Pushing through a dreadful 20 mins of stomach-churning drive, I eventually reached her place on the upper side of Manhatten in Washington Heights. It might’ve been a bit of an intrusion of privacy, but I had fished her address out of the HR system to bring her back.
Her home was a quaint little townhouse squeezed between two large buildings. There were all sorts of green vines and plants spilling out of her windows and growing up along the exterior of her house, giving it a bit of a down-to-earth feel despite being awfully close to the Bronx.
I parked the car in front of her driveway, trying to think of a good way to tell her husband what had happened at work and preparing myself for what will most likely be a resignation letter from Ms. Belcalis next week such that I probably wouldn’t ever see her again after today.
My stomach dropped at the thought.
Was this really it?
I glanced over at her peacefully sleeping body. Despite everything that had happened today, she still looked ethereal to me.
Even though I knew her husband was probably sitting in the house right in front of me, I couldn’t help yearning for her, wishing that I wouldn’t have to see her off so soon.
My fingers mindlessly thumbed the ends of her hair as the heavy thought weighed on my mind.
Letting it slip out of my fingers, I released a heavy sigh as I climbed out of the car and rounded it to the passenger’s side. No matter how much I wished for it, I couldn’t kept her to myself for she was never mine to begin with.
Opening the door, I carefully lifted Ms. Belcalis’s unconscious body out of the car, making sure not to wake her. I walked up to the door and pressed the doorbell, making a little chime ring through the house.
I waited for a few minutes without any responses or sounds of any incoming footsteps. Was no one home yet?
Right as I was about to ring it again, a pair of bright violet eyes popped out in the lower window next to the door. It was a little boy with dark black hair and eyes that looked so familiar, but he disappeared from the window just as fast as he appeared.
Fuck… Not only is she married, but she also had a child…
Before I could dwell on it any further, I heard the distinct tone of a dialing phone and a little voice saying, “Hello, Mr. Police. There’s a strange man holding my unconscious mom outside our house. Can you-”
My eyes widened at his words. I hurriedly called out, “Wait, wait! I’m not a strange man. Please don’t call the police. I work with your mother. I’m Rafael Achilles Cordova. Maybe she’s told you about how she recently started working on a project for my company.”
There was a pause before I heard a familiar click as he hung up the phone. Then, his head popped up in the lower window again with a hardened expression as he looked at me up and down.
“Yes… I do know of Mr. Cordova. He’s the asshole making Ms. Jane work late recently.”
I bit my tongue, trying to hold myself back from snapping at a little kid. He barely even looked 7 years old, yet he was cursing me like any other fully grown adult.
“Well, something happened at work, and your mother passed out from… over-exhaustion… Uh, can you please just find your dad? She was asking for him before she fainted.”
He replied in a deadly icy tone, “I don’t have a dad.”
My eyebrows scrunched up in confusion. “But she was asking for Liam earlier…”
His eyes darted over the unconscious woman in my arms before looking back at me and narrowing his eyes at me. He let out a little sigh before retreating back from the window and letting the curtain fall back in place.
Then, there were a few familiar clicks of a door being unlocked before the heavy wooden door creaked open. The little boy stepped out with a deep scowl on his face as he kept his eyes trained on me. “You will put her on her bed and then leave immediately. Otherwise, I’m calling the police, okay?”
I nodded. Anything to get her inside and resting properly.
He opened the door wider, letting me step passed him and into the house.
He was dressed in a simple black button-up shirt with a pair of khakis pants like a clean and well-raised child, not that I expected anything less from Ms. Belcalis. He barely came up to my hips but had a cold air to him as if he had already lived through life once. The child was so young, and yet he spoke like an adult. And, to be honest, it was a bit startling.
He walked in front of me, guiding me up a flight of stairs and to the right into what appeared to be the master bedroom. The walls were painted in forest green, with all sorts of plants lying around the windowsills and bookshelves. In the center of the room lay a large wooden bed frame covered in an array of plush blankets.
The moment I set down Ms. Belcalis on the bed, the little boy walked up to the bedside and leaned over to brush her hair out of her face. His eyes softened ever so slightly when they landed on her but immediately hardened when he noticed the large red handprint on her cheek.
“Who did this?”
His tone was dead serious. Any other man probably would’ve already caved under his heavy aura if I wasn’t who I am.
Thinking about how much of a handful he would be in the future, I sighed and calmly replied, “A bastard who will wish he’s dead after I’m done with him.”
He nodded silently as he gently stroked his mother’s face, severely contrasting the harsh words in his mouth. “Good, he deserves it.”
I watched as he peeked under my suit jacket, scowling when he noticed the state of her clothes. He immediately pulled one of the nearby blankets over his mother, covering her completely before pulling my jacket out from underneath. He neatly folded it in half and walked back over to me to hand it to me.
Unlike anyone else who had ever met me for the first time, he unnervingly looked me straight in the eyes and coldly instructed, “You can leave now.”
I pursued my lips. “Look, kid. I don’t feel comfortable leaving you alone to take care of her. I’m sure you know what you’re doing, but it’s just not safe. I think I should at least wait for her husband to come home to make sure everything is-”
“She doesn’t have a husband.”
“But she was looking for a man named Liam. I should at least wait for him-”
“I’m Liam.”
I stared at him in confusion, unsure of how to proceed with my words.
“No adult will be coming, and neither will it be necessary. I know how to take care of her so you can leave now.”
I sighed, frustratingly ruffling my hair. It was talking to a brick wall. “Look, kid. I’m sure you know what you’re doing, but I can’t leave you guys like this. At least let me help you change-”
His face immediately scrunched up in distaste. “You think I would trust one of you disgraceful beasts with Ms. Jane? You’re just going to try to touch her inappropriately while she’s defenseless, knowing that I would be too powerless to stop you!”
“Woah, there. I wouldn’t do such a thing.” I held my hands up in surrender. “If I did want to do such a thing, I wouldn’t have covered her up and brought her back home.”
He eyed me skeptically. A moment of silence passed before he finally huffed with a cross of his arms, “You’re annoyingly stubborn.”
I chuckled at his choice of words as a little kid. “Does that mean I can stay and help out?”
“Fine… But I’m calling the police the moment you do anything weird…”
I nodded understandingly and straightened back up to my full height. “I promise I won’t look at her weirdly. I just want to get her changed into something more comfortable and check for injuries. She seemed to be bleeding from the back of her head earlier, but she wouldn’t let me check.”
He let out a sigh as he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Yes, I’m not surprised by that.” He really did look like a miniature adult. “Just toss those clothes in the trash. I’ll find a change of clothes and get the first aid kit.”
I nodded as I watched his little figure disappear out of the bedroom doors before turning my attention back to Ms. Belcalis. I chewed on the inside of my cheek as I lightly traced along her jawline.
I wasn’t sure what to make of the whole situation. Despite the ring on her finger, there apparently wasn’t any man in her life.
But I did know that child looked awfully similar to her. Bright violet eyes that anyone could spot from a mile away. A trait that was rarely found in anyone these days.
Did the father walk out on her when she was pregnant? Maybe a past boyfriend that she couldn’t let go of?
I sighed and released her hair from my fingertips, not wanting to dwell on the aching thought any further.
Sitting down on the side of the bed, I carefully reached under the blanket to slip the remaining shreds of her blouse off of her shoulders, making sure to keep the blanket stay over her body. I was a respectful enough gentleman not to try to take advantage of a woman when she was in such a helpless state.
To add on, it didn’t help that the back of my neck was already burning bright red from the mere accidently brush of my fingertips against her boosom.
I wasn’t used to these sort of things, which only made it all the more worse.
I quickly tossed the shredded shirt aside before reaching back underneath to unzip her skirt. She never wore form-fitting clothes, so it wasn’t difficult to pull the skirt off from underneath the blanket either.
However, my heart nearly stopped when she suddenly shifted in her sleep right as I pulled it off. Luckily, she didn’t wake up and simply went straight back to sleep after curling up against my side.
I let out a sigh of relief as I took in her features. She looked utterly adorable with her cheek pressed up against my leg and one hand resting haphazardly across my thigh, completely curled up against my side. Her hair was splayed across the bed in a wild mess, but it still looked beautiful, perfectly framing her dainty features.
“Stop staring. It’s rude to stare at people, especially when they’re sleeping.”
I immediately retracted my hand and looked over at the oddly infuriating child. Almost every word that came out of his mouth held an accusing tone to it and so much attitude that I was starting to wonder if he did it on purpose to take a jab me.
He walked up to me with a long cream-colored nightdress and a first aid box in his arms. I graciously took the items from him, muttering a soft thank you before turning back to Ms. Belcalis.
I carefully lifted her upper body and slipped the billowing nightgown over her, letting it fall to her knees. Then, I open the first aid kit. Rummaging through the messy bag, I eventually pulled out an ointment bottle and some disinfectant.
Trying to ignore the kid who was sitting on the other side of the bed and staring blatantly at me despite his previous words about staring, I gently lifted her head up to check for injuries. I pressed my lips into a thin line when I found a cut on the back of her head. She must’ve hit her head on the corner of the table or something when she was trying to get away from that bastard.
Without looking up at the boy, I asked, “Can you get me a bowl of warm water and a clean wash cloth?”
He didn’t say anything in reply but obediently hopped off the bed and walked off to who knows where. Either way, he returned pretty quickly with the items I asked for and stood next to me silently without any argument.
After uncuffing and rolling my sleeves halfway up my forearms, I dipped the washcloth into the basin and lightly wrung out the excess water. I dabbed the back of her head with a damp wash cloth, cleaning up the dried blood on her scalp. Then, I reached for one of the bottles and coated the wound with the disinfectant. At least it wasn’t too deep and had stopped bleeding on the way back.
I carefully set her unconscious body back onto the bed and rinsed the washcloth in the bowl of water that he was holding. As I took the heavy bowl from him, I quietly thanked him for it and set it aside on the nightstand.
He didn’t say anything in reply and simply walked back around the bed to return to his original seat on the other side of Ms. Belcalis. Despite all his harsh words, he was unexpectedly gentle when it came to her.
As I lightly wiped her exposed skin with a damp cloth, I occasionally glanced at the little boy sitting across from me. He was holding onto her hand underneath the blanket. Even though he was trying to be strong for her, he was still just a child at the end of the day and was probably more worried about her than anyone else. It was obvious how much he cared for his mother.
“Your mother is very strong and smart. I’m sure she’ll wake up before you know it.”
He nodded silently, keeping his eyes glued on her as I carefully rubbed the ointment into the bruise on her cheek.
Trying to take his mind off it, even if it was just a little bit, I added, “I can already tell how much your mother adores you. You must be quite a clever boy.”
He nodded again. Without looking up at me, he mumbled, “Ms. Jane is very nice to me.”
I hummed in understanding. I didn’t doubt that one bit. After all, she was someone who bought dinner for her boss every night out of pure goodwill without expecting anything back.
But there was something that I was curious about.
As he looked down at his mother, his eyes held so much tenderness that one would’ve never thought it be possible in such a young child. To any onlooker, it would be obvious that they were mother and child. Yet, his eyes also held a sense of pain and longing, as if she was far out of his reach even though he was sitting right next to her.
I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to ask, but I did anyway.
“Why you call her ‘Ms. Jane’?”