneous response just now. Very cool.” He praised her without reservation.
“But of course,” Veronica replied with a self–satisfied smile before walking to the other side of the road with him.
As the pair left, traffic on the road returned to normal, and the cars were driving again as usual. The onlookers just now went about their business as if nothing had ever happened.
Upon reaching the square on the other side of the road, Veronica couldn‘t help but
ask Xavier, “What‘s the present that you said you‘d be giving me?”
Seeing how eager Veronica was to know what the present was, Xavier took her hand and strode on with her. “Just come with me.”
Next to the square was the river bank. After walking across the square, the two stood by the river, and Xavier took out his cell phone and sent a text message.
Veronica couldn‘t help but ask curiously, “What is it? You seem so secretive.”
As soon as she finished her sentence, a sound that resembled that of a whistle sounded from across the river, and several rays of light reached high into the sky like shooting stars. The next instant, these rays of light exploded into spectacular fireworks with a loud Boom!
After bursting in midair, the colorful fireworks scattered in all directions like a meteor shower, and the lights slowly dimmed. Then, there were several whistling sounds again, followed by another loud Boom! as more beautiful fireworks exploded in the sky. With their rich display of lights and colors, the dazzling fireworks illuminated the initially dark sky.
“Oh, my! How spectacular.” Despite being a competitive person, Veronica was a young lady, after all, so she liked fireworks very much. “Is this the present you wanted to give me?” Her eyes wandered before taking a glance at the fireworks in the night
sky. There were a row of fireworks along the river, which meant that at least 60 boxes –– of firecrackers had been used.
“Uh–huh. Do you like it?”
“Yeah, of course! They‘re really beautiful. It‘s just that.” Veronica couldn‘t help clicking her tongue while looking up at the exploding fireworks. “Tsk, tsk, tsk… You‘re not shooting off fireworks; obviously, you‘ve spent a great deal of money. I would‘ve been happier if you had given that amount of money to me instead.”
“Haha…” Amused by Veronica‘s remark, Xavier smiled a gentle smile as he felt happy from the bottom of his heart. Just as expected, she‘s still her usual self. She‘s never changed; she‘s frank, unaffected, and adorable.
People rarely shot off so many brightly colored fireworks in Bloomstead except during festivals, so the fireworks displayed drew the attention of countless people who stopped to watch the fireworks. Some of them held up their phones to photograph the fireworks, whereas some took a selfie with the fireworks in the background. Tonight in Bloomstead, Instagram Stories was overwhelmed with photos that had the fireworks in the background.
Buzz… The fireworks were so loud that Veronica couldn‘t hear her cell phone ringing in her pocket, but she felt her phone vibrate for a second.
She took out her cell phone to take a look, only to see that it was a voice message from Melissa. When she held her phone up to her ear, she heard Melissa say, “Veronica, are you with Xavier right now? Today is his birthday, so I made a special effort to prepare a birthday dinner for him, but that shameless guy wouldn‘t answer my phone calls!”
Only then did Veronica realize that today was Xavier‘s birthday. However, he never mentioned it at all. Instead, he gave her a feast of fireworks as a present due to her
impending departure.
Instead of replying to Melissa‘s message, Veronica put away her cell phone and continued to watch the fireworks.
The fireworks display went on for 20 minutes before coming to an end. When Veronica and Xavier looked back, they realized that the river bank was already crowded with people. As it was very noisy around them, Veronica shouted to Xavier at the top of her voice, “There‘s no more fireworks, right? Come on, let‘s go. There are too many people here.”
“Okay.” Xavier nodded slightly.
The two of them pushed and squeezed their way out of the crowd one after another.
