Page 26 of Her Property

Cat cringed, her appetite suddenly gone. How could she betray Alfred’s trust like she had? What the hell was wrong with her? Everything had gone sideways since she’d messed up the trial. What she had to do was get back to work. Prove to Alfred that she wasn’t a total screw-up.

And never see Jake again.

The thought was logical, but articulating it in her mind felt like something cinching her lungs, making it difficult to breathe. She knew she could never see Jake again. Of course she couldn’t. Yesterday had just been an incredible, ridiculous, bizarre day. But the disappointment still crushed.

At least disappointment was one thing Cat was used to. Her whole life was filled with disappointment. Her own, when things didn’t go her way in her job. Her clients’, when she had to deliver them bad news. Her parents, when she told them she was never moving back to Ohio.

Cat began clearing her dishes to take back inside, glad that at least the door could be shut on yesterday.

Then a tapping sound echoed across the lake.

Cat froze. There was an extended pause, and then more tapping. Banging, actually.

Sweat formed on Cat’s palms, and she clutched at the dishes so she didn’t drop them.

According to Alfred, on this side of the lake there were only three properties: Alfred’s, Jake’s, and a hobby farm owned by a local woman. It could be the farm, though the only sound she’d heard from there since she’d arrived here was the soft bleating of llamas, and the occasional call for said llama’s from the owner. The farm was also set back from the water, over a rise in the surrounding woods, and she didn’t think she’d be able to hear anything from the farm from here.

The hammering echoed across the water. It had to be Jake.

Cat’s stomach flipped at the thought of him; the way the muscles in his arms would work as he brought the hammer against the poor unsuspecting nail. She wondered if he’d be working up enough of a sweat to come back down to the water this afternoon like last night.

Bam, bam, bam.

Then she remembered Alfred’s words.

Call me the minute you hear anything like working.

She almost laughed at the absurdity of the situation. She couldn’t call Alfred now to tattle on Jake. Not after last night.

But if Jake was violating his stop-work order and Alfred found out she hadn’t stopped him?

Cat lowered the dishes. She’d have to tell Alfred the truth—or at least half of it. And that she wouldn’t be his go-between. Nerves jangled in her stomach as she tried to formulate the words in her head.

Jake’s words from last night echoed in her ear.

You’re a hotshot lawyer, aren’t you?

She’d denied it, but she was a hotshot lawyer. She knew how to defend a case. Even if it meant saying no to her mentor.

“Hi, Alfred,” Cat said when he picked up.

“Catherine. How goes the relaxation?”

Guilt roiled in her belly.

You can do this.

“I still can’t believe you put me in purgatory,” she said, sitting down on the bed. Her resolve was weakening. Something about talking to Alfred made her feel like she was talking to her dad, it always had, though he was nothing like her actual father. Alfred was a big time city lawyer; he drove around Manhattan in a Town car, and in his Porsche Boxster to Lake County. Her dad drove a generic Chrysler sedan and had never stepped foot in New York City.

“Purgatory, is that what they call heaven now?” he asked.

Cat laughed, though the sound was wooden. “How’s the trial going?”

“Nope. We’re not doing this.”

“I’m so sorry, Alfred” she said.

“What, for your screw-up?” Alfred said.

---