Covered with authority by Edward (6)
I believe the answer is:
plated
'covered' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both to do with contact as well as being past participle verbs.
Perhaps they are linked in a way I don't understand?
'with authority by edward' is the wordplay.
'with' says to put letters next to each other.
'authority by' becomes 'pla' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'edward' becomes 'ted'.
'pla'+'ted' is 'PLATED'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for plated that I've seen before include "Given a metal coating" , "Thinly coated with deposited metal" .)