Dirty Little Liars

by Missy Lynn Ryan

  And the last guy, she knew the face without reading the caption below. It was Dean Covington. She didn’t have time to read the entire article so she snapped a couple pictures of it with her cell phone, hoping they would be clear enough to read later, and turned to the last folder in the bunch.

  This one surprised her. It contained a police report for one Terrence Covington III. The name was too familiar to be a coincidence. This man, Terrence Covington, was the son of Dean Covington, her boss. Terrence, the same name of the stranger she had met in Covinton’s law office, the same man who lamented with her over his father troubles at the bar down the street.

  Jules stared at the mug shot in the corner of the report. The smiling face before her was one she knew well. Senator Tyler Chase.

  Chapter 32: Secrets

  Crap. Juliette paced the living room wondering why the world seemed to be imploding around her. How could Tyler Chase be Dean Covington’s son? A devious and corrupt criminal mastermind hiding under the cloak of the law—he was the exact opposite of everything Tyler Chase stood for.

  Or was he?

  How much did she really know about Tyler, AKA, Terrence Covington III? Nothing, except he was criminally good in bed.

  Though he had given her his real name the night they met. He introduced himself as Terrence and she had assumed the fake name was intended to keep the affair as far away as possible from his re-election campaign. But what if he was just trying to be honest?

  Crap. What the hell was she supposed to do now?

  Of course she knew what she needed to do— confront Ty about his past, warn him about his father, and explain the truth about what she was really doing here.

  But what was she doing? Why had Dean inserted her in this mess in the first place?

  Juliette grabbed her phone and dialed Ty’s number before she could talk herself out of it.

  He answered on the fourth ring.

  “Hullo?” His voice was raspy and his breathing heavy. He sounded more than a little distracted.

  She hesitated, “Is this a bad time?”

  There was a muffled thud and then a curse as Ty’s voice drifted away.

  “Hello? Ty?”

  “Sorry, I dropped the phone.”

  “What in the world are you doing?” It was nearing midnight and he sounded winded.

  “Just getting in a workout. I had a little extra energy to burn tonight.”

  Code—I was too annoyed at the thought of Robertson’s chief of staff groping your ass to be able to sleep tonight. See? She could read between the lines too.

  And yet somehow she fell prey to the biggest scam of the century. A U.S. Senator, the son of a notorious con man, running under an entirely fake identity. How did he manage to pull that one off?

  “Jules, you still there?”

  “Yes. I’m here.” Though she wasn’t, not really. Her mind was reeling with unanswered questions. She couldn’t even begin to figure out which to ask first.

  “Did you need something?” Tyler asked.

  “Oh yeah, right.” Come on, Juliette, get it together. “I need to see you.”

  “Really?” His voice perked at the request.

  “Don’t get any thoughts. This is strictly a professional request.”

  “At midnight?”

  ‘It’s time sensitive.”

  “If that’s the case, why don’t you just tell me over the phone? It’d be a lot faster.”

  “This is something we should really do in person.”

  He was quiet for a moment. She pictured the frown on his face, the tight grip on the phone, the questioning look in his eyes. She was tempted to throw caution to the wind and tell him everything then and there. But he spoke again before she could work up the courage.

  “I’ll be there in thirty minutes,” he said and hung up.

  Juliette would have preferred it if they lived in a world where he could teleport instantly into her apartment. Thirty minutes was a long time for her to anxiously deliberate what she was going to say and how she was going to say it.

  By the time the knock came on the door she had washed and dried the few remaining dishes in her sink and traded in the cream chiffon dress for her favorite stretchy black pants and an oversized tee. Her hair and makeup went untouched, so she imagined she looked about as frantic as she felt. Still, she pulled open the door, ready to face the issue head on.

  “Oh,” she let out a yelp of surprise when she saw Winston standing on the other side of the threshold. “What are you doing here?”

  “We need to talk,” he said. Wasn’t that supposed to be her line?

  “Where is Ty? He said he was coming over.”

  “Something else came up.”

  What the hell could come up that was more important than charges of fraud? Although she had to remember, she hadn’t explained to Ty why she needed to speak with him. He didn’t know what was going on and if Winston or Courtney came to him with another urgent matter, it was logical he would deal with the fire closest to him first.

  “What is it?”

  “Doesn’t matter. In fact, it’s better that he not be here for this. He doesn’t want you involved.”

  Juliette stepped aside and Winston came in. He slipped off his shoes in the entryway. How considerate. Then they moved into the dining room and Winston set a hard plastic briefcase on table. It looked like something straight out of a James Bond movie. He entered in a key code and she heard the sigh of the locks releasing. When he lifted the lid she saw a top-of-the-line computer with all the bells and whistles tucked neatly into its own compartment. He clicked the built-in keyboard and the screen came to life.

  “This is the info we pulled from Robertson’s computer,” he began.

  “I know,” Juliette said. “I saw some of this in his printed-off files.”

  “What exactly did you see?”

  “Police records, background checks, photos of surveillance from everyone on the campaign. He’s been following everyone for months. I don’t think he was behind the mugging, but I think he is connected to someone who was.”

  “Like who?”

  Juliette hesitated. How much did he know about Ty’s father? She remembered that Winston had said he and Ty went back a long way. She couldn’t imagine Ty being good enough to keep secrets from his super-hacker best friend.

  “Somehow he’s connected to Dean Covington.”

  In all the time that she had known him, Juliette had never seen Winston look shocked. It was more than a little jarring. He leaned back in the chair, forgetting all about the computer, or whatever else he had intended on telling her.

  “You didn’t know?”

  He shook his head. “This is what you wanted to tell Ty?” he guessed.

  “I thought he should know that the truth of his past might come out in the news now that the election is only a week away.”

  “Shit.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  Winston turned back to the computer and began to type in lines of code. After a few moments the screen changed and she saw a mirrored image of Robertson’s desktop. It was still inactive. Which probably meant that everyone in the Robertson campaign was at home in bed, where she and Winston should be.

  “Do you think he has copies of the information on his computer?” Winston asked.

  “I don’t know. I assumed that’s what you came here to show me.”

  He shook his head. “No, I came here to tell you that your identity has been leaked.”

  Chapter 33: Help From a Hacker

  Juliette gaped at Winston. “My identity was leaked? What the hell does that mean?”

  “It means that I got an alert fifteen minutes ago with your name in it which identified you as the girl in the photo at the motel.”

  “But how is that possible? No one could see my face. The people at the hotel didn’t even have my name. We didn’t even pay for the room we stayed in.”

  “Surveillance cameras.”

  Juliette shook her he
ad. “No way. There were no cameras in that Podunk town. They didn’t even have wireless internet or decent cell phone coverage.” Besides, it was something she would have checked for before deciding to break in.

  “Not at the motel,” Winston said. “Cameras outside the bar where you first met. It appears that though the place is named ‘Off the Record’, that’s not entirely true. There’s an incredible amount of security around the building.”

  Holy hell. She had never thought to check for cameras at the bar because she wasn’t “working” then. She was off the clock. Ty should have caught it, if he was a half decent con man, but maybe he really wasn’t attempting to follow in his father’s footsteps.

  “I’m sorry,” Winston continued. “It was my fault. I secured the surveillance from the Hay Adams hotel, and they are usually so discreet about their regular clientele— but it didn’t occur to me to check outside the bar.”

  “So what? We didn’t go into the bar together. I didn’t even know him then.”

  “It doesn’t matter. They have pictures of you two together, looking a little intimate. They know that you left together and now that they have a name, they can compare every snapshot of you they can find to the photo at the motel. They don’t have to prove it is true, just report it.”

  Juliette wanted to scream in protest. Her name and face would be all over the internet. Major news networks would pick up the story by daybreak.

  “Maybe no one will see it. You said it was just a small blog, right?”

  “It’s already been reposted on two larger blogs. Ty’s gotten at least four calls asking for comments. If they’re calling Ty, they’ll be calling everyone.”

  “How come they’re not calling me?”

  “I put a block on you phone. The only calls ringing through are those verified from me.”

  “You hacked into my phone without asking? What the hell is wrong with you?”

  “A thank you would be nice. I figured you wouldn’t want to deal with a lot of pesky reporters over the next few weeks. Once the election dies down, the calls will likely go away. But for now…”

  A horrible thought occurred to Juliette. “How long have you been spying on me?”

  “Relax, I haven’t said anything to Tyler.”

  “How long?” she demanded.

  “Since the morning I met you.”

  Juliette nearly knocked her chair over as she jumped up. “I cannot believe this.”

  “Believe it.” He stood too so that his brown eyes could better meet her gaze. “And don’t act so haughty. You think I was going to walk in on my candidate having a one night stand and not do everything in my power to make sure the story was contained?”

  “Well you just suck.” Juliette snapped. “If you were any good at your job we wouldn’t be in this mess right now.”

  His face morphed from casual to I just might snap your neck if you poke me with that big long stick one more time in a half a second.

  Fear bubbled up inside her. How well did she actually know Winston?

  She knew that he wasn’t against breaking the law to protect Ty. She knew that Ty was Dean Covington’s son. She knew what Covington would do under the circumstances.

  But what would Ty do? Send his “cleaner” to eliminate the evidence? He could kill her right here, in her own apartment, and eliminate any evidence of murder. They'd label it as suicide. Or natural death. No one would think twice about it.

  Except maybe Mimi and Jean, who knew she was caught up in Covington’s web. Now she was destined to a fate like her parents. Taken down by the very man who took their lives.

  Juliette bent down to pick up her chair and tried to ignore the deadly vibes emitted her way. It took every ounce of courage in her to pull the seat upright and sit down again, but once she did, Winston’s temper began to deflate. He sat down as well, but his hands were still balled into tight fists at the table.

  “I should have remembered the bar surveillance.” He grunted.

  Juliette nodded. “Do you have a plan to contain the story?”

  Winston glanced back at the computer. “It’s not that easy. I can hack into one site, but not six or seven. The story is just going to keep popping up all over the net. And once the major networks get wind, it will explode.”

  “But if they don’t have the video or the photos, the story is dead.”

  “If they are smart, and let’s assume they are since they have held onto this information for a few months, they have the original video housed offline. Which means the only way to access the evidence is to physically destroy it. Plus we can’t do anything that might look unfavorable upon the campaign. It will be obvious to anyone that the only person with something to gain from hacking the site and preventing the story from circulating is Ty. That will most definitely cost us the election.”

  “And the truth about Ty’s father won’t?”

  The room was silent as the two pondered the question. It seemed unlikely. One scandal was bad enough, but they seemed to be piling on the lies faster than quicksand could swallow a flea.

  “Forget about me,” she said. “Let that secret play out. I slept with Ty. More than once. I’m not proud of myself and it looks bad for Ty, but he can survive that. He’s not married. We can create a story that works for the campaign and paints me as the villain if necessary.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “Because I care about Ty. Winning this election means something to him. I don’t want that ruined because of me.”

  “And what about you?”

  “I already told you. I’m a big girl. I can take it. I may even get a few TV interviews out of it, or a book deal. It won’t be the end of the world.”

  “It might be if you don’t come through for Dean Covington. He’s a dangerous man and he doesn’t like to lose.”

  Chapter 34: Confessions

  Her stomach clenched and her breath caught in her throat. That’s right. He had been watching her from the very beginning. He had access to her phone. He would have seen the numbers she called. He would have known that they met at the very building where Ty’s father worked.

  “So you know about that?”

  “Afraid so.”

  “Does Ty know?”

  Winston shook his head. “I didn’t think it was my place to tell him.”

  “Just like it wasn’t your place to tell me that I was sleeping with my boss’s son?”

  “Jules, I think the reason Dean gave you the job in the first place is because you slept with Ty.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let’s just say Dean doesn’t want Ty to succeed in the election. I think he may have set you up as a trap to distract Ty and sabotage his campaign.”

  Juliette laughed. “That’s just silly. Why would his father deliberately use me to keep his son from winning? Wouldn’t he want him to succeed?”

  “Dean and his father have a rocky relationship. Ty’s always trying to be something he’s not. He desperately wants his father’s approval, as does any man. But Dean doesn’t have much faith in his son. Did you know that Ty had an older brother who died on a job in Belize?”

  “No. I mean, I knew Covington had kids, but they were so rarely mentioned in my research, I assumed…I don’t know what I assumed. What happened?”

  “The job went bad; someone on the team betrayed them. There was a shoot-out when the police arrived and he was caught in the crosshairs.” That sounded familiar.

  “He was only twenty-one and good at running a con. He had a lot of his father in him. Ty’s always been the second best. So imagine how hard it is to know that your father believes you to be responsible for your big brother’s death.”

  That sounded like the Dean Covington she had grown to hate. “I had no idea.”

  “Like I said, it’s not common knowledge. I grew up with Ty. We’ve been best friends since we were old enough to know what a best friend was.”

  It certainly explained why he was so protective of Ty. It was mor
e than a job. He was Ty’s family, his real, true family.

  Juliette dropped her head into her hands. “This is all my fault. I should have known I’d make a mess of things.”

  “What? Don’t go blaming yourself. Dean used you. That’s what he does.”

  “I have to tell Ty. He needs to know the truth.”

  “No he doesn’t. Despite what you think and the crazy mess we’ve made of this campaign, you coming into his life was the best thing that has ever happened to him. His father couldn’t have predicted it; he thinks you’re just another pretty distraction for his son. But I knew the moment I saw Ty follow you out of that bedroom that you were different.”

  “I can’t just keep lying to him. Not after knowing all this.”

  “I’m not saying you never tell him, or that he won’t find out eventually. He will. Dean will see to it. But not now. Not tonight. He can’t walk away from this campaign. If he does, his father wins.”

  “Wins what? His pride?”

  “No. We suspect Dean paid someone to assassinate Senator Reis as part of a cover-up to stall a federal investigation into his businesses.”

  “Wait, what?” She tried to process what he was saying.

  “We got Anderson to appoint Tyler to the vacant seat in hopes that we could find enough evidence to connect Dean to the death. But so far…nothing. If Robertson gets elected and we lose the seat, we lose any leverage we have over Dean and he gets away with murder.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “More importantly, it won’t be the last.”