"Mm." Nathalie Quinlan walked down the hospital steps, one hand in her pocket, the other holding a phone, heading towards the roadside ready to hail a car.
"She’s back then," Freddy Cagwin’s voice was light and cheerful over the phone, he imdiately said, "I’ll call my mom and tell her not to set up her stall tonight, to make stewed chicken at ho for you. Nathalie, you’re free tonight, aren’t you?"
"I’m free."
Nathalie rembered that she had promised to go to his house for dinner before she went to The Ninth Institute, quite naturally.
As soon as she finished speaking, while she was still thinking about whether to send Alfred Garland a ssage to say she wouldn’t be coming ho for dinner, she saw a suspicious-looking van driving towards her.
McKinney’s major roads all had traffic lights and surveillance equipnt installed, but that silver-white van didn’t have a license plate – sothing was clearly off.
"...Well, it’s settled then, you’ll co to my house for dinner tonight, I’ll head ho right after school."
Freddy Cagwin sounded happily, "Besides stewed chicken, is there anything else you’d like to have, Nathalie? I’ll pick it up for you when I pass the market."
Freddy was still talking to her about dinner that night.
"..." Nathalie half-squinted, her eyes pitch black, watching the van speed up and stop in front of her, followed by the sound of doors flinging open.
Seven or eight n with steel pipes got out of the van, and the one leading them was a muscular man with a thuggish air and a lewd look in his eye; it was clear they were bad news. He glanced at her and then asked the person beside him, "Is she the one?"
The person beside him took out a phone, compared the girl in front of them with a photo, and nodded hastily.
"It’s her, Jack! The girl in the photo is her!"
There were quite a few passersby at the entrance of City Hospital, and people occasionally walked by and could tell from the scene – a young woman being surrounded in broad daylight by a group of people with steel pipes – that these were hooligans bullying soone.
There were quite a few onlookers from a distance, and many were pointing and discussing, but seeing a group all carrying steel pipes, no one dared to step forward to intervene.
"These people must be... from the streets, right?"
"That girl doesn’t look old, how did she get involved with these people? Hey, call the police quickly, don’t let anything happen."
Soone sneaked off to the side with a phone to call the police.
"..."
"Are you Nathalie Quinlan?" Jack, the man referred to as Jack, slightly tipped up his chin, his eyes fierce, lifting the steel pipe in his hand that was as thick as the brim of a bowl.
Nathalie was surrounded by several people, her delicate and beautiful face showing no sign of fear; upon hearing him, she rely lifted her eyelids slightly and coldly raised her hand to tug at the brim of her cap, ignoring him.
"I’m asking you if your na is Nathalie Quinlan?!"
"..."
Still no response.
The muscular man frowned, sowhat annoyed, but seeing her remain silent and not scared, he spat on the ground with a vulgar curse, "Damn, real bad luck, she’s a mute!"
One of his subordinates chuckled and whistled teasingly, "Jack, this chick isn’t just mute, maybe she’s an idiot too? Look at her, no reaction at all to seeing us, doesn’t even know what fear is."
The muscular man looked around at the increasingly large crowd of onlookers, shot his subordinate a glare to shut him up, and then addressed Nathalie, "Listen here mute, soone’s paid us to take care of you. I usually don’t like hitting won but getting paid to do a job is only right! Don’t bla if you’ve got resentnt, think about who you’ve pissed off, and be more careful from now on, open your eyes wider, watch your step, and don’t offend anyone again!"
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