“I’ll take the same, with the whiskey,” he says, and it’s only a brief extra moment before we’re alone, and he addresses me again. “You don’t drink.”
“I ordered a drink at the bar,” I remind him.
“That you didn’t touch.”
“I was remembering that night,” I say. “Not forgetting it.”
“Most people want to forget nights like that one. Especially those in the spotlight.”
I already did forget, I think, but that’s not what I say. “If I forget that night, I forget the last time I saw her alive. And since she was cremated, that was the last time I saw her at all.”
Our coffees are set down in front of us and this time when the waiter leaves, I get back to what’s important. “Why are you here?”
“You were alone. I thought you might need company.”
“I chose to be alone,” I reply.
“No one chooses to be alone.”
“No one who hasn’t experienced what it’s like to never be alone,” I correct him, and his interest is starting to hit me all kinds of wrong. “Who are you, really?”
“I told you—”
“Who are you, really?” I press, concerned now that he works for my father.
“I don’t work for your father,” he says, as if reading my mind.
“That’s not an answer,” I reply.
“That’s the one you really wanted.”
“Who are you?” I press.
He shifts his weight and reaches into his front pocket before setting a badge on the table that reads “FBI” and now I show a reaction, sucking in air and blowing it out. “I thought an arrest was made on Danielle’s murder?”
“It was, but I’m undercover in the bar investigating other activity outside of your friend’s death. Which is why I was there that night.”
“What else can you tell me about Danielle’s last night?”
“Nothing you don’t know. Well,” he adds, “I might actually know a little more than you know.”
“Meaning what?”
“Were you aware that after you and your boyfriend left the bar, he came back and fought with Drew Ellis in the alleyway?”
No, I think, but I stick to questions, not answers. “Was Danielle there?”
“Yes. She tried to break them up but ultimately stood back and watched.”
“And?” I press.
“They threw a few punches and they must have kissed and made up, because they all went back inside and drank.”
“Even Danielle?”
“Even Danielle,” he confirms.
“Where were you?” I ask, deciding that’s a safe question.
“Watching from the corner of the alleyway right up until they went back inside. I had another pressing issue to attend to that night. I left after that. Were they fighting over you?”
“Drew accused Tobey of being gay.”
He arches a brow. “Did he?”
“Is he?” I ask.
“I wouldn’t know.”
But he does. I see it in his eyes. Tobey is gay and suddenly I need something real in my life, if only for now. “Let’s go to my room,” I say.
“You sure you want to do that?”
“Yes,” I say, because another thing I learned from my father is decisiveness. Make the decision. Act on the decision. Move on. And if this man ever comes at me, he’ll be the man who slept with me and has a vendetta, not the man who was investigating me.
He leans forward, seeming to read my mind. “I can fuck someone and still arrest them. You know that, right?”
“Why would you want to arrest me?”
“If I had my way, every politician that existed would be in jail. I hate them all.”
“Then I think I’m in love or at least in lust.”
He laughs, and it’s a good laugh. A real laugh. I like real. We stand up and I don’t rush as we walk across the lobby. Once we’re in my room, he’s quick to kiss me and push me against the wall. I don’t just let him. I participate with everything I am, what no one ever sees or feels, and most certainly not Tobey. Jake feels different. He feels real. He feels like a man who wants a woman, not a politician that wants a free ride, as I now accept Tobey does.
I sink into the night, into the man, and revel in every naked moment with Jake, every kiss, and touch telling me one thing I need to hear. He’s an FBI agent who wouldn’t want me if he thought I was a killer.
***
I wake the next morning alone, and this time, I’m naked, a point that drives home the fact that I was not the morning after Danielle’s death. If I’d slept with Tobey, surely I would have been. Of course, according to Jake, the FBI agent I did, in fact, sleep with, Tobey went back to the bar after we left. I wonder if he told the police that part of the story. Actually, he must have since Jake knew, or maybe he didn’t. Maybe the FBI knew Tobey lied but it didn’t matter since they captured the killer. Or perhaps, Tobey told them but didn’t want me to know about the fight with Drew, thus he wanted me to believe he was here, and we were having sex. But why? It doesn’t make sense. None of it.
I stand up and walk to the bathroom, and when I reach the sink, I find Jake’s card taped to the glass, though I have no idea where he got tape. I grab it, read the FBI agent formality of his title, and then turn it over to read: Call me if you need me.
I frown, not sure how to take that offer. Why does he think I’ll need him? Well, aside from the obvious reason, I needed him last night, and the fact that it never hurts to have a friend in the FBI. Unless of course, he’s really my father’s friend, and he was paid for last night. Which in premise, means he didn’t care if I was a killer. He just wanted money, and to please the future President of the United States. I grimace and throw the card in the trash.
An hour later, I’ve gone through the motions of normalcy with the skill of someone hired to perform, or in my case, born into that responsibility. I’m dressed in jeans and a black leather waist-length jacket and boots, my hair shiny and my lips painted pink, and I stare down at the card in the trash. I snap it up, unzip my purse and stick it in my wallet. He could be useful in more ways than one. I head to the door, and thirty minutes later, I’m at Drew Ellis’s office building. Fortunately, the security guard is easy to bypass, showing no signs of recognizing me, and with nothing more than a claim to an appointment with his firm, I’m offered the signature log. I sign it, using a fake name of course, and I’m on my way.
After a short elevator ride, I step into a lobby of rich hardwoods and dark brown furnishings to greet the receptionist, the kind of pretty blonde one decorates with, much like my father has my step-mother. “Hi,” I say. “I’m here to see Drew Ellis.”
“Drew?” Her brow furrows. “Are you sure?”
Am I sure? What kind of question is that? I think, but I go with it. “Yes. We’re old friends. I wanted to surprise him.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. You don’t know.”
“Know what?” I ask, trying not to shake the information from her.
“He took a consulting job overseas. He’s in Japan now.”
“Japan,” I say. “I see. Is there a way to get him a message?”
“He’s not working for us and he left no forwarding address.”
“Is there someone here he’s close to that might get him a message?”
“I really can’t give out that kind of information.”
“Of course not,” I say. “Thank you.”
I turn and head for the elevator, pausing long enough to take a photo of the list of associates on the wall.
A half-hour later, I sit down in my room and start calling them, trying to find someone, anyone that can connect me to Drew. I come up dry. Discouraged, I open my purse and dial Jake. “I wondered if you’d call,” he says.
“Why did Drew Ellis leave the country?”
“I wasn’t aware that he did. I told you. I wasn’t on your friend’s case.”
“All right then. Hypothetically. Why would he leave the country?”
“Someone thought he couldn’t be trusted to shut his mouth without extra incentive. In other words, he was threatened or paid off. Because some things, Hailey, are better left alone.”
“Right,” I say, and I don’t ask for details. We both know he’s giving me a message from my father. Leave this alone. I hang up.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
For every action, there is a reaction, my trip to Austin being no exception. I would be punished and who better to punish a daughter than her father?
***
THE PAST…
By six a.m., I’ve already boarded a Washington-bound plane. Once I settle into my seat, I breathe out relief that I have escaped any obvious notice, considering all the recent, local press. I tug away the baseball cap I’ve been wearing, allowing my tucked away hair to fall free, and the pressure on my head to be released.
My lucky streak ends when the flight attendant stops by my seat. “Coffee or juice?” she asks.
I look up and say, “Coffee. Three sweeteners and two creams.”
The minute her eyes meet mine, hers go wide, and I see the recognition in her gaze. “Oh I—of course. Anything else?”
“No, thank you,” I say, as if I don’t realize that she’s noticed me, the real me. “Actually,” I say. “I’m going to nap. Cancel the coffee.” I give her a smile and rest my head on the seat. Now there is no reason for further contact.
Once we’re thirty-thousand feet above land, and I’m on my way home—if I can call anywhere home—I contemplate the sea of sharks and lies threatening my sanity, if not my safety. Tobey is somehow at the core of all of this, and I find myself questioning his character. On that note, being gay isn’t a character flaw. Pretending to be straight to make it to the White House is another story. If it’s true, I suppose I should be hurt, but honestly, I’m not. That in itself tells a story I’ve ignored. Perhaps it’s the way I’ve insulated myself from emotions. Or maybe it’s that Tobey and I just don’t work. In fact, I am not even angry at Tobey, not on this. I used him as he used me. With him by my side, I pretended I wasn’t alone. He was part of my insulation.
If Danielle were in my place though, she would not be as forgiving as me. She had her flaws, but we also had reasons to be loyal to one another. If she was here now and she believed Tobey had used me, she would go at him. He knows this. If Drew told me about Tobey, it’s likely he also told Danielle. The question then becomes: Did that truly make Danielle Tobey’s enemy? Could he kill her? Would he kill her? The “could” portion of this equation feels more important than the “would” at this moment as it’s the prelude to anywhere else my mind might travel.
And where my mind travels is back in time, to a frat party we’d attended together in college. Tobey had always been a star frat boy for this particular organization, but that night a jock named Hensen Rogers, a new recruit who seemed to have it all—money, girls, grades, and a future in politics—decided to mock Tobey in front of an adoring crowd. Tobey had looked at Hensen with absolute murder in his eyes. Later, when Tobey didn’t know I was watching, only that Hensen was not, I’d witnessed Tobey spit in Hensen’s drink.
Certainly spitting in a drink does not make one a killer, but that murderous look mixed with pure hate was terrifying. I’d sensed something in Tobey that night that I never saw again, but it told a story about what was inside of him. Oddly, I think now just as I had back then, Hensen had committed suicide only six months after that party. He’d seemed an unlikely candidate for such a thing. More so now than ever. With those memories, I decide that, yes, I believe that Tobey could kill. Speculation of course, but he had a motive to shut Danielle up before she went public with his sexual orientation.
I frown. If he really is gay.
That uncertainty and the appearance of Jake and his badge tamp down my hypothesis that Tobey was the killer. Jake’s involvement has my father’s fingerprints all over it, but I have to ask myself why my father would protect Tobey. Perhaps to exclude his campaign from the dirtiness of murder but that doesn’t feel right. Tobey isn’t family, but I am, and if I did sleep with Tobey that night, at some point, I put my clothes back on. Which means at some point, I may have left the hotel room again. I may have seen Danielle again.
***
I exit the secure portion of the airport to find Rudolf decked out in his standard blue suit and tie, waiting on me, and why wouldn’t he be? If I’m correct, he had FBI agent Jake Bridges alert him that I was in Austin, soon to be booked on a flight back to Washington. “Let me guess,” I say. “My father wants to see me.”
“You’re very smart for someone so stupid.”
“Are you sure you want to move to a new level of intimacy in our relationship?” I say. “The kind where we speak our minds? Because I have plenty I could say.”
“Let the dead rest in peace,” he replies dryly.
“Funny thing about resting in peace,” I say. “They say the truth will set you free.”
He gives me a deadpan stare, and then says, “We’ll see about that.” He takes my bag. “Let’s go before we get attention I don’t want, even if you do.”
I don’t argue the semantics of who wants attention and who does not. On this, I follow him to the car, thankfully without incident. Rudolf and I don’t flex our new level of intimacy with conversation. We’re silent, and I spend most of the half-hour drive doing word problems in my head, or rather variations of conversations I might have with my father over Austin. By the time we arrive at my father’s mansion, I have about five prepared angles to every which way I think he can hit me; not literally hit me, but as his opponents know well, me included, his words pack a punch.
Rudolf parks in the driveway near the front door as if he’s expecting my rapid departure, which suits me just fine. “He’s in his office,” Rudolf says as I reach for the door.
I don’t reply. I prefer us in silence and as my mother always said, positive reinforcement feeds positive repeat results. My father, of course, never got that memo. I exit the car and walk slowly and deliberately toward the house. A brief moment later, I’m on the porch, skipping the bell. I enter the house, finding the foyer free of people, otherwise known as my fake family or my father’s trophy family. I walk the same path I had before to reach the theater room, but instead of heading down the stairs, I walk up to the private loft-style room that is my father’s office.
I find him sitting behind the heavy walnut of his half-moon-shaped desk, with a window directly behind him, hugged by bookshelves. He stands when I enter. “Shut the door,” he orders, “and sit down.”
I do it because what’s a daughter supposed to do if not obey and respect her father? Once I’m settled in the seat in front of his desk, he sits down, his blue tie resting against a perfectly pressed white shirt. “You had to go to Austin, didn’t you?”
“Yes, actually,” I say. “I did. Because we both know a homeless man didn’t kill her.”
He leans forward. “The police said he did it. Her father accepts that they have the guilty party.”
“If that’s the case, why would you care that I went to Austin to say my goodbyes?”
“She’s not in Austin, or on this planet Earth, daughter. She’s dead,” he says. “She’s gone. Lord fucking knows I know what it’s like to face that fact. I was left with you to take care of and you, Hailey, are supposed to take care of me like I take care of you.” He reaches in a drawer and tosses an 8” x 11” envelope in front of me. “I tried to suppress those, but I failed.”
I’m trained too well to react. I count to three and then reach for it, opening it to remove a photo of me on the street in the process of falling over, then in various awkward poses as I hit the ground. There are shots of me holding my face, my hair. There is a man whose face I can’t see helping me into a car, but based on his build, he’s not Tobey or Drew, well, what I remember of Drew. I’m wearing my dress fro
m debate night, which places the time as the night of Danielle’s disappearance, which must thrill step-mother dearest. The final picture is actually not a picture, but a collection of headlines:
Hailey Monroe, daughter to top presidential candidate, Thomas Frank Monroe, spent the night her best friend was murdered sloppy drunk.
Hailey Monroe, daughter to the widely believed top contender for the presidency, leaves her friend in a bar to die only hours after her father murdered his opponents in a debate.
I don’t read the rest. I shove them back inside the envelope to clarify my thoughts, at least some of them. I was on the right track on the plane. My father isn’t protecting Tobey. He’s protecting me, or rather himself and his candidacy. “Who really killed Danielle?”
He stands up and presses his hands to the desk. “They have the man that killed her,” he repeats. “What I didn’t want was for them to know that you let it happen while you were on a binger.”
My fingers curl on the arms of the chair. “I didn’t do that,” I hiss, and in that moment, I believe it. I didn’t. I wouldn’t.
“Didn’t you?” he demands, and he doesn’t give me time to reply. “The school threatened to pull your entrance into the law program,” he announces.
I stand up. “I’m going to Stanford anyway.”
“Stanford? You’re not going to Stanford on my dime. I convinced Georgetown that you’ll be entering a rehab counseling program and staying off the radar until next fall when you begin classes.”
“I wasn’t drunk,” I bite out, anger coming at me hard and fast. “I was drugged. What part of that do you not understand?”
“Like you were drugged the night your mother died?”
“Yes,” I breathe out. “Exactly.”
“Do you have a drug dealer that follows you around, and then decides randomly when to ruin my life on your behalf?”
I feel those words like a slap and physically take a step back, managing to tumble back into my chair. “What do you want me to do? Give an interview? Talk to the press?”
A Perfect Lie Page 12
