Your Dark Secrets: A Novel

The flight home is quick and relatively painless, thanks to the first-class ticket on Ovid Blackwell’s dime. I would have taken the company jet, but Mr. Griffin insisted it stay with him in the Bahamas. Something about reducing our carbon footprint by a flight or two.

Peter nearly pitched a fit when he heard I traveled to Illinois for a thirty-six-hour trip, but he got on board when I told him the context: It was do or die for Velvet Eastman; go there or allow all the goodwill we’d been—I’d been—building for her debut to tank before Fashion Week. There was no way we could let Velvet’s trade secrets slip through her fingers and earn her new powerful public enemies before this next chapter even began. Especially when Phinneas’s note directed me to the final night of the weeklong event.

Dusk sets in through the blinds of my apartment. I’m not jet-lagged, but I am exhausted when I cross the threshold. A neighbor’s dog yips erratically, then falls silent. The only outside noise audible from where I lean against my counter is the gentle hum of traffic that soaks the Los Angeles terrain.

I pour myself a glass. Bordeaux. The spiced flavor of currant washes down my throat as if the liquid were an actual massage. I relax. Take a breath after the craziness of the last day and a half. Despite a number of obstacles lately, I’m still managing to do my job—and damn well, at that.

Of course, I did promise a high-ranking police officer that I would find Phinneas’s killer. At the time, my instinct was to promise a scandal-adjacent revelation. I figured that I was already working to get back on top at Ovid Blackwell by uncovering his attacker; why not offer the identity to Mike Wadsworth sometime in the future—when my client needed his silence today? With any luck, the killer will catch wind of Mike’s announcement, too, and start to feel my breath down their neck. Nothing like a little added pressure to make someone fumble their next move.

We’ve been trading texts since I left his Airbnb yesterday morning. When my plane hit the tarmac at LAX, my phone lit up with five new messages, each more urgent than the last. I tried calling him when I got into a town car, but he insisted via text that he couldn’t tell me anything over the phone—that he needed to tell me in person.

Just got back. I’ll come over in a couple hours.

Although my hotel was first-rate in Chicago and I treated myself to a nice dinner for a successful trip, I’m beat. I deserve a little apéritif.

My phone vibrates with another text. This time from Tony Hopkins, the government fawn:

Against my better judgment, I wanted to give you a heads up.

Three dots blink in a quick pattern as I wait for Tony to type out his next message. I take another sip of my Bordeaux. Then:

Councilmember Gaines got clued in this afternoon that Variety is doing a piece on you, and other industry leaders who have had recent scandals – she’s withdrawing her public support of Velvet’s new line. Sorry. The piece should hit tomorrow. Apparently, an anonymous source says you’re more involved in that Redwood murder than anyone has reported. And they shared that you once illegally obtained info for work, which then net you a new corner office. Must be nice.

“Seriously?” I growl. Just what I need—more public scrutiny of me, this time with the added bonus of another setback to Velvet’s integration into the fashion world. Terrific.

Don’t say I never did anything for you. And forget you ever saw me at the Garage in WeHo.

Footsteps climb my porch, followed by a knock at my door. “Addison, it’s me.”

Cracking his knuckles, then shifting his weight to the other foot, Connor peers into the peephole, shaping his head into a strange oblong. Déjà vu washes over me as the wine spools through my core. He looks the same way he did in the hotel hallway in the French Riviera. Anxious. Nervous, like he’s got some bomb to drop on me. As if he’s hiding something.

Is he the anonymous source dishing to Variety? He’s the only person who would care that, years ago, I was awarded an office with a view at his expense. I open the door. “You couldn’t wait?”

He shakes his head, then beckons me onto the porch. “No. I need to show you something.”

Connor drives us down Sunset Boulevard into Beverly Hills. When he valets the Land Rover in the circular driveway of one of the most well-known hotels in the country, I turn to him. “I thought you were more practical than this. You rented a room at the Beverly Hilton?”

A sense of foreboding comes over me as I step onto the buffed curb. This is where the Pharma for Female Gala took place, weeks ago. The event that was meant to be Phinneas’s debut back into society, and instead coincided with his murder.

We enter through a glass door held open by a bellhop like it’s the most natural thing in the world—it is for me, at least—then Connor directs us right, past the deep-red reception and concierge desks through the bustling lobby. Beneath vaulted ceilings, we continue down a sprawling hallway illuminated by teardrop crystal chandeliers, our footsteps rapping a brisk rhythm against dark polished floor that reflects the hem of my jumpsuit. Crowds of tourists and guests that we pass admire the thick, sky-blue drapes framing floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook Wilshire Boulevard and conduct amateur photo shoots while posing on the luxury wraparound settees in the middle of the hall.

Connor turns into an empty conference room—no, ballroom. According to the plaque beside the entrance, the Verdant Glen ballroom features a max capacity of three hundred.

Instead of leading us farther into the rectangular space or to examine one of the paintings on the walls, Connor pauses beside an open book on a lectern. Signatures and brief messages are written across the unlined pages. A guest book.

“Connor, why are we here? The Golden Globes don’t happen until January.” I want to shine a flashlight above his face and interrogate him about his contacts at Variety magazine—but I’m also intrigued by the darty way he keeps stealing glances at me. What is he driving toward?

“All kinds.” I pan a hand across the empty room and its birch hardwood floor. “Anything one wants, probably, with the right number of zeros as payment.”

Connor lifts a finger, then begins flipping backward in the book. One page. Two. Three. “Back when his company was first formed, Phinneas attended a meeting of venture capitalists right here in this very room and discussed it in an early GQ interview. It was here that he convinced his investors to take a chance on him as a freshly graduated pharmaceutical engineer. It was here that board meetings were held for the first five years of the company’s formation while Phinneas was searching for a permanent office space befitting what he thought was his groundbreaking product.”

He continues to flip backward, as if ignoring me. The tome is larger than I realized, its pages thinner than I first thought. “Addison, I searched different European news outlets for any mention of a note at Devon’s hotel crime scene or some object left behind that might incriminate you—but I didn’t find anything. Instead, I went back to Jamie Mendez and thought about why a pickup truck from his entourage might have followed us to Hashim Swartz’s building.”

“What if Hashim was downplaying his true opinion of Phinneas, knowing that Phinneas was murdered? He wouldn’t want word getting around that he actually thought Phinneas was an idiot, draining Thrive, Inc. of its profitability. That’s not a good look for an investor with a potential motive.”

Right. We talked about this. Pop music from the Top 100 blares across this room, not dampened by guests checking in or taking selfies.

“But Hashim’s record stands pretty clean. He’s just a rich expat splitting time between LA and Frankfurt. Mendez, however—he’s got a colorful past. And according to public disclosures of his own campaign contributions during his first and second runs for office, he’s pretty loaded.”

“With possible mob ties,” I note. “So you knew Thrive, Inc. held meetings here and thought you’d ask management if Jamie Mendez and Hashim Swartz ever met.”

Connor shakes his head. He flips almost to the very front of the book, then points to a signature beneath a date. The year 1987 is written in block letters. “Better. I know they have.”

I step to the lectern and recognize Hashim Swartz’s name at the top corner, then a list of other names underneath. Jamie Mendez features near the bottom, above Phinneas’s name.

Connor stands straighter in the glow of the hotel’s ornate light fixtures. “This puts all three of them in the same room at the same time. Hashim Swartz sits on the board of directors of Thrive, Inc., and Jamie Mendez publicly disclosed that Swartz was among the largest donors to support his run for the House of Representatives. The storefront we drove past with the black construction paper on the windows is the business address registered as his campaign headquarters.”

“Wait a minute, wait.” I step back from the lectern. “Mendez has the shady background, I’ll give you that. But would he really kill Phinneas or have him killed if he’s running for a spot in the House? What would be so dire that he’d ruin his political career to get Phinneas murdered?”

A group of housewives in Chanel tweed march down the hall, complaining about lumber cost increases. Connor leans closer to me. “It would make sense if Mendez was bleeding money into a company that he thought Phinneas was tanking. If Phinneas was more of a liability than an asset at this point.”

Connor pouts his lower lip. “Collateral damage, maybe. Devon and Annalise were privy to a business meeting or transaction gone wrong, before Devon hightailed it to Europe to hide out. I also learned that Annalise Meier was a double major at Stanford: English and human rights. She worked for the Human Rights Commission in Hong Kong, in the Wan Chai district. If Phinneas was working with Devon Lim on some kind of app for his new product, and Annalise consulted for Devon, or for them both, to ensure international labor standards were followed, she could have been a direct target of the killer—more than a bystander with bad luck. Or maybe Phinneas confided something to Annalise. After all, she was important enough to frame.”

The group of women doubles back the way they came, laughing. One of them sloshes a drink that stains another woman’s cream skirt. More laughter.

Connor takes a photo of the guest book pages with his phone. “What’s that?”

“Important enough to frame. No one framed her for anything. And we discussed that Phinneas dated Annalise, but not how important she was or wasn’t to him.”

In Phinneas’s office, he had a single framed photo on his bookshelf. An image from college of Phinneas and Annalise. Her cheek, pressed close to Phinneas’s sparse facial hair, as if they were good friends, possibly romantic. Black undyed hair was swept up in a ponytail, while dark brown eyes framed a strong aquiline nose. How could Connor have seen this picture?

Connor shrugs. “It’s just an expression. I’m sure she was significant to Phinneas.”

“She was his girlfriend, a long time ago, though not a business partner,” I continue, focused. “Phinneas made it clear to me how much she meant to him.”

“Someone confessed their more vulnerable feelings to you? That’s a surprise.” Connor’s tone turns acidic. “If Annalise Meier was an old friend—or ex, or whatever—of Phinneas, then she could have introduced Phinneas to Devon, just like you said. Important enough.”

“Really?” He lurches forward. “You lied to me. Two nights ago, Hyacinth Aspen came over to the Airbnb and said she heard Devon telling a woman over the phone that he would be in France. Then you seduced me. You wanted me to forget those details before I connected the dots.”

“You knew exactly where Devon was, the whole time. You let me bust my ass all over Southern California—up to Santa Barbara, then Bel-Air—all the while knowing he was headed to France. You only copped to the information about his French Riviera home when I figured out that his drug arrest was published by the German news outlet.”

“You were the woman on the phone call with Devon that Hyacinth overheard. You’ve been lying to me for weeks. What else are you lying about?”

“Does that make you the only living person, beside his fiancée, who knew Devon’s location, and where to find him?” Connor glares at me, the accusation flung out in the open. As if he already knows the answer to his question.

I draw a shallow breath. “Devon called to tell me he was going to France, it’s true. He wanted to know if he should stay stateside, to vouch for me. There was so much attention and suspicion swirling around me then.”

“Who would do anything for…his publicist?” Connor shakes his head. “Nope, doesn’t sound right to me, either.”

I level him with a stare. “I was acting in my client’s best interest at the time. And you said that Annalise Meier was important enough to frame.”

“I said she was Phinneas’s girlfriend,” I interrupt. “I never mentioned the fact that she was the only framed photo in his office. Only someone who has been there would know that. Not even the media has had access to that part of the crime scene, so there’s no way of knowing without visiting the site. You did work for Phinneas at one point. Did you hold some grudge against him?”

Connor scans the hall of clustered tourists and cushioned benches along the wall.

“That’s right, you have been cursing my name ever since you left Los Angeles.”

“Variety. I just learned I’m being included in a takedown piece by Variety magazine on entertainment industry professionals who have been hit by scandals. You’re the anonymous source for it, who complained I stole info from you for profit. Isn’t that right?”

I’ve got him. Cornered him, after he had the nerve to suggest, yet again, that I might have harmed a client. And still, a sticky feeling of remorse taints the usual glow of winning. Connor was my partner in all this—my lover and my first friend in ages. I don’t usually have friends, not when it comes to my line of work. There’s no loyalty in true ambition.

Connor shakes his head. “I didn’t act as a source against you. To anyone, although I could make my own Wiki page of all the ways you’ve wronged people by this point. No, I’m just another casualty on the long list of people you stepped on to advance.”

“Don’t do that—don’t pretend you’re some victim.” The words I used to scream at my mother tumble from my mouth with ease. New nausea pinches my stomach, but I push on: “You knew Phinneas before any of this happened. You lied to me, Connor. You broke my trust, too. Again.”

I don’t need him. I don’t need anyone. Growing up in poverty and with a neglectful single mother who cared more about garnering sympathy from the neighbors for her ailment of the week than her daughter, I learned that I am truly the only person I can count on. And I am the very best to have in my corner.

“You’re right,” Connor starts. “I didn’t tell you about doing work for Phinneas, because I knew you would jump to this conclusion, that I could be to blame somehow—”

“Oh, I’m not being fair to you? Really? Let me guess. Phinneas owed you money for a job. Sounds like motive for murder to me.”

“Addison, cut that shit out! You can’t just say whatever comes to mind during a homicide investigation—”

“If you’re frustrated with how it’s gone, maybe you only have your terrible professional record to blame!”

He flinches, and I know the cut landed. “Keep singing the same tune, Addison. Your wit is showing.”

I search for the words to twist the knife and be done with this whole charade of parity. Of mutual respect—emotional connection. “Well, you’re just a loose-lipped PI, and now you’re linked to a murder, as far as anyone’s concerned.”

Color drains from his face. “At least I know what it’s like to have people trust me. You’ll never experience that burden because you’re an unlovable opportunist, Addison. No one could ever care for you. You’re only out for yourself. I see that now.”

Laughter carries from the bar past the lobby, contrasting with the sickly tension of the ballroom. I don’t reply. Connor is spot-on about me, yet again. A flush climbs my neck—embarrassment at seeing the only person I’ve cared for in years, on more than a utilitarian level, describe me in such heartless terms.

Am I heartless? I always considered myself pragmatic. But hearing Connor’s ruthless assessment of me, I’m not so sure.

Connor lied to me—for weeks—probably waiting until the right time to strike with this Variety piece. And while it’s not like I opened myself up and tucked the key to my heart in his back pocket, I gave him more of me this time around than I ever thought possible. Only to learn our recent relationship was steeped in dishonesty. On both sides.

Without a backward glance, Connor snakes a path between tourists down the embroidered carpet runner. He takes the corner, toward the main entrance, as my mother’s voice comes to mind: Addison, you spoiled brat. You don’t care about me. You don’t care about anyone but yourself.

I spot a large-brimmed pink sun hat up ahead at the restaurant’s bar. The housewives will have asked the bartender to pop a white wine from a good year. One that will taste crisp and clear. Not the same as the bubbles of victory. But I’ll accept any filter that dulls this sour taste in my mouth.