by Nella Tyler
Something was nagging at her — something she’d seen in the want ads. She had passed over it quickly, not taking it seriously. Now, however, it made all the sense in the world.
She scrambled across the bed and sank to the floor, pulling the lamp with her and grabbing the discarded paper. She found it again — and every light in the world couldn’t have been brighter at that exact moment. The ad was offering a secretarial position at the New York City Police Department. It was perfect! Not only would she be protected from Scott and others like him, but she would be a part of helping other women who had come from similar circumstances.
She had her plan; she had her life. She was so excited, she could hardly get to sleep. Even if she couldn’t land that particular job, there had to be others like it. This was a big city. It was now her city.
Chapter 4
Four Years Later
Cole looked at the city from his vantage in the descending jet. He saw it not with the eyes of an excited tourist, but scanned the familiar horizon for the unusual. Was there something or someone out of place? he tried to reason mentally, although he was far too high over New York City to make a valid judgment. He felt like a new recruit, filled with nervous anticipation, his senses on high alert as he considered the enemy waiting below.
He would make the difference; he could feel it in his gut. It wasn’t arrogance that fueled his conviction, but a confidence that he was fresh upon the scene and not war weary. He understood the state-of-the-art weapons and his tactical awareness was newly briefed from headquarters. He was keyed up and ready to go.
Passengers seated nearby saw only a very fit man with a military haircut. He held himself erect, and his features were constantly on the alert. They felt his tension and wondered whether there was a purpose to his being on that plane.
Few people could approach New York City without some sense of apprehension; it was a fabled town with a vivid past. It was the land of territorial immigrants and mobsters, murders and terrorism.
The pilot’s voice came on and announced their approach to LaGuardia, as did the “Fasten Seatbelt” light. The passengers began an anxious chatter. Some were looking forward to meeting friends or family; others were just business travelers, home from another trip.
The voice broke through Cole’s reverie, and like a command he’d just received, he relaxed and began to collect his things. He had arrived at the destination and his mission was about to begin.
* * *
Cole signaled a taxi and requested to be taken to East 20th Street, the main precinct of the New York City Police Department. Just days before, he had finished his last tour of duty with the U.S. Army and was moving on to his next career dream: to be a cop in one of the most dangerous, exciting cities in the world.
Cole was a man who sought out challenges. The opportunities had never been few; growing up with his father had seen to that.
With his military service in his pocket, he had already qualified for the department and now just needed to begin his pre-hire interview. The medical and psychological exams would come later. He felt no anxiety over the process — his military career had seen to that.
The taxi stopped before the entrance to the eight-story building, and Cole paid the toll and stepped out, looking upward and around. He was always aware of his surroundings and checked in at the identification booth before proceeding inside the NYPD building for his appointment.
“Cole Stephens, reporting for my pre-hire interview,” he spoke tersely through the grate of the bulletproof glass separating him from the on-duty officer.
“ID?” The man barely looked up. Cole held up his driver’s license and slid it through the revolving tray in the base of the window. The man looked it over, made some notations on his clipboard, and glanced at the picture and then at Cole before sliding it back. “Third floor, room three-eight-six,” he barked, and Cole grabbed his ID as he heard the lock click.
The interview was brief, and there were several candidates there at the same time. He was seated with a few others and given packets of information for the upcoming interview steps, the next being a medical exam. He had no doubts about that, nor any of the rest of it for that matter. The U.S. Army lost one of their finest when his tour ended.
Cole pulled out the file folder from his briefcase and extracted the information he’d collected regarding short-term housing to get his new address for a form. He wanted to remain fairly mobile until he knew whether he’d made it onto the force.
Before leaving the building, he headed for the small medical unit the NYPD maintained for physicals and other non-emergency treatments. He realized it was considered a secure area as it was a counter behind a wire mesh door. A young woman in her mid-twenties with blondish hair was typing at a computer behind the counter. Cole tapped on the glass of the door and held up his ID and visitor’s pass. Huge brown eyes regarded him, nodded, and buzzed him in.
“May I help you?” she asked, and he instantly recognized a southern inflection in her voice.
“Yes, ma’am. My name is Cole Stephens, and I need to schedule a medical exam as part of my application to join the force.”
“Mr. Stephens, now if you’ll just have a seat over there, please,” she pointed, “and we’ll see when they can schedule you in?”
Cole nodded and sat as indicated, shuffling his folder to straighten his papers repeatedly.
“You a military man, Mr. Stephens?” asked the young woman, nodding toward him.
“Yes, ma’am — that is, I was,” he answered, puzzled.
“Call me Gilda,” she laughed, “and I see lots of you guys in here. I can always tell when one of you is freshly out.”
“Ma’am?”
“Oh, yeah,” she began and stood up to lean over the counter. “That’s the first sign: you address me politely. The next is that you’re shuffling your papers to keep them orderly, and then, well, then, there’s your haircut. That isn’t something you got in a salon,” she added with a grin.
Cole’s hand instantly smoothed his hair and he looked self-conscious.
“Now, don’t worry about that. It looks good on you,” she drawled, and he liked the sound of her voice. His attention, however, was on her full breasts that seemed to flood her shirt onto the counter; the buttons strained from the weight of her. He could feel himself becoming hard and quickly looked away to regain his composure.
Gilda smiled, knowingly. She knew the attraction she drew from men, and those around the precinct knew she was not “easy.” They looked after her like a kid sister. It had afforded her a certain ability to be her natural, comfortable self — a quality many men found flirty and appealing.
“Could I get you to pee in this cup?” Gilda asked Cole, holding a plastic vial.
His head popped upright. “Ma’am?” he asked, unsure he’d heard her correctly. When he saw the urine sample cup, he knew he had. He rose to his feet and with a flushed face, gingerly accepted the cup and followed the direction she pointed.
“Thank you. They’ll need time to check that out. Around here we like to surprise the guys…we call it random. When you’re done with that, you’ll want to leave it on the sink and I’ll see to it. Then I’m going to poke you for some blood.”
Cole acknowledged her instructions with a curt nod as he went into the small bathroom. When he returned, Gilda opened a door behind her and motioned him inside. “Roll up your sleeve,” she told him and picked up the tray with equipment for drawing blood. “So, you want to be a cop?” she asked, making conversation as she normally did. She’d learned that despite bravery under fire, a burly cop could still be afraid of a needle. Cole didn’t seem to have any problem, however. He immediately did as asked: bent his elbow and stoically looked straight ahead. Gilda nodded her approval.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You can call me Gilda. If you work here, you’ll be one of the guys, and they all know me.”
“You didn’t grow up in New York, Gilda?” he said, making it more of a
statement than a question.
“No, you noticed that, did you?” she responded, exaggerating her drawl.
“How did you end up here?” Gilda seated the needle but Cole didn’t even blink.
She hesitated. She wanted the past left where it was and preferred to think of her life in New York City as the beginning. “Came to visit and decided to say,” she offered, withdrawing the needle. “Here, hold this over that, and it should stop bleeding in a few seconds.”
She turned and went about her business. He felt drawn to her for some reason and it was more than the fact that her breasts rested against his arm as she drew the blood. She smelled of lilac, and for a moment, the image of the huge flowering bush in his mother’s backyard came to mind. He felt the momentary softening and instantly drew himself upright. There was no room for sentimentality in his future. In his mind, he was simply trading one army for another and awaiting his orders.
“Well, there you go,” Gilda concluded cheerily as she put a small bandage over the spot. “You’ll get a phone call after these results are in. If everything is fine, they’ll set you up for the remainder of the physical.”
“Any idea how long?” Cole asked. It wasn’t as if it really mattered; he just felt like sticking around a bit longer. She made him feel good.
“Hmm…probably three or four days. Be sure we have a number for you.” She set about tidying up the room.
Cole nodded and turned to go, but had another thought. “Is there a number I can call here?”
She nodded and pressed past him to get to her desk. He smelled the lilacs. “Here you go. This is our card. It rings right here to this phone directly.”
“Thank you…Gilda… An unusual name,” Cole commented.
“My mama watched too many movies,” she answered in what he considered an absolutely charming drawl.
“I like your mother’s taste,” he offered and gave her a short salute before leaving. Gilda finished tidying up the small laboratory room and had a smile on her face as she sat back down at her computer.
Chapter 5
“Mama!” cried Carson, running for his mother’s arms. He leapt upward and she caught him, realizing those days were numbered. He was growing like a weed and before long, she wouldn’t be able to carry him.
“Was he good, Mrs. Crutcher?” she asked.
Mrs. Crutcher looked up from her crocheting. “Yes, yes, as always,” she smiled, the gold cap in the German woman’s teeth gleaming in the light from her lamp. “He is always good,” she affirmed.
Mrs. Crutcher lived a floor above Gilda and Carson in the very modest apartment building Mrs. Crutcher’s husband had bought when they first immigrated to America. Without grandchildren of her own, she was only too glad to watch Carson while Gilda was at work. In return, Gilda helped her keep up the place, scrubbing floors, washing windows, mowing the postage stamp backyard in summer, and so forth. Gilda had become like a daughter to her.
“See you in the morning, Mrs. Crutcher,” Gilda said as she hugged the rotund woman goodnight before she and Carson headed downstairs.
“Macaroni and cheese for dinner, please, Mama?” Carson pleaded, holding her hand down the shallow stairs.
“I think we can manage that,” Gilda laughed as she let them into their apartment with her key. It was a very small, two-bedroom apartment, and the furniture was the odd piece that Gilda had been able to drag home from the Goodwill on the corner. She’d done her best to make a home for them, but things were so expensive in New York City.
Her first year working had gone toward putting together their apartment home. The second had gone to pay for the lawyer who maneuvered through her divorce from Scott. That had been tricky as Scott didn’t want the divorce, and wanted to see her face-to-face. She knew she wouldn’t get a second chance to escape, so she had vehemently refused and operated totally from a post office box relay set up with her girlfriend at home so he couldn’t track her.
Eventually, her lawyer had prevailed when she gave up all rights to child support, alimony, and any property they’d had. Scott didn’t know that she didn’t want anything from him, regardless. Her attorney had bargained down from the maximum in order to appeal to Scott’s sense of having taken advantage of someone.
She made dinner while Carson set the table and turned on his favorite cartoon to watch until it was ready. Gilda went through the mail, sighing at the growing stack of bills. She knew she was going to have to take on a second job to get caught up, but was trying to delay this until Carson was in school come the next September. In the meantime, she paid on her balances and hoped that she’d somehow skate through. She knew she was behind in her rent to Mrs. Crutcher by a month, but the kindly old lady said nothing about it.
Gilda owed her a great deal, not only as a landlord, but as a surrogate mother figure. She had taken Gilda and Carson under wing as her own family, and together, the three of them contributed their individual richness to one another’s lives.
Carson sat next to Gilda on their stiff, shabby sofa and watched the movie To Kill a Mockingbird.
“Mama, why do those people talk funny?” he asked, lifting the crook of her arm to snuggle more closely to her side.
“That’s set in the South, baby… That’s where we’re from.” She loved these times they spent together.
“We are?” There was wonderment in his voice. “Where is the South?”
“Ohhhh, baby, it’s far, far away from here. It’s hot in the summer — so hot that you can’t hardly stand it. The people there move slower, and even talk slower, because it’s so hot and they got to take things easy. Almost everyone lives in houses, not apartments like this. Most of them drive cars or walk, or ride bicycles.”
“Bicy…bicy…”
“Bicycles, baby. Haven’t you seen one of them? Yes, you have, stinker. That’s what the couriers use here in town. Two wheels with a seat on top?”
Carson nodded, his huge brown eyes matching her own. Gilda constantly looked for similarities to Scott in Carson. Almost superstitiously, she thought if he looked something like Scott, he might not act like Scott — not be mean and hateful and drink when he should be working. She wished she could take Scott’s blood right out of him. She wanted him to have a different daddy — maybe somebody like that Cole Stephens who had come in the precinct earlier that day.
Now there’s a real man, Gilda thought to herself. She had liked the way he carried himself, as if he were in charge, even when there was nothing to be in charge of. He was tall enough that Gilda had barely reached his chest, and that, she thought, was broad enough to sleep on. He’d made her feel safe and protected. She truly hoped he’d pass the physical and other tests and become a cop. She loved the idea of feeling truly safe.
“Now, you get going and go brush your teeth,” she playfully slapped Carson on the bottom. “I’ll be in to kiss you goodnight.”
Carson did as asked and Gilda turned down the volume on the movie and pulled out her books. She wanted to become a fully-fledged nurse and was studying through an online class. It was the only way she could think of to make more money so she could look after Carson properly. She allowed Carson a few minutes and then kissed him goodnight and returned to her books.
Scott had never given her a chance to work or to let him see all she was capable of doing. He had preferred her to be submissive and at home, waiting for his return. That had made her all the more determined to find her place in the world in the best way she could for her and Carson’s sakes. Even though Scott was no longer a part of her life, nor could he find her, she continued to be motivated by fear of him.
Gilda knew that the more she added to her own strength, the less power he would have over her — and Carson. She bent over her studies and didn’t turn out the light until the early morning hours.
Chapter 6
Cole entered police headquarters and headed straight for the medical unit. He tapped the glass and Gilda looked up. He noticed that her smile was like the sun’s early rays cl
imbing over the horizon, and it made him feel great.
“How are you this morning, Mr. Stephens?” she asked.
“Haven’t we gotten to the point where you could call me Cole?” he suggested and managed a grin of his own. “After all, you held my urine cup.”
“Oh, don’t be vulgar, big boy; I’ve heard that joke before. I’d like to call you Cole, but I’m not supposed to refer to anyone by their first names here. It’s ‘officer’ or ‘lieutenant.’ You get the idea.”
“Hmm…but I can still call you Gilda?”
“You sure can. In fact, I’d like that. And like you say, I did handle your urine cup,” she added with a laugh.
He rolled his eyes. “Can’t get much worse than that! So, I take it I passed?”
Gilda stifled the smart comeback she had in mind and instead held out a cotton gown. “Third room on the right, it opens in the front. The doc will be right in.”
His face instantly sobered, and he took the gown and went down the hallway. Gilda smiled to herself as she prepared the exam instruments and notified Dr. Keeler that the patient was ready. Dr. Keeler tapped on the room door and pushed it open, Gilda trailing behind.
Cole was sitting on the end of the exam table, the gown open and his manhood clearly in evidence. As he saw Gilda come in, he snapped his hands over himself to shield her view.
“Calm down, Mr. Stephens. This is a nurse, and there’s nothing you’ve got she hasn’t seen before,” muttered Dr. Keeler. Gilda grinned wickedly, and Cole seriously flushed.
“Lay back, Mr. Stephens,” Dr. Keeler instructed, and as Cole began his decline, the cotton gown separated and slid open. Frantically, he tried to hold it together while Gilda stood next to the exam table. Her eyes sparkled as she took his blood pressure, forcing his arm to let go of the gown. Cole focused on the ceiling; he couldn’t bring himself to look Gilda directly in the face.