Tell Me No Lies

by A. V. Geiger

  Eric stuffed his hands in his pockets. Suddenly light-headed, he leaned against the wall beside Tessa’s door. “What’s going on?” he asked. “Has Maury been arrested?”

  “Not yet.” The lead detective cleared his throat. “Suspects Gilroy and Darrow both fled the scene before officers arrived.”

  Eric scuffed his shoe against the floor. “You have enough to charge them, right?”

  “That’s why we need to speak to Tessa.” Morales took a hesitant step forward, holding out the tablet before him like a shield. “We have partial video footage of the incident, but there are still some holes.”

  Video footage…

  Eric swallowed. He’d almost forgotten about that part. Detective Morales pulled something up on the screen and angled it so Eric could see. “The video file was uploaded and tweeted to us last night.”

  Taylor @EricThornSucks

  @911LAPD Tell Tessa I love her. If they hurt her, make them pay. #KeepingWatch #GuardianAngel

  The tweet was followed by the opening frame of a video, and Eric recognized the scene in black and white. His bedroom. His own four-poster bed.

  He didn’t want to see it. He pushed the tablet away.

  “You can’t show that to Tessa,” he said. Talk about a trigger… Blair watching while they both slept. It was enough to give Eric nightmares. He couldn’t imagine what it would do to Tessa’s head. “How did he do it? How did he have a camera in my house?”

  Morales tucked the tablet away. “Your TV had a hidden camera installed in the power panel. When the TV was powered off, it fed surveillance footage to a remote location.”

  “That CIA shit? From Wikileaks?” Eric could feel the color draining from his face. He’d read an article about it back in March. Laptops…TVs… He’d unplugged the microwave in his backstage dressing room, and Maury had laughed in his face.

  “It’s unclear how long the device was in place or how many people had access to the feed.”

  Eric made a fist and pounded it against his thigh. “I knew it. I friggin’ knew it!” He pressed his shoulder blades against the wall for support. His pulse thundered in his ears, and he felt every muscle of his body convulse. His insides loosened, while his chest clenched so tight that he thought he might implode. Was this how Tessa felt when she was panicking?

  “Eric?” Detective Stevens’s voice penetrated from some far-off, foggy place. “Eric, are you listening?”

  He looked up. The lead detective hovered in front of him with his head tipped to one side. “Son, do you need to sit down?”

  Eric shook his head. If this was panic, then he knew what to do. He’d watched Tessa calm herself down a million times. Deep breaths. Count to five. She’d explained to him how she counted people’s names inside her head. Whose names? Did it matter? She hadn’t specified. He couldn’t worry about that now. Any names would do. Eric inhaled slowly, ticking through the mental list of people he’d like to strangle with his bare hands.

  Blair one…Maury two…Clint three…

  “Eric,” the detective interrupted. “The video recording cuts off after a few minutes. We need Tessa to complete her statement.”

  He held a stack of papers. It rustled as he extended it in Eric’s direction. Eric took it, spreading the sheets before him like a fan. His vision blurred at the sight of the black ink swimming across the pages.

  Case #75937.394.1

  OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPTION OF POLICE INTERROGATION

  “These are the relevant sections from the interviews conducted yesterday,” the detective explained.

  Eric let the air out in a rush. It actually helped—the breathing exercise. He felt a little steadier. He let go of the wall and stood up straight.

  He’d be damned before he let them talk to Tessa. Not today. Not with everything else she had on her mind right now.

  He dug his heels into the floor and squared his shoulders, blocking the policemen’s path to Tessa’s door. “You’re not going in that room,” he said, meeting Detective Stevens’s eyes. “But go ahead. Ask your questions. You can talk to me.”

  • • •

  Blair turned sideways in his chair, presenting the stroller mom on the other side of the table with a view of his shoulder. He hated being back here in this overcrowded coffee shop. He thought he’d seen the last of this dump.

  But here he was again. He’d blown every penny he possessed on a remote connection to a hacked big-screen TV—a useless piece of scrap metal that now graced the inside of a police evidence locker.

  What an astronomical waste of money. Blair had actually thought he might be getting somewhere when he stumbled on that DNM posting. Dark net markets were mostly populated by lowlifes selling drugs and fake IDs—but you never knew what you might find lurking in the underbelly of the Internet. Blair had only needed to cough up the cash, and voilà! Like ordering off a menu, only the main course was a peep show into Eric Thorn’s master bedroom.

  The key was to avoid spooking the guy on the other end of the transaction. Blair had made it a point to steer clear of annoying questions. Like, how did you get access to this video feed? And who installed a spy cam in that TV panel to begin with?

  Blair hadn’t asked a thing when he met the seller in March. The guy claimed that Eric Thorn put the hidden camera there himself. Heck, maybe that was true. That asswipe probably used it to record all his sexcapades with his latest fangirl flavor-of-the-month.

  Poor Tessa. She had no idea. Blair didn’t feel a shred of guilt for looking in on her. It was Eric’s fault if he chose to parade around his bedroom in front of a camera every night. Why should it be Blair’s responsibility to look away?

  In any case, it didn’t matter now. It was all over. Blair had tipped off the police to the camera’s presence the moment he directed his first tweet at @911LAPD.

  Taylor @EricThornSucks

  @911LAPD Crime in progress. Send police to 83 Kirkwood Drive in Hollywood! Hurry!

  He’d hesitated before he sent it. He knew he was putting his neck on the line. His finger had hovered over the tweet button, watching and waiting, until he knew with absolute certainty that Tessa was in trouble. Once they threw her on that bed and tied her up, Blair didn’t have a choice. He had to pull the trigger. He couldn’t sit there on his hands and watch the girl he loved get hurt.

  The girl he loved… What a joke.

  What was wrong with him anyway? Maybe he really was delusional, like she’d claimed to those cops in Texas. He probably should cut his losses. They were never getting back together, and Tessa Hart was way more trouble than she was worth. Beautiful, yes. But so incredibly messed up…

  Blair’s head throbbed. He hadn’t slept last night, and he dug the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. He needed to let it go. Forget Tessa. Move on.

  But he couldn’t do that. Not now! Not after the scene he watched unfold yesterday in real time. He still had no way of knowing how she was doing. He’d called the hospital to check, but they would only tell him that her condition was stable.

  At least that meant she was alive.

  Thanks to him, Blair thought. She was damned lucky she had him. Blair couldn’t really regret all the money he’d blown on the surveillance feed. If he hadn’t been keeping an eye on her, no one would have. Certainly not that self-obsessed goon she called a boyfriend. Talk about a dysfunctional romance. He was too busy prancing around in his music videos…or working on his abs.

  Blair sighed. He knew he should let it go, but a part of him still clung to some tiny molecule of hope. Maybe the near-death experience would wake her up. Maybe Tessa would finally see where she belonged. Hadn’t he done enough to prove himself? Hadn’t she tortured him sufficiently? Rejected him. Hid from him. Pushed him off a deck. Gotten him thrown in jail for a week before the police dropped the charges…

  Surely, she would see the truth now. She would figure out who really cared about her.

  With a sniff, Blair clicked onto his camera roll and scrolled through the old photos
. He stopped at random and gave a little start when he saw the picture that came up. Out of all the thousands of images, this one was one of a kind. Not Tessa by herself. She was dancing in a crowd, arm in arm with a group of friends. Happy. Full of laughter. Tessa, the night he met her—before she hid herself away.

  Blair smiled.

  Someday, she would dance with him again. It was only a matter of time. He needed to be patient. Let her come to him. He understood that much about her by now. The more he chased, the more she ran away.

  So he wouldn’t chase any longer, he decided. Tessa knew how to find him. She’d come crawling back into his Twitter mentions one of these days. He’d saved her life after all. The least she could do was thank him.

  Maybe she was tapping those words into her phone right this very instant. Blair wiggled his fingers at the thought and logged on to the Twitter account to check:

  Username: EricThornSucks

  Password: password

  The home screen came up, and his smile faded.

  No new messages. No new notifications. Nothing to do but wait.

  And refresh…

  And refresh…

  And refresh…

  A hand clapped him on the shoulder. Blair shoved the phone into his pocket. Who was bothering him now? Hadn’t anyone in this godforsaken coffee shop heard of privacy? He jerked his shoulder out of range and opened his mouth to snap at whoever had crept up behind him.

  But the words died in his throat. The stroller mom in her yoga outfit gaped from the other side of the table. She grabbed her baby and scurried off, leaving the stroller behind in her haste to get away. Blair grimaced when he realized what must have freaked her out.

  He turned around slowly with his hands raised in the air. Oh great, he thought. Here we go again.

  “Blair Duncan, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law…”

  24

  THE MIND PERCEIVES

  Eric raised his chin, locking eyes with the tall detective. He wondered if he’d overplayed his hand. Was it a crime, blocking Tessa’s door? Obstruction of justice?

  He wouldn’t back down. They’d have to drag him away in handcuffs before he let the girl on the other side of that door face another round of interrogation.

  The detective edged closer. Eric braced, waiting for the order to step aside. Instead, Detective Stevens reached out and patted him on the shoulder. “You’re a good guy, Eric. She’s lucky to have you.” He flipped his notebook open and cleared his throat. “I’ve got more questions for you too as long as we’re here.”

  Not under arrest, then. Eric swallowed, suddenly aware of how dry his mouth had gone. “You’re not going to record me, are you?”

  “We can if you like, but we’d have to take you back down to the station.”

  Eric shook his head. No way. He’d be perfectly happy if he never set foot in a police station again.

  Morales approached and whispered something in his partner’s ear. Detective Stevens nodded. “We’re still nailing down Maury Gilroy’s motive. Can you shed any light on why he brought Dr. Regan to that hotel room the night she died?”

  Questions, Eric thought. Still so many questions, flooding his mind, drowning out his ability to think straight. At least that one he could answer. “Chalet Santé.”

  Detective Stevens cocked an eyebrow.

  “Google it.” Eric pointed to Morales. “There’s a website. Look it up.” He waited for the policeman to pull it up on his tablet. “‘Hit Refresh on your life.’ It’s a treatment center for Internet addiction.”

  Morales nudged his partner, reading from the screen, as Stevens jotted notes. “Ninety-day voluntary lock-in… Secluded setting… No access to electronic devices of any kind…”

  Eric waited for them to catch up, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Maury told Tessa’s mom that she had an Internet addiction! He totally lied to her. He must’ve told Dr. Regan the same story.”

  Detective Stevens stopped writing and squinted at the tip of his pencil. “Why?”

  They still didn’t get it. He wasn’t making sense. Eric pressed his hands against his legs, gathering his scattered thoughts. “Maury was trying to break up Tessa and me. He wanted Dr. Regan to talk Tessa into going to that place. That way she’d disappear. Poof ! No phones. No Twitter. No Snapchat. It would look to me like she totally ghosted!”

  He paused a moment, thinking. It was all starting to make sense. He felt like the truth was right in front of him, just out of reach, like a word on the tip of his tongue that he couldn’t quite remember. “There’s something else,” Eric said slowly. “That DM yesterday. The one from @Snowflake734. Did Maury send that?”

  Detective Stevens met his eyes. “He must have. Who else could have done it?”

  “But how?” Eric asked. “I was so careful. No one could have guessed that password!”

  The lead detective stood silent, tapping his pencil eraser against his chin. It was his partner, Morales, who chimed in. “I could venture a guess. Can I see your phone?”

  Eric glided it out of his pocket in its custom titanium case. He entered his passcode, and then he stared at it with widened eyes. No, he thought. No way… Morales plucked it from his hand, but Eric already knew what the detective would find. “Maury programmed that phone. It came in my swag bag at the YouTube Awards.”

  Morales handed it back to him with an app on the screen that must have been hidden from view until now.

  iMonitor

  “Spy software,” Morales explained. “He had access to every keystroke you made. Your passcode. Passwords to all your accounts. The works.”

  Eric exhaled slowly. He could feel all the blood in his body rushing to his head. His legs had gone rubbery. He needed to sit down, but he couldn’t think about that now. “That’s why,” he whispered. “Maury wasn’t expecting me to show up at the hotel. He thought it would be Tessa. Because that night when I set up the meeting with MET, I was using Tessa’s phone!”

  “You catfished the catfish.” Morales eyed him thoughtfully. “You’re lucky. He might’ve gotten away with it if Tessa had shown up.”

  Detective Stevens frowned. He’d been writing frantically, but he looked up from his notes. “I still don’t understand why Gilroy brought the psychiatrist and the mother into it. If he wanted to get rid of Tessa, all he had to do was get her alone and stage a suicide.”

  Eric closed his eyes. He had a headache coming on. A bad one. He pressed his temples between his hands. He could have lost Tessa so easily—and he never would have known where she had gone. It was too much to process. He sucked in a ragged breath and held it.

  Maury one…Maury two…Maury three…

  Morales answered his partner. “I don’t think Gilroy initially intended to kill anyone. He was hoping Tessa would leave willingly. He said so in the video, didn’t he?”

  Stevens flipped backward in his notebook, searching. “Here. Suspect was asked why he killed Dr. Regan. He responded, quote, ‘That wasn’t supposed to happen. She’d still be alive if she didn’t have such a stick up her ass.’”

  “Dr. Regan must have spoiled his plan somehow.”

  Eric held up a hand. A memory came to him, jarred loose by the cross talk between the two detectives. “Tessa always used to complain about her…how she was so rigid. Always by the book.”

  “Maybe he tried to pay her off, but she insisted on evaluating Tessa herself.”

  That made sense, Eric thought. Obviously, once Dr. Regan talked to Tessa, she would have seen that the so-called “Internet addiction” was a load of BS.

  Detective Stevens scratched his nose. “So he dosed the doctor’s drink with phenobarbital. Only he overdid it. She must have gotten dizzy and hit her head.”

  “And then he had a real mess on his hands,” Morales added. “He needed to pin that dead body on someone. Probably intended to stage it as a murder-suicide then and there.”

  Eric nodded. “Only Tes
sa didn’t show up. I did.”

  “Right,” Morales agreed. “At which point, the whole plan was shot to hell. He had to wait and finish the job on Tessa the next day.”

  Eric gritted his teeth. He could feel the weight of his cell phone in the front pocket of his jeans, pressed against his thigh. He was surprised the detectives had let him keep it. They would probably need it for evidence, and Eric wouldn’t mind handing it over. He never wanted to touch his phone again. In fact, he might be ready to wash his hands of personal electronics altogether.

  “The TV,” he said slowly. “In my bedroom. With the secret camera… Was Maury the one who put it there? Or Blair?”

  Detective Stevens closed his notebook and stuffed it in the pocket of his suit jacket. “We should know more soon. Blair Duncan was picked up by agents this morning for violating federal wiretapping laws.”

  Eric nodded. Good. At least that was one less cyberstalker to worry about.

  “But, Eric, that’s why we need to talk to Tessa. We need to hear from her if she wishes to press charges.”

  “Of course she does. Why wouldn’t she?”

  “Blair Duncan saved her life.” Detective Stevens gestured past him toward the entrance of the room, but Eric didn’t budge.

  “You can’t talk to her,” he said. “Not today.” Not while the biggest question of all remained unanswered.

  • • •

  Tessa woke disoriented. It took her a moment to remember where she was.

  The hospital.

  The baby.

  She pressed her hand to her belly. How long had she been sleeping? Where was everyone? She sat up, but the room was empty. The door was propped open a crack, and she heard voices coming from the other side. Was Eric out there? Who was he talking to?

  “Blair Duncan saved her life…”

  Tessa froze.

  Did she hear that right? Her mouth dropped open, but otherwise, she sat perfectly still as the words reverberated inside her skull.

  She’d been looking at her lap. Her eyes remained fixed in place, but she no longer saw the sheet covering her legs. She couldn’t hear whatever words Eric said in reply. She ceased to follow anything going on around her. She only heard the thrum of her own heartbeat, whispering that name inside her ears.