Joseph looked at the two who were messing around and didn’t understand what was going on, but that didn’t stop him from joining in the fun. He smiled and lunged at them.
The three of them instantly fell into a mess.
Less than two minutes later, Catherine was standing at the entrance of her bedroom in her pajamas. Looking at the three guys who were laughing, she asked helplessly, “You’re all awake? Then shall I make breakfast?”
The three guys continued to laugh, and Luke was the only one who took the time to say “okay,” before they started playing around again.
Five minutes later, Robert woke up with a dark expression.
But when he saw the three “kids” in the living room who were laughing and making noise, his anger from being woken up early in the morning suddenly disappeared, and he couldn’t help but smile.
This scene was too familiar.
More than a year ago, it had been a common occurrence at home.
Now that he saw it again, he realized that it felt like a long time ago.
After a while, the three of them finally stopped their childish behavior when Catherine shouted, “Breakfast is ready!”
After breakfast, everybody left for New York again, led by Luke, the tour guide.
It was the same for the next two days.
Since the police department didn’t have any urgent assignments, Luke naturally wasn’t dispatched. It was a peaceful Christmas.
On the morning of the 27th, Luke took everybody to Chinatown. At noon, they went to the familiar barbecue restaurant to try the local Chinese food.
Chinatown was bustling with people.
Most of the Chinese in Chinatown didn’t celebrate Christmas. At the very least, they didn’t regard it as a major holiday, but as a good day to make money.
When most restaurants were closed on Christmas, business in all the restaurants here was naturally booming.
It was a good thing that Luke had prepared for this, and the boss gave a repeat customer like him special treatment.
After Luke paid for the food in advance, the boss of the restaurant reserved a private room for them. Hence, they could come here after they strolled around Chinatown and the dishes would already be ready.
After lunch, the whole family wandered around Chinatown again, looking at everything in wonder.
In the Chinese gift shop, there were all sorts of dazzling items like Chinese knots, window stickers, electric lanterns, firecrackers, couplets, fortune cards, pinwheels, and kites. Claire and Joseph couldn’t get enough.
When he saw a store selling candied fruit on sticks, Luke bought some for the whole family.
Claire, who was greedy and could eat a lot, even bought two sticks each of hawthorns, apples, and strawberries.
However, she generously allowed Joseph to have a taste of each of them, but was responsible for demolishing the rest.
Just like this, the family had all sorts of trinkets in their hands and didn’t forget to munch on the candied fruit sticks.
Robert was the most depressed.
He chose the apple because it matched Christmas.
But he didn’t really like sweet things. The apple under the sugar layer didn’t taste sweet, and was even more sour. He didn’t like sour things either, but he could grit his teeth and bite into it.
Luke slowly ate the original candied hawthorn and savored the flavor from his previous life while he observed Robert’s vexed expression.
Suddenly, Robert looked stunned.
With his quick reflexes, Luke immediately looked in the direction Robert was facing, and saw a man and a woman standing in a Japanese shop.
Luke raised an eyebrow, and approached Robert. “Do you know him?”
Robert turned around and frowned. “You know him, too?”
Luke nodded slightly. Just as they were about to walk past the shop entrance, they saw the man take out a roll of tape from his pocket, only to be stopped by the woman.
The woman said in a low voice, “Is this what you mean when you said you were going to have a chat? I thought I was the only one who enjoyed this treatment.”
The man said, “Because it’s very effective.”
The woman was horrified. “His daughter just died. Don’t you have any compassion?! At least let me try first, okay?”
The man hesitated for a moment before he finally put the gag tape back into his pocket and followed the woman in.
At that moment, he finally took off his wool hat to reveal a bald head.
Luke: …Yep, it’s definitely him.
Two nights ago, in a two-story house in North Bergen, this bald boss had single-handedly killed fifteen professional mercenaries with one pistol. He was a true-blue, violent bigshot!
Robert, however, looked away and continued to follow Catherine and the others, his footsteps never pausing at all.
Luke chased after him. “Hostile?”
Robert’s lips twitched, and he simply shook his head. He said in a low voice, “That old man used to be my instructor.”
Luke was stunned. “So?”
Robert said, “So, stay as far away from him as you can when you see him. This guy has a lot of crap on him. You’ll just have bad luck if you get involved.”
Looking at Luke’s thoughtful expression, he sighed and said bluntly, “If there are a hundred people who want me dead, there are at least a thousand who want him dead… No, it should be two or three thousand.”
Luke’s lips twitched. “…Then why is he still alive?”
Robert curled his lip. “If I can survive, it’s not unusual for him to survive and retire. In any case, he’s RED.”
Luke asked, “What’s that?”
Robert: “Retired, Extremely Dangerous operative.”
He then noticed Luke sizing him up, and couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “Okay, me too, but I’m not as excessive as he is.”
Luke could only chuckle at that.
When the Carlos family had run over to Shackelford to court death, Robert might have only killed a dozen criminals, but that was because Luke beat him to it.
After that, Luke had jumped the gun and gone off to clean up the Carlos family in Mexico.
Actually, it was just that Robert hadn’t found a good excuse to leave town then. Otherwise, the Carlos family would’ve still been wiped out a few days later.
Thus, Robert’s idea of “excessive” was only just slightly less compared with the bald bigshot.
After thinking for a moment, Luke then gave a simple account of the raid on the baldie.
Robert was unperturbed. “There are too many people who want to silence him; in the end, it’ll be even more idiots who are killed by him. If it isn’t absolutely necessary, just pretend you never saw him.”
Luke asked, “What would be considered ‘absolutely necessary’?”
Robert said, “Like if he was shot in front of you and about to die. That would be necessary.”
Luke was lost for words.
From this, Luke knew that Robert didn’t really believe that anyone could do anything to this instructor of his.
Maybe a certain someone had been taught a ruthless lesson by this instructor before? Luke couldn’t help but smile as he imagined Robert pissig his pants in terror in front of this bald instructor.
Robert’s back suddenly itched. He turned around and said, “Tell me, what are you thinking about? It definitely isn’t something good!”