Chapter 8: Just Like Celeste
1728 Words
I stared at the message until the words blurred.
The car moved smoothly through the city, but my stomach felt like it had been left behind outside that mansion with the blood, the police, and Cassian’s hand still burning against my bare shoulder.
The photo was clear.
Too clear.
Me standing beside the car.
Cassian’s jacket wrapped around me.
His hand near my skin.
His face turned toward mine in that dark, unreadable way that made even silence look intimate.
Whoever took it had been close.
Close enough to see the tiredness in my eyes.
Close enough to catch the softness I had not meant to show.
Close enough to turn one dangerous moment into evidence.
My fingers tightened around the phone.
The driver’s eyes flicked to me through the mirror.
“Miss Moreau?”
I locked the screen quickly. “I’m fine.”
Liar.
I was starting to hate that word because Cassian used it too well, and now I could hear it even when he wasn’t around.
My phone buzzed again.
I flinched.
This time it was Tessa.
TEXT ME OR I’M CALLING THE POLICE, GOD, AND YOUR DEADBEAT LANDLORD.
My laugh came out broken.
I typed with shaking fingers.
I’m alive. Coming home now. Don’t panic.
Her reply came instantly.
Too late. I was born panicking.
Then another.
Are you hurt?
I hesitated.
My side throbbed where the knife had nicked me. The cut was shallow, but the fear was not.
Small cut. I’ll explain.
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Appeared again.
Then: I’m making tea and preparing to hate him professionally.
I almost smiled.
Almost.
Then I looked at the unknown message again.
Just like Celeste.
I wanted to delete it.
Instead, I saved it.
Tessa had taught me that fear was not useless if you kept receipts.
By the time the car pulled up outside our building, my body felt heavy with exhaustion. The driver opened the door and waited as if I were someone important.
I stepped out carefully, gathering the torn red silk at my side.
The dress no longer felt like sin.
It felt like proof of a bad decision.
Tessa was waiting in the doorway with a mug in one hand and a kitchen knife in the other.
The driver blinked.
Tessa stared back. “What?”
He said nothing.
Good man.
The second I reached her, she shoved the mug into my hand and inspected me from head to toe.
Her eyes stopped at the tear in the dress.
Then the blood.
Her whole face changed.
“Inside. Now.”
“Tessa—” “Inside before I commit a felony in front of a witness.”
The driver wisely returned to the car.
Our apartment smelled like ginger tea, cheap soap, and home. I had never loved its cracked walls more.
Tessa locked the door behind us, set the knife on the counter, then turned to me.
“Show me.”
“It’s not bad.”
“Alina.”
That tone.
I sighed and moved the dress slightly.
The cut was thin, already drying at the edges. Tessa looked at it, then at me, then closed her eyes like she was asking heaven for patience and maybe bail money.
“A man cut you?”
“It was more of a nick.”
“I asked a yes-or-no question.”
“Yes.”
“And someone was shot?”
“Yes.”
“At the dinner?”
“Yes.”
“Was Cassian involved?”
“Not in the shooting.”
“That is the least comforting sentence you have ever said.”
I sank onto the couch before my knees could betray me.
Tessa went to the bathroom and returned with our cheap first-aid kit. She cleaned the cut with careful hands, muttering under her breath the whole time.
Words like billionaire demon, rich people circus, and I told you so floated around the room.
I deserved all of them.
When she finished, she sat beside me.
“Tell me everything.”
So I did.
The woman in green.
Mara.
Celeste.
The red room.
The silver-haired man.
The lights going out.
The hand over my mouth.
The knife.
Cassian pulling me free.
The gunshot.
The dead man whispering Celeste’s name.
By the time I finished, Tessa’s face had gone completely still.
Not because she had no reaction.
Because she had too many.
Then I showed her the photo.
She took my phone slowly.
Read the message.
And went pale.
“Okay,” she said softly. “This is no longer romance-novel dangerous. This is call-somebody dangerous.”
“I know.”
“Do you? Because your face is doing that thing again.”
“What thing?”
“The thing where you look terrified but also curious.”
I looked away.
She grabbed my chin gently and made me face her.
“No. Look at me. Curiosity gets women killed when powerful men are involved.”
“I know.”
“Do you want out?”
The question settled between us.
Simple.
Heavy.
Do you want out?
I should have said yes.
I should have grabbed the contract, called Elias, demanded release, blocked Cassian’s number, and spent the rest of my life pretending the man in black had never stepped out from behind a red door and looked at me like I was a temptation sent to punish him.
But then I thought of my mother’s payment.
Of Celeste’s photograph.
Of Mara disappearing.
Of the man who died after whispering a dead woman’s name.
Of Cassian’s face when he said, someone I failed.
I thought of his hand hovering near my wound, asking may I before touching me.
I thought of the way his voice had broken when he shouted my name in the dark.
That was the problem.
He was dangerous.
But not simple.
And I had always been ruined by complicated things.
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
Tessa stared at me like I had slapped her.
Then she stood and walked to the kitchen.
“Tessa.”
“No, I need a second before I say something loving but violent.”
I let her have it.
My phone buzzed again.
This time, Cassian.
Are you home?
I stared at the message.
Tessa saw my face from the kitchen.
“Is it him?”
“Yes.”
“Tell him you’re dead to him.”
I typed something else.
Yes.
His reply came a second later.
Lock your door. Do not open for anyone. Elias will send private security to watch the building until morning.
I frowned.
I didn’t ask for guards.
No. You attracted a threat. There’s a difference.
My fingers flew over the screen.
Don’t make me sound like I invited this.
A pause.
Then: You’re right. I chose the wrong word.
I stared.
An apology?
From Cassian Voss?
Not exactly, but close enough to make my pulse stumble.
Another message came.
I’m sorry.
I stopped breathing for one ridiculous second.
Tessa came over and snatched the phone from me.
“Absolutely not. Why are you looking at the screen like he sent you poetry?”
“He said sorry.”
She looked at the phone.
Then at me.
Then back at the phone.
“Huh.”
“Exactly.”
She handed it back reluctantly. “Manipulation can have punctuation.”
I rolled my eyes but smiled a little.
Then Cassian sent one more message.
Tomorrow. Noon. My office. If you still want out, I’ll release you from the contract. If you stay, no more half-truths.
My chest tightened.
No more half-truths.
From him, that felt like a dangerous promise.
I typed: I want to see the red room.
The reply did not come immediately.
One minute passed.
Two.
Tessa leaned over my shoulder. “That was a terrible idea.”
“I know.”
The phone buzzed.
No.
I laughed once. “Of course.”
Then another message appeared.
Not until you understand what it cost the last woman who opened that door.
My smile died.
Tessa read it too.
The room went quiet.
I set the phone down.
“Go shower,” she said softly. “I’ll sleep on the couch.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I know. That’s what makes me loyal and annoying.”
I hugged her before going to the bathroom.
Under the hot water, I finally let myself shake.
Not cry.
Not fully.
Just shake until the night loosened its hands from my throat.
When I came out in pajamas, Tessa was on the couch with a blanket and the kitchen knife on the coffee table.
I paused. “Really?”
“I’m emotionally attached to it now.”
For the first time that night, I laughed properly.
Then we slept.
Or tried to.
At 3:17 a.m., I woke up because someone was singing.
Softly.
Not inside the apartment.
Outside.
Below the window.
A woman’s voice.
Thin.
Sweet.
Wrong.
I sat up slowly.
My heart began to pound.
Tessa was asleep on the couch, one hand near the knife.
The singing continued.
A lullaby.
I didn’t know the words, but the melody crawled over my skin like cold fingers.
I moved to the window and lifted one blind slat.
The street below was mostly empty.
One security car sat near the corner, headlights off.
For a second, I saw nothing.
Then she stepped into the streetlight.
Mara.
The woman from the dinner.
Her green dress was torn.
Her hair was loose.
Blood marked one side of her face.
My breath caught.
She looked up at my window.
Straight at me.
Then she lifted one finger to her lips.
Quiet.
In her other hand, she held something red.
A key card.
My phone buzzed on the table.
Unknown number.
I grabbed it with numb fingers.
The message had no words.
Only a photo.
A red door.
Slightly open.
And inside, written across the wall in black paint, was my name.
ALINA MOREAU Behind me, Tessa woke with a start.
“What is it?”
I turned back to the window.
Mara was gone.
Only the red key card remained on the pavement below, lying under the streetlight like an invitation.
Or a warning.
And then my phone buzzed again.
One final message.
If you want the truth about Celeste, come before Cassian finds out.
- Writer
