Chapter 10: Trauma Ties
Raf & Lili & Casey & Daphne
She checks her phone again. Still nothing. No response.
Ever since their date and that long, electric kiss that left her breathless, she’s been waiting. Waiting for something. A reply. A sign. But every text she’s sent has gone unanswered. Had she misread the signals? Or did he just… not feel the same? She bites her lip, considering. Then dials.
Casey’s phone goes straight to voicemail. She waits for the beep. “Hey, it’s me. Just… wondering if you got my texts. Hope everything’s okay?”
Was he really ghosting her? How dumb was she to believe in the spark of something after just one date? She’s been here before—empty promises from charismatic men. And still, she let herself hope. Guess I’m just that desperate.
She lifts her bag off her desk, eyes sweeping the exposed brick and floor-to-ceiling windows of her office. “Lesson learned,” she mutters as she locks the door behind her.
Outside, her Prada shades catch the glare as she crosses the empty lot, baking beneath the sun. In her monochrome Max Mara blouse and high-waisted trousers, gold Chopard studs glinting in the light, she looks like she took a wrong turn off a fashion shoot.
Then, movement. From the corner of her eye, maybe fifty feet away, a car door swings open. Raf barely registers it as she heads for her own car. Doesn’t see the figure at first. Doesn’t hear the footsteps. Not until—
“Hey!”
Raf turns. A woman barrels toward her—dirty-blonde hair wild in the wash of sun, movements frantic, unhinged. The way she advances sets off a silent alarm.
For a split second, Raf wonders: What the hell? A banshee? A junkie mid-episode?
But the woman doesn’t stop. And in a flash of recognition, Raf freezes. Because the woman in her Chloé dress, clinging in the heat, D&G platforms scuffing the pavement, looks like she doesn’t belong here either.
“Can I help you?” Raf calls out, stiffening as the woman approaches.
The woman lifts her Celine shades. “Are you Rafaella?”
Raf freezes. She knows my name.
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Do you know who I am?”
“No, I’m sorry—”
Raf starts to turn, every instinct screaming. Leave. Now. Get away from this manic stranger in full designer armor.
“Did you really think you could stay hidden forever?”
“I think you have the wrong person.” Raf starts to back away, caught between fight and flight. “I don’t know what you’re talking about—”
The woman doesn’t raise her voice this time—just a low, seething certainty. “You get off on this? Wrecking people’s lives? Playing poor little rich girl while you fuck married men?”
“I don’t—”
“Liar!”
Then, time fractures. The woman lunges, shoving Raf with both hands. She doesn’t register the fall until her ankle twists hard, heel snapping. Then she’s down, body hitting asphalt, palms scraping across the pavement.
“Was he worth it?” the woman spits, stepping closer.
Raf scrambles backward, cowering on the scorching blacktop, heart jackhammering. Does she have a weapon?
“Did he make you feel special? Wanted?”
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Raf shrinks back, still crumpled on the pavement, inching away as the woman closes in. “I don’t know who or what you’re talking about—”
But somewhere, deep inside, the pieces start locking into place.
Casey. This woman—
“I’m his wife, you fucking bitch!”
“Casey…” Her voice thins to almost nothing. “Casey’s your… husband?”
And then she sees it—the full derangement in the woman’s eyes, wild and glassy in the sunlight. Backlit by the sun, she looms over Raf, swallowing her in shadow.
The woman’s voice doesn’t shake. It doesn’t rise. It claims. And Raf realizes… this isn’t just a threat.
“Come near us again, and I’ll kill you. That’s a promise.”
Raf’s heart lurches as she draws in a silent gasp. This is it. This is how I die? Murdered by a scorned wife in Dolce & Gabbana platforms.
But then… the woman turns. Like a mirage, her figure ripples away across the pavement, back to her car. Raf watches, each shallow breath more fragile than the last, as the driver’s door slams shut.
Then, the engine roars to life. Tires screech. Panic seizes her. Oh God—she’s coming for me!
Her heart slams as she braces for the impact, for her body to be shattered and flung like trash across the lot. She sees it: her own death. But at the last second—
The car veers. Barrels out of the parking lot, kicking up a cloud of dust in its wake. Raf stays there, trembling on the blistering pavement, too shaken to notice…
Another car’s in the lot. Parked. Still. Through a cracked, tinted window, the photographer steadies his telephoto lens. He keeps shooting, frame after frame after frame. She’d call it pathetic if she could see herself: crumpled on the ground, blood streaking her dirt-caked hands, dust tangled in her hair.
She staggers to her feet, limbs unsteady, vision swimming. Then fumbles for her phone, smudging the screen with dirt as she dials. It rings once. Twice. Then straight to voicemail. She swallows her panic. Tries him again. And to her shock—
A click, then his voice.
“Raf?”
She hears it instantly, like he hadn’t meant to answer. Like he’s guarding something.
“Casey,” she breathes, barely holding it together. “Please! I need to see you. Now. Can you come to the beach house?”
She hears her own voice, echoing across the empty lot. God, I sound unhinged.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Raf.”
“You owe me that much!” Her voice breaks, too hurt to hide it, too angry to care. “Don’t you dare fucking do this to me!”
“Okay,” he says after a moment, quieter than before, like he’s surrendering.
This is it, she thinks, collapsing into the driver’s seat. This is where everything falls apart.
She floors it. Tires scream against the asphalt, the car fishtailing into the shimmer of heat ahead. And through the dust and glare, the photographer raises his camera…
Then takes one last shot.
By the time she’s home, the sky has turned a bruised gray above the Pacific, waves crashing hard against the shore. She’s paralyzed, staring at the kitchen clock, barely registering the crunch of tires on gravel outside. She catches her reflection in the window and for a split second, Raf sees her again—Casey’s wife. The wild gleam in her eyes. The wind-tangled hair.
A sharp knock jolts her. She turns. Sees him. Casey, just outside the sliding door.
“Come in,” she says, stepping aside.
He enters, eyes sweeping across the high-end interiors, the curated shell of her life. The sanctuary she built. The place her children call home.
“Got here as fast as I could. What’s this about, Raf?”
“I need you to tell me the truth,” she says, barely above a whisper. Like part of her already knows. “Are you married?”
She realizes it as soon as the words leave her mouth. He doesn’t know yet. He doesn’t know that his wife knows.
“Raf—”
“Just say it,” she spits back. “Right now. No more lies.”
His breath hitches, like releasing it might unravel everything. And for a moment, she thinks he might burst into tears. You must be fucking kidding me.
Casey’s eyes hold hers, searching for a way out that doesn’t exist. When he finally speaks, his voice is hollow. “Yes, I am.”
Something buckles inside her, the last of her composure splintering beneath the weight of it all.
“Your wife attacked me outside my office today. She knew my name, Casey. She shoved me. Knocked me down. Do you have any idea what you’ve done to me?”
“I am so, so, so—”
“Don’t! Don’t you dare try to apologize!”
She staggers back a step, like the truth has knocked the air from her lungs, just as her gaze lands on the Murano bowl gleaming on the coffee table. The piece she bought the day she moved into the beach house. Back when the emptiness felt like possibility. A blank space to be filled. A new life waiting to take shape.
She doesn’t even register the impulse—her hand is already closing around it. Then, with a guttural cry, she hurls it to the floor.
Glass explodes, skittering across the tile. Raf watches Casey, numb, the edges of her focus splintering like shards. Until a small voice pulls her back—
“Mommy?”
She turns. Evie stands in the hallway, wide-eyed, trembling. Her lip quivers as she looks between her mom and the man she doesn’t recognize.
“Luca!” Raf cries, her voice cracking. Her son appears instantly, and what she sees in his eyes guts her. It’s not the look of a child.
“Take your sister,” she whispers. She turns from the boy back to Casey—the man who invaded her life—then down at the shattered glass at her feet.
And that’s when the question hits, impossible to ignore. Why? Why did Casey seek her out? Why gain her trust? What did he want? There had to be something more. Without a word, she watches as Luca takes Evie’s hand and leads her down the hall. Then Raf turns back, ready to demand the truth—
But Casey is gone.