When You Came Back to Me

Chapter 1

As the provincial capital, A City was busy at all hours, its streets choked with traffic.

In the glittering commercial district, fashionable young men and women strolled arm in arm, dressed to look effortlessly cool and confident, as if they were walking a runway. The area was full of aspiring influencers—and more than a few freelance photographers hoping to discover the next one.

A block away stood rows of towering office buildings. Most housed corporate offices, and the men and women hurrying through the streets in shirts and business suits were the exhausted workers heading in for the day.

In an alley just beyond all that wealth and glamour, the dull thud of fists striking flesh rang through the air.

Julian Bennett had just knocked one man to the ground when someone attacked him from behind, kicking him hard enough to send him stumbling.

He spun around and feinted with a punch before driving his foot into the man’s groin. As the man howled, Julian caught a flash of silver from the corner of his eye.

A knife, he thought.

The thin, buzz-cut man, who looked like a walking stick, slashed at him. Julian dodged, kicked the knife from his hand, and gave him a vicious grin.

“That isn’t very sporting, brother.”

He snatched up a fallen length of pipe and brought it down hard against the man’s head.

The other thugs saw their leader and second-in-command lying on the ground and decided to rush him together. Surrounded and outnumbered, Julian took a few hits despite himself.

After dropping the last man, he wiped at his bleeding hand and pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He lit one and smoked slowly, taking his time until only the filter remained. Then he pressed the glowing end into their leader’s arm.

His voice turned cold.

“I don’t care who sent you. Remember this beating. If you come after me again, your injuries won’t stop here.”

The thugs no longer had the strength to cry out. At that moment, every one of them deeply regretted accepting the job.

Their employer had told them to teach Julian a lesson. They were supposed to break one of his legs, and they had been paid handsomely for it. The employer had even warned them that Julian could fight.

At the time, the six of them had thought there was no way they could lose to one person. Surely they weren’t that useless.

If a reporter had interviewed them then, their unanimous answer would have been: regret. They regretted it more than anything.

Julian smoked as he walked home. He already had a pretty good idea who had sent the men after him.

He worked security at a nightclub. The night before, a man had started harassing one of the female customers. Julian had seen it and stepped in. When the warning failed to work, he had resorted to his fists, beating the man until he begged for mercy.

Chapter 2

Julian and another bouncer had dragged him outside and thrown him onto the pavement. The man scrambled to his feet and ran, shouting over his shoulder, “Just wait!”

Julian hadn’t cared.

Back inside, the woman he’d helped thanked him. Blushing, she asked to add him on her messaging app. Julian rejected her without the slightest change in expression.

Seeing that she had no chance, the woman left regretfully. On the way home, she chatted with her friend.

“That guy was so handsome. He has such a clean, gentle-looking face, like he wouldn’t hurt a fly. But when he started fighting, he was terrifying. Oh my God, he completely hit my weakness. It’s a shame he’s so cold.”

Her friend hugged her face and eagerly agreed, both of them looking like lovestruck teenagers.

After Julian watched them leave safely, he found a seat and ordered a drink. The bartender came over and warned him that he shouldn’t have hit that man. The man’s family had money and influence, and Julian would probably have trouble coming his way.

Julian only gave a cold laugh.

“Let him come. I’ll be happy to teach him how to behave.”

As it turned out, several large men had been waiting for him before he even made it home from campus.

Now, standing just outside his building, Julian kept delaying the moment he would go inside. He hadn’t been home in a long time. He didn’t want to face his mother’s hysterics.

But this time, she had claimed she was sick. He couldn’t bring himself to ignore her completely.

Julian had grown up with his mother in one of the most expensive residential communities in the center of A City. Every square foot was worth a fortune. The apartment had been bought for his mother by his biological father, a man who kept her as his mistress.

Julian was an illegitimate child. He knew there was nothing respectable about the circumstances of his birth, and he despised everything about his family.

But fate had never been kind to him.

His father, Richard Bennett, had a legal wife, Margaret Bennett. After giving birth to fraternal twins, Margaret had been left unable to have any more children. Later, doctors discovered that her son, Alexander, had a severe cognitive disability. Margaret’s appearance had also changed after the pregnancy.

Richard had been bitterly disappointed. He grew distant toward his wife and children, then began an affair with his secretary—Vivian Monroe, Julian’s mother.

When Vivian became pregnant after one careless night, she didn’t tell Richard. She hid for several months before showing up at his family home, one hand resting on her swollen belly.

Chapter 3

By coincidence, Margaret was the one who opened the door.

That foolish woman had immediately confronted her, demanding that Margaret divorce Richard.

Margaret was so enraged that she fainted on the spot. The twins, barely two years old, broke free from the housekeeper’s arms and ran over crying for their mother.

Vivian hadn’t expected things to go that far, and she was terrified. The housekeeper shot her a furious look before calling an ambulance.

Richard drove straight to the hospital after receiving the news. By the time he arrived, the housekeeper had already told him everything over the phone.

He stormed toward Vivian, intending to slap her. But when he saw her heavily pregnant, he stopped.

What if the baby was a boy?

He had never gotten over the disappointment of having a disabled son with Margaret.

“I’m never divorcing my wife,” he told Vivian. “You can forget that ridiculous idea. But you can keep the child. If it’s a boy, I’ll make sure you’re taken care of for the rest of your life.”

That was how Richard hid Vivian in a private house under his name. He told Margaret that he had ended the affair and that the baby had been aborted.

In the end, Vivian gave Richard the healthy son he wanted. Afterward, he bought the apartment where she and Julian lived.

Several years later, Margaret learned that Julian existed. By then, there was nothing she could do about it. Her heart had already gone numb, and she no longer fought or demanded anything. All she wanted was to care for her own children.

After Margaret found out about Julian, Richard began bringing him to the family home for dinner once a month.

Julian had been only five the first time. At first, he was delighted. He was happy simply because he finally had a father.

But after going a few times, he began to wonder why his father’s wife wasn’t his mother. Why did the woman who sat beside his father always look at him with such coldness? Why did his brother and sister constantly bully him?

Gradually, Julian learned the truth about his birth.

He began to think of himself as dirty. Whenever he saw Margaret with her two children, guilt twisted inside him.

He went home and demanded to know why his mother had destroyed someone else’s family. Crying, he swore that he would never go to his father’s house again.

Vivian was afraid that if Julian stopped going, Richard would reduce the money he gave her and she would lose the comfortable life she had grown used to. She coaxed and pleaded with Julian to go, but he was stubborn and refused.

So Vivian slapped him hard across the face.

From that day on, the illusion of harmony between mother and son was gone.