183 Charmingly Dark (1/2)
While Anthony played with the fireworks, he kept turning his innocent baby face toward Ye Shuang. Other people thought this golden retriever was acting cute, but Ye Shuang knew the man actually wanted to find out if she had heard anything.
She pouted and glared at Anthony. She had no intention of putting the headphones on. Everyone was having fun playing with the fireworks, so if she put on the big headphones, didn't that mean that she found them annoying‽ She would definitely be the talk of the party.
Anthony was a foreigner, so he had his own ways of doing things. Even if he acted strangely at times, other people would understand that as a cultural difference. However, the same thing could not be said of Ye Shuang if she tried to follow Anthony. In any case, with Ye Shuang's hearing, even when the headphones were just left around her neck, she could still hear it clearly.
Therefore, the headphones continued to hang around her neck, and Ye Shuang ignored Anthony and smiled at the people who waved at her. Then she walked away, playing with her fireworks like nothing had happened, as the voices from the headphones drifted into her ears.
”Done?” A male voice appeared from the headphones. It sounded like he was inside a building. Based on the sound of fireworks in the background, he should be a guest at this spring party.
The voice that answered was also male, but the background was a night breeze at an empty field.
”Done, Lin A12345…” Then he hesitated before continuing with a cautious tone. ”Are you sure no accident will happen‽”
”Why didn't you worry about that when you accepted the money‽” The guest scoffed and added, ”I'm not an idiot. Do you think it'll be easy for me if a human life is lost? Furthermore, you know what you're doing; I'm just trying to scare him.”
By then, Ye Shuang had a brief idea what was happening. The rest of the conversation was nothing new. It was A buying out B to do something to C's car. The plate number Lin A12345 was rather familiar like it belonged to one of Yao Zhixing's racer friends. Ye Shuang had some memory of this plate; she knew generally the group that it belonged it, but she could not remember the actual driver.
After they hung up, Ye Shuang twirled the fireworks in her hands and paid attention to the hall. Not long after that, a man rushed out from the nearby hall. The man had a white bathrobe on, and his hand that was stuck in a pocket seemed to be holding a phone. His other hand held a towel to dry his hair. His body did not look like he visit the gym often; he appeared like a quintessential young master.
Ye Shuang glanced at the man twice before moving naturally toward Yao Zhixing's group. The group of racers winked and nudged among themselves, clearing a spot next to Yao Zhixing. Ye Shuang took the space and squatted down. The firework that she was holding was almost finished, so she tossed it away. Yao Zhixing saw that, grabbed another from his lackey, and passed it to her. He thought Ye Shuang was there to ask for more fireworks.
Ye Shuang accepted the new fireworks and used her elbow to poke Yao Zhixing. Then she lifted her chin to point at the man. ”Who is that man?”
Yao Zhixing raised his eyes to look, and after a surprised gasp, he turned to ask the others, ”Who invited the kid?”
The racers kept quiet; none of them seemed to want to admit anything. After some pushing and shoving, one of them came forth to say, ”Not us, he came with another guest. It would have been rude for us to just chase him away.”
Ye Shuang soon understood what was happening. The man's father was in the transportation business. He had once bet on his whole family's savings to buy two large trucks, and that was how the business started. Today, his company had connections with all the large cities in the country, one of few success stories that started from nothing. Yao Zhixing's family was in the eatery business, so due to transportation of ingredients, his family had constant cooperation with the man's family.
However, a good father might not breed an equally good son. The man in the bathrobe was not on the same level as his father. Probably because his father came from a life of poverty, he naturally believed that, since he had resources, he needed to give his son a better life. Therefore, he had given his son everything since he was a babe. Even his allowance during primary school was several times the salary of a normal white collar.
Raised by the love and pampering of everyone around him, it would have been a miracle if the son did not grow up to be a cocky young master. Since he was young, the man had been involved in many incidents like assaulting his teacher and truancy. The school would not do anything to him because his father was one of the school's top donors. The boy would do anything he wanted, and that only got worse after he grew up. Since he had the impression that everything could be settled with his father's money, he only grew unrulier and mixed with a bunch of friends that shared his views or just made use of his money.
Innocence meant fearless. Yao Zhixing was famed in San Lin City and came from the powerful family. Normally, people would not purposely step on his toes. However, there was one thing good about Yao Zhixing; if you did not provoke him, he would leave you alone. As long as you did not touch him or his friends, Yao Zhixing was quite a generous person.
But this bathrobe man could not stand that someone else's name was louder than his, and his arrogance meant that he had been taught a few lessons by Yao Zhixing several times in the past. He kept trying to annoy Yao Zhixing when he had time. The latest conflict was when Yao Zhixing went after one of his so-called 'friends'. He undressed the man and dropped him at the city center, causing the man to run home naked.