Private Lives Part 63

'Can she prove anything?' he asked, a low, considered malevolence about his question that made her feel chill.

'She found Amy's laptop in the vault.'

'What?' he spat. 'You stupid woman! You were supposed to keep it safe.'

'It was safe,' protested Helen. 'There are only two people who have access to that room: myself and Larry Donovan. And even if Larry found it, he was hardly going to know who Amy Hart was.'

'You were careless,' he roared.

How dare he suggest that? Helen felt her hands shaking and tucked them under her arms. She hated the way Simon was looking at her. No one ever made her feel stupid, no one. And yet the thin, disdainful line of her boyfriend's mouth cut her to the core.

'What does she know exactly?'

Everything, she thought. She knows everything.

'She knows about Amy's affair with Peter,' she said. 'She knows she was blackmailing him. She knows that the Dallincourt senior executives, including Peter Rees, were aware that they had botched a repair job at the rig and that it was highly dangerous for it to keep operating.'

'And the rest?' said Simon. 'Does she know about Peter's involvement with Doug Faulks?'

Helen nodded.

's.h.i.t.'

Helen turned away and took a deep breath, fighting to control her emotions, wondering where it had all gone wrong. She knew, of course. When Simon had asked her to bury the story of Amy Hart's inquest, Helen had hesitated. The quickest way of doing it was to use a big, big story to push everything else out of the headlines. And as the final day of the inquest coincided with the Sam Charles injunction return date, she knew she had the perfect opportunity to help Simon. It would mean sacrificing the best interests of a wealthy and high-profile client and breaking every code of professional conduct. But Simon had been persuasive, in the bedroom and out of it rea.s.suring Helen that he would make it worth her while, that he would send millions of pounds of legal work her way from his roster of powerful international companies. And it was hard to say no to someone you were in love with.

'I can't believe it,' said Simon, pacing up and down the terrace. 'Why didn't you just destroy the b.l.o.o.d.y computer?'

'You know why,' she said, watching his face. She didn't need to spell it out. She had kept it as insurance. When you were dealing with men who thought nothing of sacrificing lives like p.a.w.ns in a chess game, sometimes you needed your own leverage.

'Did they kill her, Simon?' she asked suddenly. It was a question she had not dared ask when Simon had pleaded with her to help him.

'I don't know,' he replied, not looking at her. 'It's not my problem.'

She stepped forward and grabbed on to his arm.

'But it is is our problem, Simon,' she said. 'I need to know everything if I'm going to work out what we can do next.' our problem, Simon,' she said. 'I need to know everything if I'm going to work out what we can do next.'

He shrugged her off.

'Nothing is ever a problem,' he said, his eyes cold. 'Not if you are prepared to do what it takes to fix it.'

He stomped back into the house and slammed the door. When he was gone, Helen sank to her knees, covering her mouth with her hand. It's all over, everything is gone, she thought desperately. My life is at an end. For a moment she gave into it, letting the fear and the despair wash over her, consume her.

But she was Helen Pierce. Helen Pierce did not give in to anything for long. And so, slowly, she pulled herself to her feet. Simon was right. You had to be prepared to do what was needed to fix things. She walked back into the house and picked up her phone.

'Peter,' she said, trying to keep her voice even. 'It's Helen Pierce.'

A warm breeze fluttered through the trees as Helen descended the stone steps into the sunken garden in Bloomsbury. She had been surprised when Peter Rees had suggested meeting here, because she had thought she was one of the few people in London who knew about it. Years earlier, when she had lived in a large apartment behind UCL, she had come to this hidden oasis often. It had been her private sanctuary, a place to clear her head. I could do with a little of that today, she thought, walking along the gravel path.

It was not yet 10 a.m. and, as she had expected, the green s.p.a.ce was almost deserted. Just a man walking his dog and two young lovers entwined on a bench who looked as if they had been up all night partying and were loath to leave each other even now. She wondered if they felt as tired as she did. She'd left Seaways immediately after her argument with Simon, arriving home at 2 a.m., and had lain awake, turning things over in her mind, until the sunlight cut across the ceiling.

Across the garden, Helen could see a slim, silver-haired man sitting on a bench, one long leg crossed over the other. She had only met Peter Rees once before, introduced by Simon, of course, but even at this distance she could tell it was him.

'So, the cat's out of the bag?' he said with a small smile as she sat down next to him. 'I don't suppose it's in my interests to sue you for professional negligence.' His expression lacked the anger that Simon had displayed the night before. Instead he seemed sad, worn down. He looked up and tapped Helen's knee; almost a paternal, rea.s.suring gesture.

'In a way, I think I'm glad that this has got out.'

'Glad?' said Helen.

'You can keep the headlines out of the newspapers, but you can't hide the truth from yourself,' he said quietly. 'It's not been easy living with what has happened. I loved Amy, you know, in my way. She made me feel young, clever, handsome, and that doesn't happen much these days, let me tell you.'

'But you couldn't commit to her?'

Peter held his hands open.

'I couldn't give her what she wanted from me. My children would never have forgiven me.'

Helen swallowed, then looked at Peter.

'Amy didn't just fall down the stairs, did she?'

He didn't speak for several seconds.

'A few weeks before it happened, we'd gone out dancing. Ridiculous for an old fart like me, but like I say, she made me feel young. I'd had too much brandy and got sentimental. I told her about Doug Faulks's suicide well, not everything, but I was drunk, unhappy. I told her I blamed myself.' He snorted. 'In vino veritas, eh? I blamed myself because it was was my fault.' my fault.'

'But how did that lead to her death?'

Peter shook his head, remembering.

'I was stupid. Amy used to stay in the Bloomsbury flat I use during the week and I left my computer on. She'd been putting pressure on me to leave my wife and she obviously thought she might find something about Doug on the laptop, something she could use to force my hand. She did. She found the Atlanticana report and copied it.'

Peter looked at Helen, his eyes red.

'She was a clever girl, Amy. People thought she was an airhead, but she had enough intelligence to connect the engineering faults in the rig with Doug's death. So she threatened me, told me she'd blow the whistle on us; she had that do-or-die mentality.'

'What did you do?' asked Helen, already knowing the answer, but needing to hear it.

'What could I do? I told James Swann about her. Everyone goes to James with their problems. I thought he was just going to pay her off, maybe threaten her. But two days later she was dead.'

'You think James had her killed?'

Peter rubbed at his eye with the heel of his hand.

'He said he'd dealt with her. I guess he did.'

Helen looked away from him, watching the man with the dog, wishing she was back at Seaways the afternoon before Anna Kennedy had called. In Simon's arms, their bodies entwined, no worries or fears.

'So are you glad you know now, Miss Pierce?' asked Peter. 'I'm a.s.suming that's why you never asked before. Because your conscience couldn't deal with it.'

Helen didn't answer. She didn't need to.

The first time she had met Peter, he was a steely and vital man, but now he looked pale, weak, as if the life force had been drained out of him.

'I should confess,' he said quietly. 'Give the newspapers a little bite to their story, eh?'

'Don't be ridiculous,' said Helen, a little too loud.

Peter's expression was one of pure resignation.

'It's what I want,' he said wearily. 'I don't want to live like this.'

'But why?' said Helen pa.s.sionately. 'Amy's dead and yes, I know you loved her, but throwing yourself to the wolves won't bring her back.'

'I killed Amy and I killed Doug. Not with my own bare hands, but I might as well have.'

'Doug committed suicide,' said Helen plainly.

Peter sat back on the bench, his head tilted towards the milky sky. 'We knew the rig was unsafe,' he said softly. 'Half the board of Dallincourt knew. We'd completed a repair job but the materials used were compromised.'

'Cost-cutting?'

He nodded.

'We didn't know at the time that they wouldn't be up to the job, but when the senior engineer gave us some projections and said we'd need to go back down and strengthen the work we'd done, well, we took a chance to leave it. It was all about profit, Helen. We wanted to spin off the engineering arm of the company, and a multi-million-pound repair job would have affected the bottom line and our projected sale price.'

A tear ran down his cheek.

'Doug was CEO of Pogex Oil. They owned the Atlanticana rig. He was my friend.' Peter sighed. 'When Atlanticana exploded, we panicked.'

'Who's we?'

'Myself. Malcolm Wainwright, the Dallincourt CEO. James Swann, a major shareholder in both Dallincourt and Pogex. We went to see Simon Cooper at Auckland Communications, who handled corporate publicity for Dallincourt and Pogex. He said the best way to hide Dallincourt's culpability was to blame Pogex Oil. As Pogex was another client of his, he wanted to miminise corporate reputation damage, but he was prepared to sacrifice a senior-level executive. He said we should create a fall guy, and the obvious person was Doug, Pogex's CEO. A brilliant man, but highly strung, maybe even a little bipolar. I knew he would crumble under questioning, especially if Auckland fed him a few soundbites that made it sound like he was trying to wriggle out of it. And it worked. The press crucified him. And Doug ... We both know what happened next, don't we?'

Peter stood up and brushed down his trousers.

'Now I think I need to be alone,' he said, nodding a goodbye.

Helen jumped up and grabbed his arm.

'Please, Peter, don't do anything rash,' she said, her heart pounding. 'Remember we're all in this together, and if we work together, we can get out of it.'

Peter looked down at her hand and gently lifted it from his arm.

'We all have a way of dealing with our problems,' he said, walking away. 'You go and figure out yours.'

66

The atmosphere in Media Incorporated's boardroom was electric. Amir and Andy stood by a big whiteboard full of red, black and blue scribbles, arrows pointing to circled names and facts boxed off and starred according to their importance.

'Gentlemen, please,' said Andy, addressing the room. 'We all know this is going to be a big story, but we need to be absolutely sure of our facts particularly what we can and can't say legally. We've got to be tight as a nut on this, especially as we have the enemy in the room.'

There was a ripple of laughter as the journalists all looked over at Anna, Matt and Larry standing to the side. Anna smiled too. She had been watching Andy at work, seeing him running his team, his eyes blazing with pa.s.sion for the story, yet completely in control, never letting his excitement run away with him.

I'm over him, she smiled to herself. I finally really am.

She respected him, enjoyed his company, but that little spark of whatever it was that drew people together had gone. And she felt glad. It was a weight that had been pulling her down, an unhealed wound that had kept her from moving on and finding someone else. For a moment, she thought of Sam. They hadn't spoken all week; just a few half-apologetic text messages that had left her with very mixed emotions. Their time together in India had been sensational, of course, and he was so good-looking she could feel a little part of her sigh whenever she thought about him. But another part of her wondered if they were really suited. She looked at Andy, realising that they had been a perfect match on paper, everyone had said so; and yet sometimes things just didn't pan out. One thing she had come to understand was that you couldn't deconstruct love and figure out what made two people connect. It just happened. Or didn't. That was the nature of love; its randomness, its unpredictability, and she supposed it was what made it so intoxicating.

Charles Porter, the newspaper's editor, looked over at Anna.

'Andy's right,' he said. 'We need to know what we can print. Are you sure the contents of Amy's laptop would be admissible in court?'

Anna felt flattered that Charles had addressed the question to her, with her boss and the legendary Larry Donovan standing next to her. She had been getting a lot of respect from the journalists since Andy and Amir had brought the story in. She nodded to Charles.

'Yes, Matt found the laptop, which had clearly been taken, stolen from Amy's apartment. But we should be able to argue that ownership still belongs to Amy Hart, and as she is now deceased, it's pa.s.sed on to her estate. Of course we've got the full cooperation of her family.'

Charles nodded and looked up at Amir.

'What about this Peter Rees character? Can we name him?'

'Absolutely,' said Amir. 'The emails show he was Amy's lover. I've also been able to nail him through the offsh.o.r.e account he set up to pay the rent on Amy's apartment.'

'Okay, so that links Dallincourt to the dead girl,' said Charles. 'But what about linking the girl to the oil spill?'

Matt shook his head.

'Unfortunately the Atlanticana report was essentially stolen by Amy, which compromises its admissibility. And there's still no way of proving Amy's death was foul play. Not without a confession, anyway.'

Anna loved the energy in the room as they put the story together. Media law tended to move much faster than the rest of the legal system no one else but a media lawyer would be knocking on a judge's door at nine at night but the speed with which the news was crafted was edge-of-the-seat stuff. The only person who did not look alive with adrenalin was Larry Donovan. At last he stepped forward.

'Charles. Can I have a word?' he said, touching the editor on the shoulder. He motioned to Anna to follow them into an adjoining office. The two lawyers and the newspaper editor stood huddled in the small room. Larry spoke first.

'Listen, I'll be straight with you, Charles, I'm not happy about Helen Pierce's name being on that whiteboard.'

Charles Porter gave a thin smile.

'But it does look like Helen leaked Sam Charles's private life to overturn his injunction, which is nothing short of a cover-up.'

'I know you ink boys love conspiracy,' said Larry tartly. 'But do you need to trouble the reading public with every last detail?' He inclined his head towards Anna. 'And seeing as it was Donovan Pierce who brought you the story ...'

Charles raised his eyebrows.

'So we should cut Donovan Pierce some slack?'

'Something like that,' said Larry.