18. Cassie
— ? —
Cassie
The peace lasts exactly four days.
I’m in the middle of reviewing some notes on new clients when my phone buzzes with an alert from the home security system. Elliot is in a meeting at the office, so I’m home alone, enjoying a rare quiet morning with nothing but coffee and paperwork for company.
I glance at the phone, expecting a delivery notification or maybe a neighbor’s dog triggering the motion sensors again.
Instead, I see Celine.
She’s standing in the middle of the front garden, looking up at the house with an expression I can’t quite read from this angle. She’s dressed better than the last time I saw her, in clean clothes with her hair brushed, but there’s something wild in her posture that sets off alarm bells.
I pull up the full security feed on my laptop.
Celine is walking around the garden now, touching the flowers, trailing her fingers along the hedges like she’s reacquainting herself with a beloved home.
She picks a rose, brings it to her nose, smiles like she’s having a pleasant afternoon stroll through a garden that no longer belongs to her.
She looks up directly at one of the cameras and waves.
The audacity of it makes my blood boil.
I call Elliot.
“She’s here,” I say when he picks up. “Celine. She’s in the front garden.”
“What?” I hear him excuse himself from whatever meeting he was in. “Did you call security?”
“Not yet. She’s not doing anything threatening, exactly. She’s just... wandering around. Touching things. Like she owns the place.”
“She’s trying to provoke you. Waiting for you to come out and confront her so she can cause a scene.”
“I know.” I watch as Celine sits down on one of the garden benches, crosses her legs, and pulls out her phone like she’s settling in for a long wait. “What do I do?”
“Call security. Have them remove her. Don’t engage.”
“But-”
“Cassie.” His voice is firm. “Don’t give her what she wants.”
He’s right. I know he’s right. The smart thing to do would be to call security, have Celine escorted off the property, and forget about the whole thing.
But as I watch her scroll through her phone, completely unbothered by the fact that she’s trespassing on private property, something in me snaps.
I don’t want to be smart. I want to be petty.
“I have a better idea,” I say.
“Why does that worry me?”
“Because you’re a smart man.” I’m already moving toward the mudroom. “Trust me on this one.”
“Cassie-”
“I’ll call you back.”
I hang up before he can argue.
The mudroom contains a lot of things I’ve discovered during my time living here, but the most interesting by far is the irrigation control panel. The system is fully automated, but there’s also a manual override that allows you to activate specific zones on command.
I pull up the garden map on the touchscreen and locate Celine’s current position. She’s sitting right in the middle of Zone 3, surrounded by sprinkler heads on all sides.
Perfect.
I activate Zone 3.
The first sprinkler head goes off about three feet to Celine’s left. The shriek she lets out is audible even through the closed windows, and I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing out loud.
She jumps off the bench, dropping her phone in the grass. The second sprinkler activates behind her, then a third in front of her, creating a triangle of water jets that douses her from every direction.
“What the hell!” Her scream carries across the property. “Turn them off! Turn them off!”
But I don’t turn them off. If anything, I activate more, creating a maze of water that she can’t escape. Every time she dodges one jet, another activates in her path. Her expensive clothes are soaked through in seconds. Her carefully styled hair hangs in dripping tangles around her face.
I move to the front window to watch the show in person.
Celine is thrashing around the garden like she’s being attacked by invisible enemies.
She tries to run for the gate, but the sprinklers along the driveway activate too, cutting off her escape.
She’s trapped in a water prison of her own making, shrieking like the water is acid, flailing and slipping on the now-muddy grass.
She goes down hard, landing on her ass in a puddle of muddy water. The splash sends dirty water arcing up around her, coating her in brown sludge.
I’m laughing so hard tears are streaming down my face.
My phone rings. Elliot.
“What’s happening?” he demands. “I can hear screaming in the background.”
“The sprinklers happened.” I activate another zone just as Celine tries to take shelter under a tree. The resulting shriek is almost musical. “She shouldn’t have come back.”
“You turned the sprinklers on her?”
“I did.”
There’s a long pause. Then: “Is there video?”
“Multiple angles.”
“I want to see it when I get home.”
“I’ll have it queued up.”
I hang up and return my attention to the spectacle outside. Celine has finally managed to make it to the edge of the sprinkler zone, her clothes ruined, her hair plastered to her face, mud covering her from head to toe. She looks like a drowned rat that fell into a chocolate fountain.
I remotely unlock the gate just long enough for her to stumble through it.
She turns back as soon as she’s outside, her face contorted with fury.
“You’re crazy!” she screams at the security camera. “Both of you! You’re absolutely insane!”
I pick up the intercom handset and press the button.
“I warned you what would happen if you came back,” I say, my voice calm and pleasant. “Consider this a reminder.”
“I’ll get you for this! I’ll make you pay!”
“You already said that. It’s getting repetitive.” I pause, savoring the moment. “Oh, and Celine? The next time you trespass on private property, there’ll be a squad car waiting in the driveway instead of a sprinkler. Consider this your one free soaking.”
I release the button, cutting off whatever response she was about to make.
Celine stands there for another moment, shaking with rage, water dripping off her in rivers. Then she turns and squelches away, leaving a trail of muddy footprints on the sidewalk.
I watch until she’s out of sight, then collapse onto the couch, still laughing.
My phone buzzes with a text from Jinny: What the hell is happening? My cousin who lives down the street just sent me a video of a woman screaming in your driveway. Please tell me that’s who I think it is.
I send her a clip from the security footage.
Her response is immediate: THIS IS THE BEST DAY OF MY LIFE. I’M FRAMING THIS.
I’m still laughing when Elliot gets home an hour later. He finds me on the couch with the security footage playing on a loop, tears of mirth streaming down my face.
“You’re enjoying this,” he observes.
“I’m enjoying this very much.” I pat the cushion beside me. “Sit. Watch. Experience joy.”
He sits. He watches. And within thirty seconds, he’s laughing too.
“The part where she falls,” he manages between gasps. “The splash. And then her face-”
“I know. I’ve watched it at least twenty times.”
“We should have this framed.”
“Jinny already claimed that honor.”
He pulls me into his arms, still chuckling. “You’re diabolical.”
“I prefer ‘resourceful.’” I settle against his chest. “She had it coming.”
“She did.” He presses a kiss to the top of my head. “But Cassie, this might make her more determined. More desperate.”
“I know.” I look up at him. “But I’m done being afraid of her, Elliot. I’m done letting her dictate how I live my life. If she wants a war, she can have one. But I’m not going to cower in a corner waiting for her next move.”
“That’s my girl.” His hand slides down my back. “Speaking of next moves...”
“Already?” I laugh. “We just-”
“I’m celebrating.” He shifts, pulling me onto his lap. “You just defeated our enemy with lawn care equipment. That deserves a reward.”
“A reward, huh?” I straddle his thighs, feeling him harden beneath me. “What kind of reward did you have in mind?”
“Let me show you.”
He does.
Right there on the couch, with the security footage still playing in the background, Celine’s distant screams providing an unexpected soundtrack to our celebration.
Afterward, lying tangled together with our clothes scattered across the living room floor, I prop myself up on one elbow and trace patterns on his chest.
“She’s going to escalate,” I say. “This isn’t going to stop her. If anything, it’s going to make her angrier.”
“Probably.” He captures my hand, brings it to his lips. “But whatever she does, we’ll handle it.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true.” He rolls me beneath him, settling between my thighs. “I’ve got you, Cassie. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you. Not Celine, not Charles, not anyone.”
“My hero.” I keep my voice teasing, but I mean it.
“Your partner,” he corrects. “In crime and in life.”
“I like the sound of that.”
“Good.” He leans down to kiss me. “Now, about that reward... I don’t think you’ve been properly rewarded yet.”
I laugh, and for a moment the sound surprises me, light and unguarded.
But even as I lose myself in him again, I can’t quite shake the feeling that Celine isn’t done.
And whatever she does next is going to be worse.
***
Hours later, as we’re finally getting dressed and pretending to be productive adults, my phone buzzes with a text from an unknown number.
You think sprinklers are going to stop me? You have no idea what I’m capable of. Enjoy your happiness while it lasts. - C
I show it to Elliot.
His jaw tightens. “Block her.”
“Already done.” But I can’t help the chill that runs down my spine. “She’s not going to give up, is she?”
“No.” He pulls me into his arms. “But neither are we.”
I let myself sink into him, right there in the wreckage of the morning, and it hits me how strange it is that this is the safe place now.
His chest. His arms. A man I’ve known for a matter of weeks.
I spent five years married to someone and never once felt what I feel standing in this kitchen, half-laughing, watching sprinklers ruin my enemy’s designer heels.
“You’re doing the thing again,” Elliot murmurs.
“What thing?”
“Overthinking. I can hear it.” He tips my chin up so I have to look at him. “Wherever your head just went, come back.”
“I’m here.” And I mean it. That’s the part that scares me and thrills me in equal measure. For once I’m not bracing for the floor to drop out. “I’m right here.”
He kisses me, slow and unhurried, like we have all the time in the world and no one’s life is currently on fire in the front garden. When he pulls back, I’m smiling despite everything.
Then my phone buzzes.
I want to believe him. I want to trust that we can weather whatever Celine throws at us.
But as I stare at the blocked message notification, I can’t shake the feeling that the storm is just beginning.