Shame on Him

CHAPTER 5

After we got home from searching Richard’s house a few nights ago, I fed Snowball a can of tuna and attempted to give her a bath. I still have scratches up and down my arms and the wet cat didn’t come out from under my bed for a full day. Even dry, she still chooses to hide under there, hissing and growling at me all night long, every single night.

I’m now thinking the name Snowball isn’t very fitting for her.

In between research on Richard Covington and trying to coax the cat out from under my bed without injury, I looked up what I could find on Miles Harper in our alumni directory. It turns out he’s practicing law at my father’s old firm. Since I’m having dinner with my parents this weekend, I figured I’d wait until I’m out that way to try and talk to him.

In the meantime, I decided it was time to start questioning a few people. For the most part, Richard Covington led a pretty normal life. He was raised in an upper-class family, he had no siblings, and there aren’t any living relatives left. He went to school to be a doctor, invented a new type of mechanism for heart catheters, and made billions. He met his wife a few years ago while he was giving a speech at his alma mater. She was a student there, of course. Why should a fifty-five-year-old billionaire marry someone his own age?

According to all of the research I’ve done so far, he was an upstanding citizen and a philanthropist, giving to as many charities as he could. His only downfall was his addiction to porn. Or so said his ex-wife’s Facebook page. The majority of her status messages ever since they separated were along the lines of, “I struggled with this for so long, but it’s finally time to come clean. Richard and I separated because of his addiction to porn.”

I am so glad I didn’t grow up in the land of Facebook. Nothing like airing your dirty laundry for the entire world to see. This just makes her even more of a suspect now in my book.

Since I don’t want anyone knowing what I’m up to, I’m using a fake name and fake reason for all of the questions. I decided a good place to start would be the ex.

“Hello, Mrs. Covington, I’m Lori Wagner. We spoke on the phone the other day?”

Stephanie Covington stands in the doorway of her condo with a cup of tea in her hand and looks at me in confusion for a few moments.

“Oh, that’s right. You’re the reporter,” she says as she nods, holding the door wider. “Come in; I was just making taheebo tea. My herbalist told me I have a sluggish liver. Would you like a cup? Do you have a sluggish liver?”

I have no idea how to respond to this, so I just smile and politely decline as I walk through the doorway.

Stephanie Covington isn’t at all what I pictured when I found out she was thirty years younger than her husband. Well, looks-wise she fits that picture to a T. She’s twenty-five years old and supermodel gorgeous with long blond hair and a chest that has had some help, judging by the way she’s practically spilling out of her skintight red dress.

But to be honest, I imagined she would behave like an elitist, gold-digging child. But when we spoke on the phone, Stephanie was more than happy to answer some of my questions and was extremely polite.

“You’ll have to excuse the mess. I’ve just been too depressed since I heard about Richard to even think about having the maid come by,” Stephanie explains.

I glance around and briefly wonder what this woman thinks is a “mess.” The place is pretty spotless from where I stand.

“I’m so sorry for your loss, Mrs. Covington. As I said on the phone, I just need to ask you a few questions.”

She sits down on the love seat in the sitting room and gestures for me to take a seat across from her on the matching couch.

“Please, call me Stephanie.” She leans over the arm of the love seat and pulls a tissue out of a box, dabbing gently under her eyes. “It’s still such a shock. We had our differences and the divorce wasn’t going very smoothly, but he was still my husband, and I loved him when we married.”

I smile softly at her and give her time to compose herself.

“If you don’t mind me asking, Stephanie, why were you and Mr. Covington separating?”

Aside from the porn addiction.

She sighs and folds her hands in her lap. “It’s the same old story. A few years after we got married, he decided to turn me in for a younger model. I caught him screwing his secretary on his desk. I had decided to surprise him with dinner when he was supposed to be working late.”

Even though I feel bad for Stephanie, she just made herself a prime suspect.

As if reading my mind, she continues. “I know what you’re thinking. I know what everyone is thinking. I killed him in a jealous rage. But Richard and I had been having problems even before I caught him cheating. To put it delicately, Richard had a fondness for pornographic movies. And I’m not just talking a few viewings here and there. I mean, he watched it all the time. Morning, noon, and night. He even took it to the office. I begged him to get help, but he just laughed it off. I told him I would leave him if he didn’t stop and the next thing I know, I’m walking in on him reenacting a scene with another woman. People think I might have killed him because he was trying to stiff me in the divorce. But Richard was worth more alive than he is dead.”

I look at her in confusion. “I’m sorry; I don’t follow.”

“My dearly departed ex didn’t believe in life insurance. He was fifty-five years old and he refused to go to the doctor even for a checkup. And now that he’s gone, his board of directors will take over the shares of his company, because even though he didn’t believe in protecting his life, he made damn sure to protect the only thing he ever loved,” she says bitterly.

Well, there goes that idea.

“Do you know anyone who might have had a grudge against your husband? A business associate or a friend whom he might have wronged?”

“I went over all of this with the detective who stopped by yesterday. Dallas, I think he said his name was. He was so nice—he took me out for drinks,” Stephanie says with a sniffle.

Oh, I’m sure Dallas was very nice at helping you forget by trying to get in your pants.

“Anyway, I just realized that I forgot to tell him last night that he should also question Richard’s old business partner, Andrew Jameson,” Stephanie tells me, crossing her legs and leaning back against the love seat.

Well, at least one good thing came from Dallas being a man whore last night: he was so busy feeding her alcohol and making her “forget,” that I know something he doesn’t.

“I don’t know everything that happened between them, but I know that they didn’t part on the best of terms when Andrew decided to leave the company. Are you going to put all of this in the article you’re writing? I don’t want Andrew to know I’m pointing fingers at him or anything.”

Oops, the article!

“Um, no, don’t worry about that at all. I’ll make sure to keep your name out of it,” I lie.

Stephanie looks relieved at my answer and continues. “I don’t know how many times I heard Richard on the phone with Andrew arguing. Richard was offering him quite a lot of money to buy him out, but Andrew felt like it wasn’t enough. Their arguments were just horrendous. They disrupted my chakras and I just couldn’t seem to get my life force back on track after that. My herbalist had to cleanse my aura three times a week just so I could sleep.”

Oh, my God.

I don’t want to seem rude, but I need to get out of here right away and get to this Andrew Jameson’s house before Dallas finds out about him. Or before Stephanie wants to cleanse my chakras.

“Stephanie, I appreciate you taking the time to speak with me today. I have a prior appointment I need to get to. Would it be okay just to chat on the phone if I have any more questions?” I ask as I rise from the couch.

She walks me to the door. “Absolutely. I’ll do anything I can to help Richard’s killer be brought to justice. If you don’t mind my saying, you seem to have a very gray aura about you, Lori. That usually means you’re troubled by something or you have deep secrets. People with gray auras are usually struggling to find balance.”

Seriously? Is this a joke?

“I’m going to have my herbalist put something together for you. In the meantime, the best cure for a gray aura is love. You should get some love in your life, Lori.”

I thank her without laughing and as she closes the door behind me, I wonder what color her aura is. Is there a color for mentally insane?

Rushing down the stairs, I see a 1965 black Mustang pull into the circular drive and park a few feet behind my car. I’m instantly filled with longing when I see it. I always wanted a car like that when I was a teenager, but my father thought it was impractical. There was a girl in my high school who had a car just like it. She was wild and fun and I wanted to be just like her.

I stop in my tracks and groan when I see who steps out of it. Of course he would own my dream car.

“Well, fancy seeing you here, Lawyer,” Dallas says with a smirk as he saunters around the front of the car and walks up to me. “Are you having fun speaking to someone I already questioned?”

Folding my arms in front of me, I glare at him. “Questioned? Is that what they’re calling it nowadays? Did you come back today to apologize to the widow for getting her drunk and taking advantage of her?”

Dallas leans in close to me. I can feel his breath on my face and see tiny specks of blue in his gray eyes. My heart rate picks up when he leans down and his cheek brushes against my own, and I wonder if he’s going to whisper a secret in my ear. He smells like soap and there’s a tiny hint of cologne mixed in that makes me feel warm all over.

“Careful there, Lawyer.” His lips graze my ear when he speaks quietly. “You almost sound jealous.”

I let out the breath I was holding when he moved in so close to me, noticing he didn’t correct me when I accused him of taking advantage of Stephanie. Taking a step back to gather my wits, I roll my eyes at him. The heat I felt from moments ago disappears into thin air when I see the cocky smile on his face and realize he probably did sleep with her to get the answers to his questions.

“You’re delusional.”

“And you’re in over your head. You can’t handle this case. Go back to your courtroom and stop trying to be something you’re not,” he informs me.

I’m so tired of people assuming they know what I can and can’t handle. All people see when they look at me are three-piece suits and a brain, not someone who can solve a murder and kick Dallas Osborne’s arrogant behind.

“You have no idea what I’m capable of, you smug bastard.”

Shouldering past him, I make it to my car and slam the door closed behind me. I let myself fall apart just a little when I see that Dallas is no longer watching me and is already ringing the doorbell. My hands shake and I swallow past the lump in my throat. All my life someone has been trying to tell me what to do and I’m sick and tired of it. First my parents and now Dallas. I’m tired of being the woman who does as she’s told. And on top of all that, now I have to worry about Dallas informing Ted that I was impersonating someone from the media to get close to a suspect.

Pulling my cell phone out of my purse, I make a call to my secretary at the law firm.

“Candace, I need you to pull up a case the firm handled about ten years ago for the Bay Corporation. I need an address for one of the members of the class-action lawsuit. His name is Andrew Jameson.”

As I wait on the line for Candace to search through the archives on the computer, I try not to think about the fact that I’m doing something illegal right now that could compromise everything I’ve worked for over the last seventeen years. I’m crossing a line.

Candace gets back on the phone and tells me she’ll have to call me back because it’s going to take her a while to find the file, which ends up being perfect.

My next call is to Paige. Right now, her help is equally important.

“I’m coming over. I need to borrow some clothes.”

I ignore her squeal of delight through the phone line and remind myself that I’m doing what I need to do to make it as a private investigator.

Hopefully I don’t regret it.