Tell Me No Lies

by A. V. Geiger

  She took a step in his direction. “It isn’t you,” she said. “I was journaling about Dorian mostly. Dorian and that girl.”

  Eric pressed his lips together in a line. Dorian again… How was it possible that a man he’d never met kept fouling up his life at every turn? He could feel an epic conversation coming on. Eric sank down on the edge of the bed, shifting his weight backward to find a comfortable position. “Yeah, and you thought I was crappy to my fans. Good thing you never started a hashtag called #DorianCromwellObsessed.”

  Tessa didn’t smile back. Oops. He probably should have known better than to tease her about that. “Sorry. Too soon?”

  She wrapped her arms around herself. “It’s not funny. Don’t you feel bad for that girl?”

  “She was stalking him,” Eric said, careful to keep his voice level. “Do you have any idea how freaked out I would be if some fangirl decided to creep around my house and slip notes under the door?”

  “You don’t know what she might have been going through,” Tessa answered. She tapped and swiped at the cell phone screen as she spoke.

  Eric crossed the room and peered over her shoulder. He could almost have laughed at what he saw filling the screen.

  Tessa looked up at him with a question in her eyes, and Eric realized what it was. They weren’t really talking about Dorian and that girl. He cupped her shoulders gently. “You know there’s a big difference between you and Dorian’s stalker fan, right?”

  Tessa shook her head.

  “Erotomanic delusional disorder.” He pronounced the words slowly, enunciating every syllable. “Emphasis on delusional. That girl imagined a relationship with Dorian that didn’t exist.”

  Tessa sniffed. “So I’m the nondelusional type?”

  “No, you’re not a stalker. Period. It’s not celebrity erotomanic whateverness if the celebrity in question is actually in love with you.” He ran his fingers up her neck, cradling her heart-shaped face between his thumbs. “I love you, snowflake,” he whispered. “Remember? This is real.”

  A hint of color blossomed where his fingers brushed her cheeks. At the sight of it, Eric felt something hot and jagged catch in the pit of his stomach. “Come here,” he whispered. He dropped his arms and drew her toward him.

  She stuck out her tongue at him, but she allowed him to gather her against his chest. “You’re annoying.”

  Thawing, Eric thought. Definitely thawing… He broke into a grin and whisper-sang the chorus of the song he’d written for her:

  Just one snowflake.

  She thought that no one cared.

  Perfect snowflake.

  I’ll catch you, don’t be scared…

  He watched with satisfaction as the flush of color crept downward from her collarbone and disappeared beneath the vee of her white T-shirt. “I can’t believe Eric Thorn turned out to be such a cheesebal—”

  But the end of her word was silenced by his kiss.

  This time, it was different. Her reluctance melted away. Tessa went up on her tiptoes to meet his lips and wrapped her arms around his neck to pull him closer.

  It was Eric who broke the kiss first. He searched her face. Her mouth had gone soft and supple, without a trace of tension. Her lips were swollen from where his mouth had left its mark. “Don’t stop,” she whispered without opening her eyes. “Keep going.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She nodded. Eric clenched his arms around her waist. He dipped his head to kiss her again. He could see the bed beckoning behind her. He pressed his hips against hers, and she didn’t resist as he took a tiny step in that direction.

  But Tessa jerked away after a moment.

  “What?” Eric asked, with a gasping breath. “No good?”

  She didn’t answer. Her forehead furrowed as she looked down at the cell phone clutched in her hand.

  Eric heard it then—the sound of the phone vibrating. Tessa showed him the screen, and his eyes landed on a new Snapchat notification.

  But not from the username he expected.

  RealEricThorn

  “What the…” Eric’s eyes narrowed. “What is this?”

  Tessa clicked the Snap open. Eric bent toward the phone, struggling to make out the image against the glare of sunlight streaming through the window.

  He cupped his hand around the screen to shade it, and all the air left his lungs.

  He knew what he was looking at: his own face locked with Tessa’s, framed between a pair of faded curtains. A caption cut across their chests.

  Hey, kids. Nice to see ya. Say cheese!

  Eric swiveled on his heels and bounded toward the drapes, but he was too slow. A sudden burst of light filled the room.

  A camera flash.

  And then another…

  And another…

  And another…

  THE INTERROGATION

  (FRAGMENT 3)

  May 1, 2017, 1:39 p.m.

  Case #75932.394.1

  OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPTION OF POLICE INTERVIEW

  —START PAGE 1—

  INVESTIGATOR: Thank you for sitting down with us, sir. Could you please state your full name and occupation for the record?

  GILROY: The name’s Maurice Oliver Gilroy, but you can call me Maury. I’m the founder and CEO of Gilroy Artist Management, LLC.

  INVESTIGATOR: You’re a talent manager in the music industry. Is that correct?

  GILROY: Bingo.

  INVESTIGATOR: And who are your major clients?

  GILROY: You want a list? I’ve been in the biz for thirty years. Cut my teeth with New Kids on the Block back in the eighties. You remember them, right? Then there were Hanson, Boyzone, 98 Degrees, a couple American Idol losers until I dropped them—

  INVESTIGATOR: Your current clients will suffice.

  GILROY: I’ve managed Eric Thorn exclusively for the past four years.

  INVESTIGATOR: Only Eric Thorn?

  GILROY: He’s a full-time job. Believe me.

  INVESTIGATOR: OK, Mr. Gilroy. We’d like you to take a look at some photographs. From what we can gather, these pictures were taken in the vicinity of Tijuana, Mexico, on or around February 3. Do they look familiar to you?

  GILROY: Sure.

  INVESTIGATOR: Do you know who took them?

  GILROY: I took them myself. Not bad, huh? Might try a second career as a pap if the whole talent management thing doesn’t work out. [laughter]

  INVESTIGATOR: Can you give us a little more context? How exactly did you come to take these photos?

  GILROY: You know how it is. Artists can be a little prickly. Sometimes you need both a carrot and a stick, if you catch my drift.

  INVESTIGATOR: This was the stick?

  GILROY: Eric had a nice vacation, but he needed to get back to work. I took some pictures to make sure he understood that.

  INVESTIGATOR: So you took pictures of him without his knowledge and used them as leverage to force him to resume his public life. Is that your statement?

  GILROY: Well, that doesn’t sound very good, does it? [laughter] Listen, it was for the kid’s own good. He needed to get back to the States before he ended up in real hot water.

  INVESTIGATOR: What kind of hot water?

  GILROY: Look at Dorian Cromwell. Six months in prison for tax evasion. That’s what happens when you don’t have Uncle Maury around to clean up after you. It could’ve gone real ugly for Eric if I hadn’t shown up when I did.

  INVESTIGATOR: And what can you tell us about the woman in the photos—Tessa Hart?

  GILROY: What about her? I think the picture spells it out.

  INVESTIGATOR: For the record, Mr. Gilroy is indicating a photograph of Mr. Thorn and Ms. Hart in a state of undress, apparently kissing.

  GILROY: Don’t worry. I made my presence known before it got too pornographic.

  INVESTIGATOR: Were you aware of the romantic nature of their relationship before these photos were taken?

  GILROY: Sure. Listen, I know everything that goes on in Eric Thorn’s private l
ife. I know it before he does most of the time. That’s my job. I’m out there doing damage control before he even realizes he’s got a problem.

  INVESTIGATOR: So that’s why you went to Tijuana in search of Mr. Thorn? Damage control?

  GILROY: Exactly.

  INVESTIGATOR: And precisely how did you locate him, if I might ask?

  GILROY: You don’t get to be where I am without acquiring a few friends who owe you favors, if you know what I mean.

  INVESTIGATOR: No, I’m afraid I don’t.

  GILROY: Let’s just say the music business is a tight-knit community.

  INVESTIGATOR: Someone in the industry tipped you off?

  GILROY: I have a guy who works in social media for DBA.

  INVESTIGATOR: Dorian Cromwell’s record label? Are you saying that an employee of DBA Records leaked the contents of a private conversation between Mr. Cromwell and Mr. Thorn?

  GILROY: Private? Trust me, Detective. Nothing in this business is private. Not Twitter. Not Snapchat. Nothing.

  INVESTIGATOR: So, for the record, your statement is that you took this series of photos as leverage to coerce Mr. Thorn—

  GILROY: Not coerce. Persuade.

  INVESTIGATOR: Excuse me. To persuade Mr. Thorn to return to the United States. You then orchestrated the terms of his return with both the federal authorities and his record label.

  GILROY: All in a day’s work. I’m what you call the cleanup crew. Ninety percent of my job is keeping Eric’s fans from catching wind of his latest mess.

  INVESTIGATOR: It appears that your cleanup abilities have their limitations.

  GILROY: Really? I would respectfully disagree. [laughter] I mean, the kid fakes his death, breaks his contract, sticks up his middle finger at his label, and still comes out smelling like a rose. More than doubled his Twitter following. Record sales went through the stratosphere. All that, and the feds let him off with a fine! We couldn’t have staged a better PR stunt if we’d tried.

  INVESTIGATOR: That’s all well and good, Mr. Gilroy, but it doesn’t answer why you’re currently being interviewed by a homicide detective.

  GILROY: Homicide? Now wait a minute. Hold your horses. What—

  INVESTIGATOR: When was the last time you spoke with Mr. Thorn?

  GILROY: Who said anything about a murder?

  INVESTIGATOR: And what else can you tell me about Tessa Hart? Her relationship with Mr. Thorn was not made public at the time of his return. Whose decision was that? Yours?

  GILROY: Slow down! Tessa’s not dead, is she? I just saw her.

  INVESTIGATOR: Mr. Gilroy, please answer the question. Why was the relationship between Mr. Thorn and Ms. Hart kept secret?

  GILROY: Don’t look at me! We could’ve spun that. It was Tessa who wanted to keep it all hush-hush.

  INVESTIGATOR: Why?

  GILROY: Have you spoken to her? I thought Eric was paranoid, but Tessa takes the cake. Talk about a match made in heaven.

  INVESTIGATOR: What exactly was she paranoid about?

  GILROY: She didn’t want to be photographed. Kept going on and on about some shady character who might notice her. Some kind of ex-boyfriend, maybe?

  INVESTIGATOR: Did she mention this individual’s name?

  GILROY: I honestly couldn’t tell you. How many stalker exes does she have?

  INVESTIGATOR: So Ms. Hart expressed a wish to keep the relationship private, and Mr. Thorn agreed?

  GILROY: He didn’t agree. There was much wailing and gnashing of the teeth until good old Uncle Maury came up with the perfect solution.

  INVESTIGATOR: Which was?

  GILROY: I told them the best way to hide her was to leave her in plain sight. Play it like she worked for him—like we hired her from the get-go to organize his little mental-health hiatus.

  INVESTIGATOR: A publicist essentially?

  GILROY: Right. Social media consultant. I told her to dress in black and walk five feet behind him in all public appearances. That way, if she wound up in a pap photo, they’d crop her out of the shot. Standard operating procedure.

  9

  SOCIAL MEDIA CONSULTING

  March 3, 2017

  Tessa pressed her back against the rough concrete wall of the rehearsal space, striving to make herself invisible. Could this day get any worse?

  She needed to get out of here. Tessa longed for an empty room. Solitude. Window blinds that shut tight, blocking out the sun.

  But she couldn’t leave. Not yet. Not until she’d snapped the pic.

  Tessa braced her elbow against her side to stop her hand from shaking. “You can do this,” she whispered to herself.

  She knew the drill. She’d spent the past month since her return from Mexico trailing Eric like a shadow through an endless string of celebrity appearances. Press conferences…meet and greets…photo ops… She couldn’t believe the pace he kept. He barely had a moment to himself from the time Maury came to collect him at the crack of dawn each morning to the moment his head hit the pillow at the end of the night.

  Tessa’s own job? Ever-so-slightly less taxing. In theory, she worked as a member of Eric Thorn’s vast PR machine, but she mainly spent her days steering clear of the real publicists…and fending off the panic attacks that threatened whenever she found herself thrust into a crowded room.

  A crowded room like this one.

  Tessa pulled a deep breath into her lungs and held it for a five-count, waiting for her insides to untwist themselves. Today was proving even more anxiety ridden than usual. Eric was slated to perform live tonight at the YouTube Music Awards. His whole team had flown by private jet from LA to Las Vegas this morning. Now, Eric would spend the day here at the MGM Grand Arena, darting in and out of sound checks and dress rehearsals until he took his turn on the red carpet with the rest of the star-studded lineup. Tonight’s performers included every big name on the radio, and that meant Tessa had to contend with the usual pop-star entourage multiplied by what felt like thousands.

  She currently found herself in the basement of the MGM Grand, watching from behind her upraised phone as Eric stepped through tonight’s dance routine. The room reverberated with the sound of the choreographer counting out the beats and the squeak of rubber soles against the floor.

  At least the rehearsal wasn’t open to the camera crews. Tessa’s main goal for today was to keep her face off live TV. That was key. She couldn’t let down her guard. And that wasn’t her old phobia talking—it was a perfectly rational fear. Blair Duncan was still out there somewhere, and he knew that Tessa and Eric were together. No doubt he’d be watching every move that Eric made, scouring each photo for some sign of Tessa’s face.

  The thought of it made Tessa’s heart rate leap. She pressed a hand beneath her rib cage to calm the sensation.

  He won’t show up here, she told herself. Even if he did, he wouldn’t see her. Tessa planned to avoid the red carpet at all costs. No way could she contend with the massive throng of people gathering behind the barricades outside. Once she got through this rehearsal, she planned to escape somewhere quiet. Maybe head upstairs to her hotel room and hide out for the rest of the day with the dead bolt securely fastened.

  It wasn’t like Eric would need anything from her.

  Tessa scowled. Maybe it was all a big mistake, this whole plan to pose as Eric’s publicist. It had seemed like a good idea back when Maury suggested it—or not exactly a good idea, but the best option they had. Eric had been livid at the time, yelling and screaming at Maury to butt out, but Maury had calmly explained to them both that they were in deep trouble. The FBI knew she and Eric had faked the crime. They’d broken several federal laws by staging Eric’s death: planting false evidence…possibly fraud…

  Thank God for Maury. She understood why Eric found his manager annoying, with his high-handed manner and his endless string of corny jokes, but Tessa had taken an instant liking to Maury. She appreciated the way he took charge of the situation. He had a plan to get them out of the whole mess, and he came in person
all the way to Tijuana to rescue them. The only catch was that Eric had to come forward—and Tessa had to pretend that she’d been nothing more than an employee on his payroll the whole time.

  A social media consultant, to be precise. What a joke. At least this so-called “job” had forced her to get over her Twitter phobia. It didn’t feel so scary, logging in to Eric’s account, as long as she could hide behind his celebrity facade. No one could see her after all. None of Eric’s Twitter fans would suspect the real identity of the person they were tweeting. Tessa might have enjoyed herself if Eric’s management let her interact with her fellow fans for real.

  So far, she’d only been allowed to tweet the carefully scripted lines that Maury handed her. She had another one going out later to promote tonight’s appearance, and she’d already saved the message to her drafts. She just needed a picture to illustrate the words.

  If only Eric would look up. He had his eyes on his feet, his face a mask of concentration. She could see him mouthing song lyrics as he stumbled his way through the steps. If she took the photo now, she wouldn’t capture much besides the shape of his latest haircut: short in the back, with a curtain of sweeping bangs to emphasize the squareness of his jaw.

  He hadn’t made eye contact with her once the whole time she was in the room. Tessa frowned. She knew he was busy, but he couldn’t spare three milliseconds to look up at her and wave? When was the last time he’d smiled in her direction? He was always surrounded by other people. Backup dancers. Hairdressers. Fans swarming him for autographs, buzzing around like flies. Tessa couldn’t help but feel like one more annoying pest to him. Not a leech anymore, but not a whole lot higher on the food chain. Maybe more like a mosquito nowadays?

  Eric’s feet flashed across the floor. He had the hardest combo down, and the fangirl in her glowed with pride as she watched his movements gain confidence.

  Tessa bit her lip. She wasn’t being fair. He had so much on his plate… And anyway, the whole plan was for him to pretend like she wasn’t his girlfriend. She was posing as his employee for her own protection—to keep her out of the spotlight. If anyone caught him flirting with her, it would spell disaster. Her face would end up plastered all over the tabloids, and anyone looking for her would know exactly where to find her.