Devoted Love, Mr. Hayes’ Darling Wife

Adán Rouco drove back to the Rouco family at a speed of 300 km/h.

It was late and the house was silent. Neither Paulita nor Dante could be seen playing, only the old man was sitting alone on the sofa in the living room, apparently waiting for him.

Adán Rouco enters the house with a hostile step, without even calling the old man, and asks him: “Where have you taken Estrella?

The old man grabs his cane and observes him with his old-fashioned look, his eyes vaguely exasperated by his lack of discipline, “Look how you are now! You don’t have to worry.”

“She is safe with me, too! You got rid of her without a word, and now you are calm, at peace! Have you ever thought what she will think in her heart?”

“Adam Rouco, what’s your attitude? I’m your old man! I’m your father! I’m not dead yet! I’m still in charge of this house!”

Adán Rouco took a deep, cold breath and put his hand to his forehead, containing his anger and anxiety. “You can rule in this house, but do you think it’s proper to throw Estrella out without saying anything? She’s not an outsider, she’s your daughter-in-law! She’s the mother of your granddaughter.”

“Hmph.” The old man stood up with his cane and looked at him, “What are you yelling in the middle of the night, Paulita is sleeping and you want to wake the little girl up so she can hear you arguing with me here?”

Adán Rouco gritted his teeth: “I don’t want to argue with you, just tell me where Estrella is now.”

“If I hadn’t fired Estrella Berrocal on the sly, would you have let me fire her, you son of a bitch? Do you know how serious this is? If I don’t fire her, tomorrow your ungrateful second aunt will have scandals all over the place!”.

Adán Rouco had always ignored how the outside press had given him an axe to grind, when had those characters of the press and irrelevance, afraid to move a muscle, ever put a knife to his neck?

“Okay, I know you want to save face, I’ll give you that, but tell me where Estrella is.”

Mr. Rouco’s eyes slanted and he laughed at the way I was after him, “Adán Rouco, are you on my bad side now? I’m not going to tell you, what do you want? Are you going to burn the house down or tear it down? Or are you going to call the police and say I’ve kidnapped your wife?”

“I don’t mind doing that if that’s what you want me to do.”

“You …! want to do after I tell you where Estrella Berrocal is?” The old man frowned and glared at him.

Adam Rouco gave the old man a cold, sweeping look, but his tone was serious as hell. “Since so many people in La Ciudad Santa can’t see the good in us, I’ll go with her and never come back. I just can’t believe those people can still stick their hand in the air and fight overseas…”

“Good for you…, what about Paulita? What about this family? You don’t care about the group either, do you? You … you’re trying to piss me off!”

The old man raised his cane and tried to rest it on Adam Rouco’s leg, but stopped in mid-air and, after a long pause, pursed his lips, turned his back on him with the cane and said: “I’m not going to tell you where Estrella Berrocal has gone, and I hope you’ll remember that I’m not as cruel as you think I am, to lock Estrella Berrocal up for the sake of The Rouco family and leave Estrella Berrocal where you’ll never see her again, after all she was Paulita’s mother, and it was hard for me when the boy left, but I . ….. did it for her sake after all. For the moment, you can pretend this didn’t happen, I will go on your second aunt’s side, and when your second aunt is appeased, this will pass, and then we can bring Estrella Berrocal back …”

As soon as the old man said that, Adán Rouco scoffed and said, “You have not been so cruel, you just laid out for her all the consequences of everything that had to be done in front of her and then let her choose, you just guessed that she would leave this place of good and evil for The Rouco family, for me and for Paulita. ”

“Dad, I thought you were only hard on her with your mouth and that in the end you wanted her in your heart, I thought the second aunt might push her, that Arella Rouco might push her, even that the second uncle might push her, but I never thought that the person who finally pushed Estrella away from me would be you.”

The old man, his back to him, stood transfixed on his form.

The old man wanted to say he was sorry, but the words got stuck in his throat, and the ones that came out of his mouth were, “Blame me or not, I had to do it for The Rouco Family!”

Adán Rouco’s eyes were stern and cold: “Why didn’t you force her to sign the divorce papers before she left? It’s safer that way, isn’t it?”.

“Adam Rouco, how dare you! Get out of my sight right now!”

“Do you think I would want to come back to you if I didn’t want to know from you where Estrella is going?”

Adán Rouco turned on his long legs and walked away, and when he reached the door, he took a step and said, “By the way, if I never see Estrella Berrocal again in this life, you will never see me again in this life.”

His voice was calm, cold and dry.Property © NôvelDrama.Org.

“Fuck you! You think I want to see you, you bastard?”

“Then I’ll take Paulita with me when the time comes and you won’t want to see Paulita either.”

The old man’s face turned blue with anger and he covered his swollen chest, “You bastard! How dare you!”

But the voice and the figure of Adán Rouco disappeared from the door, leaving only the sound of a rattling engine.

The old man sat slowly, clinging to the couch, resting for a good while, and when his breathing steadied, he suddenly heard a small, clear, milky voice.

“Grandpa!”

Paulita came running downstairs in her little cotton pajamas and slippers.

“Paulita, what are you doing down here, did I wake you up?”

Paulita ran up to him, blinked her big hazel eyes, frowned and asked, “Grandpa, I just heard daddy’s voice, is daddy back?”

“No, you heard wrong.”

“But I heard it clearly… Grandpa and you said he was an asshole, Grandpa, did you scold Dad away?”

Grandfather: “…”

“Nothing, well Paulita, Grandpa is going to put you to bed.”

Paulita took the old man’s hand, the old man had just been so angry that he swayed as he stood up, Paulita wrinkled her little eyebrow and looked at him worriedly, “Grandpa, what’s wrong?”.

“Nothing, I’m probably tired.”

“Then Grandpa, let’s go to bed.”

“Come on, let’s go upstairs to bed, we’re still the sweetest people in this house, Paulita.”

Paulita asked curiously, “Grandpa, if daddy is a bastard, then what is grandpa, a big bastard? Does that make Paulita a little jerk? Little jerks doesn’t sound good, Grandpa, I don’t want to be a little jerk.”

The milk bun looked at the old man with an innocent and inquisitive face.

The corners of the old man’s mouth twitched: “That’s not true, our Paulita is the prettiest, how can she be a little bastard? Grandpa, he’s the one who loves Paulita the most, come in and go to bed.”

The old man thought to himself, “Adam Rouco, that big bastard! If you have the guts, don’t ever come back!