Chapter Twenty-Four
CHASE
Lyric glares at me.
And it’s only going to get worse.
“You lied about that, too?”
“Just listen, Lyric…” Stylo encourages as she stares at him.
Her breathing is shallow as I continue, “I was in jail for a Class B felony for embezzlement and grand theft against Ego Star Recordings.”
Her head snaps around so fast it reminds me of something from The Exorcist. She stares at me like she’s trying to see me as someone different, like she has no idea who I am right now, and that thought fucking kills me.
“You were in… jail?” she asks me directly this time, but her tone is laced with bitterness.
My chest squeezes. “Yes,” I reply simply, because there’s no way to lessen the blow.
Her entire body slumps as she places her head in her hands. “Oh my God… for how long?”
I hesitate, but then she looks at me like she’s dying inside, and I can’t hold anything else back from her. “Five years.”
“Holy fuck! Who the hell are you, Chase?” she blurts out as I begin to wonder if this was such a good idea after all.
“Baby girl, listen to the whole story,” Stylo offers, placing his hand on her thigh to ease her discomfort.
She sits taller, her watering eyes now focused right on me. She’s ready to hear me talk. That’s got to count for something, so I reach out, grabbing her hand, and by some miracle of grace, she lets me.
I stare right in her big, beautiful doe eyes. “Lyri, the thing about my family is we’re close. Mom, Dad, and I. We’re all we’ve got. I don’t have siblings, and Ego Star Promotions is what defines the Covingtons.”
She narrows her eyes on me. “That doesn’t explain anything, Chase.”
I roll my shoulders, forcing myself to breathe as the weight of what I’m about to say settles deep in my gut. This isn’t easy to talk about. Hell, I’ve never said it out loud to anyone outside my circle, but Lyric deserves the truth. All of it.
My jaw flexes as I look at her. “A while back, Ego Star wasn’t just my father’s company.
He ran it alongside another man, Howie Rockmann.
Howie was the showman, the guy with flair.
He knew how to work a room, charm a client, and keep the party going.
My father? He was the hammer. Cold, controlled, all about structure and power.
They were a hell of a team. Artists loved them.
Labels respected them. That partnership brought in bands from every corner of the world, including Savage Riot. ”
Lyric’s brows draw in slightly, suspicion curling in the crease between them. “Okaaay?” she says, dragging the word like she’s waiting for the catch.
I nod, eyes locking onto hers. “One day, Howie figured out someone was stealing from the company. Embezzling. Not just a couple of bucks here and there, serious cash. He swore he’d find out who it was and make them pay.
He wasn’t the kind of guy who let shit slide, especially when it came to loyalty and trust.”
The pressure in my chest builds as the memory resurfaces.
My throat tightens, but I push forward. “I didn’t know anything was going on until I stayed late one night.
Walked into the office and found my old man hunched over his desk, sweating bullets while placing bets on an underground gambling site. ”
Lyric stills.
My fists clench at my sides. “That’s when it clicked. The missing money. The secrets. The lies. My father… he was the one bleeding the company dry. The same man who always preached control and discipline was fucking everything up behind the scenes to feed his addiction.”
Lyric’s lips part, but no sound comes out.
Her hand drifts up to press against her mouth like she’s trying to process what she’s hearing.
Her eyes glisten, wide and unblinking. The sharp edges of her anger dull for a moment, replaced by something I can’t quite name, shock, maybe even a sliver of sympathy.
I swallow hard, the bitter taste of old shame sitting heavy on my tongue. “I wanted to believe it was a mistake. A one-off… but it wasn’t.”
Her eyes flick to her father, wide with disbelief. “So, he took from the bands? For gambling?”
Stylo lifts a steady hand, urging her to keep listening.
I shift a little closer on the sofa, careful not to crowd her, and she doesn’t pull away. That one subtle act, just letting me be near, sends a wave of tension breaking in my chest.
“My dad took from more than one band,” I admit, my voice low but clear.
“He bled the company dry behind the scenes. But the second I realized it was him, I knew what would happen if Howie found out. If he exposed my father, there’d be no salvaging any of it.
Howie would dismantle Ego Star Promotions, press charges, and everything would come crashing down.
My dad would rot in prison. My mom would lose everything. We’d be humiliated. Homeless.”
I glance away for a moment, dragging in a breath thick with regret before forcing myself to meet Lyric’s gaze again. “I couldn’t do that to her… to my mom. So I stepped up and took the hit. I told everyone that the money trail led back to me. Said I’d been the one skimming.”
Her hand flies to her mouth like she’s trying to hold something in. Her breath catches audibly, eyes glossing over with tears she doesn’t even try to hide. The way she looks at me is as if she’s seeing me for the first time, and it twists something profound in my chest. I almost can’t take it.
But I press forward, needing her to know the rest. “The bands never found out. As far as they knew, it was a clerical mistake, an accounting error. Every cent was paid back, down to the last dollar. I covered it myself, ensuring the artists received what they were owed. Even Ego Star Promotions got repaid for what Dad took.”
I pause, because this part stings. “But it didn’t matter. My name was mud. My rep was shot. I became the guy no one trusted, the one who’d betrayed the business. And I never corrected the record. Not even when it nearly cost me everything.”
Lyric blinks slowly, tears slipping down her cheek. Her chest rises in a tight, stuttered breath, but she doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move. Just watches me, and I see the war behind her eyes, what she thought she knew versus the truth now sitting heavy between us.
She narrows her eyes, confusion racing through her. “W-what do you mean?”
Flaring my nostrils at the memory, I exhale slowly, the weight of it pressing down on my chest. “I was charged, and they put me away for five years.” My voice drops.
“The first year, I kept to myself. Then I met Rip. We were cellmates for three years. He made the place bearable, a funny bastard, even in hell.” I shake my head, my jaw clenching as the memory of my third cellmate comes crashing in.
“After Rip got out, I spent the last year with a guy named Atlas. He was cold, quiet, so fucking calculating and mean in a way that got under your skin. He made Rip look like a ray of sunshine.”
I glance at Lyric. The way she’s gone eerily quiet unsettles me, but I see the tension around her mouth, the emotion flickering in her eyes, so I continue, “Before I went in, I made a promise to myself, to get my old man help. We told my mom everything, and she didn’t hesitate.
She helped keep him in line while I was behind bars.
We locked down his finances, monitored his devices, put systems in place to ensure he didn’t slip.
” I pause, my throat tightening. “We kept the truth buried, held it tight between us. Not to save his pride, but to protect the company…” I take a deep breath.
“To make sure everything he risked didn’t burn to the ground. ”
Lyric sniffles, brushing away a single tear as it rolls down her cheek. My hands twitch at my sides, the urge to reach for her so fierce it nearly undoes me. I want to pull her into my arms, kiss away the pain, tell her she’s safe with me.
But I don’t.
Because I don’t know if she’ll let me or if touching her now will break whatever fragile thread we still have left.
So, I keep going, laying it all out. “While I was locked up, Howie dropped dead from a massive heart attack. Too much booze, too many wild nights had finally caught up with him. The company passed fully to my father, just like that.”
My jaw tightens as I stare ahead, memories I’ve buried crawling back up my spine.
“When I got out, Dad welcomed me back into the business without blinking. No apology. No second thought. Just opened the door like nothing had happened. The company was his now. Ours. But a lot of people at Ego Star Promotions weren’t so quick to forget.
They still thought I was the one who stole from them. ”
I exhale hard, raking a hand through my hair as my voice roughens.
“Some walked out. Others stayed, but they looked at me like I was a stain. I had to prove myself every single day, head down, grinding, taking the heat while my old man played the role of the forgiving hero. The guy who gave his screw-up kid a second chance.”
The resentment still burns like acid in my blood. “Dad got clean. He got sympathy. And I got five years of steel bars, cold concrete, and a felony charge that’ll follow me forever.”
I glance at Lyric, see the shimmer of fresh tears in her eyes as she wipes one away, and I force out a humorless laugh, low and raw. “But that’s what you do for the people you love, right?”
Her bottom lip quivers as her hand comes up, caressing the side of my face. The touch of her hand sends warmth through me—a heat, a spark. I haven’t felt her soothing touch for so long, I’m like a junkie getting a fix.
“You did all that? You took the fall to protect those you love?”