63 Little frui (1/2)

Alex placed her down by the end of the ladder.

He turned to her and said, ”I'll go down first. Make sure you hold on to the ladder so the wind doesn't blow you away again,” he almost sounded worried about her but he was wearing a mischievous smile again as he said those words.

He quickly made his way down and the moment his feet landed on solid ground, he looked up and motioned for her to follow.

Abi swallowed. It was easy when she climbed up but looking down now, she felt a little scared. Thankfully, seeing Alex down there calmed her heart.

She then placed her feet on the first rung and Alex immediately noticed her feet were slightly shaking. He twitched as he became alert. This girl was simply unbelievable. How could she talk so tough and all that when she was trembling over something like this?

As Abi carefully climbed down, Alex didn't realise it but he had been holding his breath the entire time he watched her and only let it out when she was finally at arms reach.

Abi jumped down to the verandah and clapped her hands together and beamed in satisfaction. 'One more thing to tick off the list!' she celebrated inwardly.

They headed back to the dining hall where dinner was already laid out on the table. She was surprised to see Mr. Black Leather Jacket sitting there, casually chatting with Alex's latest visitor.

”Alex! What took you so long? Were you exercising or something?” Xavier said as he saw the two enter the room.  He accompanied his statement with a couple of winks, clearly indicating what kind of 'exercise' he was referring to.

Kai nudged Xavier like a big brother does when their younger brother was being naughty and he went up to Abi and finally introduced himself.

”Hello, Abigail. My name is Skyler, but you can call me Kai for short.” He paused and looked at the guy next to him and introduced him also. ”This guy here is Xavier… You can call him Zee or you can just ignore him, that's fine too,” he said with a quick smile and a twinkle in his eye.

”Hi Kai. I finally found out what your real name is! I've been calling you Mr. Black Leather jacket this whole time,” she confessed with a shy smile.

The moment she smiled at Kai, she felt a chill coming from behind her. She immediately turned to Alex and made puppy dog eyes at him and tried to distract him. ”Alex, I'm hungry… Can we eat?” Her stomach grumbled right on cue and the frozen iceberg melted a little.

Without a word, Alex strode towards the table and sat down and waited for everyone else to take their seat.

Abi was relieved that Alex didn't ask her to sit on his lap again. Was it because Ezekiel Qin was not around? She noticed that the table was only set for four people - one for Alex at the head of the table, one to his right and two to his left. Maybe Ezekiel Qin wasn't back yet.