Five Years of Marriage to Mr. Bradford (by Koi Fish) novel Chapter 697

Chapter 697

On second thought, Rebecca realized what was going on.

Darren’s parents ran an import–export business, so it made sense that he had picked up such excellent French from them.

There were no surprises in the scoring. Darren shot straight to first place, breaking the previous ranking. Vande took second, and Catherine placed third.

If only the top two contestants would advance, Catherine would be eliminated.

Watching Catherine’s dejected expression, Rebecca felt a wave of relief, as if a heavy burden had finally been lifted from her chest. None of the remaining contestants managed to change the ranking until it was/Rebecca’s turn.

When she walked to the waiting area backstage, she once again met Catherine’s hostile, challenging glare. / Rebecca gave her a small, cool smile and whispered, “Stealing my topic didn’t do you much good, did it?”

Catherine’s face darkened with anger. She looked ready to explode but quickly forced a cold, mocking laugh. ” Rehashing someone else’s material is even more pathetic. I lost to Darren fair and square, but you have no chance of beating me.”

“We’ll see about that,” Rebecca replied with a smile, focusing on preparing for her presentation.

The second Catherine spotted Vance walking over, her expression flipped on a dime. “Good luck, Rebecca!”

Vance stopped right in front of Rebecca.

She frowned. “I’m up to compete next. What’s up?”

The last thing she needed was for him to mess with her mood and throw off her performance.

“Don’t stress.” Vance’s face was stony, sounding like a stern dean. “Just speak from the heart. My offer still stands. If you really want to make it to the city finals, I can step down.”

The contestant on stage wrapped up their speech, and the announcer called out to Rebecca.

“My turn.” She walked onto the stage with her head held high, her posture straight and confident. Her voice rang out clearly as she announced her speech title, “What If I Lost My Leg One Day?”

Catherine’s face went deathly pale. Rebecca caught the reaction from the corner of her eye and shot a taunting look right back at her.

In fact, she had prepared two speech drafts. The “Us in Ten Years” draft had been deliberately leaked. If Catherine had been decent and fair, Rebecca would have used it for this round and saved the leg speech for the city finals.

But Catherine had lived up to expectations and stolen the idea, forcing Rebecca to switch. Yet Rebecca hadn’t noticed that Darren’s expression had also changed dramatically when he heard the new title.

She had no time to worry about anyone else. She poured her entire heart and soul into her presentation.