Page 151 of Don't Believe A Word

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

SADIE: ‘You can choose to use this video in a pod, or on your website, or maybe you won’t use it at all, we’ll leave it up to you. We just want to express our disappointment and hurt – yes it was very hurtful – that you chose to end the series the way you did.’

Cristy’s eyes moved carefully between the three faces on the screen, Gabe and Lukas either side of Sadie who was making no secret of the fact that she was reading from a pre-prepared script. Each of them appeared solemn and, on the parts of Gabe and Lukas, perhaps bemused by the fact that they were having to make this video at all. They’d sent it half an hour ago, with a follow-up text alerting Cristy to the fact that it was attached to an email. She’d waited until she was at the office before opening it and this was now the second time she and Connor had watched it. Clove was there too; Jacks had rung to say he was running late but would be in by eleven.

SADIE: ‘I don’t understand why you felt the need to do what you did. I thought we’d become friends over the past few weeks, certainly I trusted you and, as you know, I gave you virtually unlimited access to my life, my thoughts, all my emotions, and my story. I totally believed you would treat your findings, and me, with sensitivity and respect. Throughout our time together it seemed my judgement was sound, you were kind, supportive, and always careful about detail, as well as mindful of my feelings. I fully trusted your honesty and integrity, and never thought for amoment that you would end up using my aunt’s death, and my bereavement, to sensationalize your podcast the way you have. The question of whether or not Mia was pushed to her death will now always hang over me. I don’t deserve that, and I can’t believe that you think I do.

‘We all know that you have no evidence to back up your insinuations – you can’t have as none exists. You have framed them in such a way as to paint me in the very worst of lights and I’m sure that in your hearts you know I am not the person you are making me out to be. It has been a difficult and often painful journey for me to get to where I am now, but working with you, believing you were on my side every step of the way, was what helped me to keep going. Now, thanks to you, I have my father and uncle and I couldn’t be happier about that. But they are as shocked and upset by your betrayal – yes, that’s how we see it – as I am.’

LUKAS: ‘We won’t be taking any action against you, although of course we could. We’ve decided that it would only cause further heartache to go that route. Perhaps it will serve us better for your actions to be recognized, over time, for what they are: shamefully self-serving.

‘We have discussed making this video available to other press outlets and that option, of course, remains open to us. However, before we do that, we’d like to give you the opportunity to go on the record with an apology for the way you misled your listeners in the latest podcast and with an admission that, in spite of knowing your implications were without foundation, you went ahead with them anyway in order to create more interest in the series. If you are prepared to make a statement to that effect, we will not publish this video.’

As the screen darkened Cristy turned to the whiteboard where photographs of Sadie, Janina, Mia and Lottie were lined up along the top. Three dead, only one still alive: the child on the beach who’d grown into a beautiful and, as it turned out, very astute young woman. And now, presumably, a very rich one too.

But what if they were wrong? What if Mia really had jumped?

‘There’s no way we can do what they’re asking,’ Connor stated. ‘And no reason why we should.’

‘I say we call their bluff,’ Clove urged. ‘Do nothing, let everything stay as is … If they want to put out their little statement they can, I don’t see it making any difference to the way people are seeing things. Listeners know they’re not getting a full picture of the journals, and now they have a pretty damned good idea why. Half of them are already posting about it, they’re even outright saying Sadie killed her aunt for revenge as well as personal gain.’

‘All that is true,’ Cristy said, turning back to them, ‘but I’m afraid she’s outmanoeuvred us with this. Its tone, its subtlety and incisive attack on our integrity are powerful enough to do us a lot of damage going forward.’

‘But …’ Clove protested, and stopped when Cristy’s hand went up.

‘Sadie’s right,’ Cristy continued, ‘we don’t have any actual evidence to support why we – to quote her – painted her in the very worst of lights. And by calling our honesty and professional integrity into question – something we should have seen coming – she’s opened us up to the kind of scrutiny that’ll be hard to withstand.’

‘Why?’ Clove objected. ‘We haven’t lied about anything …’

‘And how could we, in all good conscience,’ Connor said, ‘have let her last interview run unchallenged when the fact that there is only her version of events absolutely needed to be acknowledged? We wouldn’t have been doing our jobs if we hadn’t gone for it, no matter how we phrased it. Just about every listener we have would have been calling it out before the episode had chance to finish. Even without the journals they’re thinking the sisters did away with Janina, and therein lies Sadie’s motive for punishing her aunt in the worst possible way. We had to do it.’

‘If that was her motive,’ Cristy stated.

Clove and Connor stared at her uncomprehendingly.

‘I’m not saying it wasn’t,’ she explained, ‘it would certainly have been a part of it, but without knowing what went on between them prior to Mia’s “fall” …’ She broke off with an impatient sigh, knowing there was no point speculating any further over that now.

‘Whatever we might think,’ she said, ‘if we let them run that video the public will turn, mark my words. We’ll be perceived as having treated Sadie Winters badly, or as Lukas put it, in a shamefully self-serving way. And ask yourselves this, where will that leave us with future investigations? Trust is at the very core of what we do. And we all know how spiteful some of the tabloids can be, how hungry they are to bring down success. So as soon as it’s known a new series of the “increasingly popularHindsight”is underway, out will come the Sadie Winters video to show how we treat people.’

‘Well, I for one am not up for putting out the kind of statement they’re asking for,’ Clove declared defiantly. ‘Apart from anything else, it’s too soon. It would be a knee-jerk on our part when we still don’t know how the police might have reacted to the pod. For all we know they’ve already pulled her in for further questioning.’

‘You’re right,’ Cristy agreed and reached for her phone. ‘Let me speak to David, see if he can find out what’s going on over there. If the investigators are still all over it, it could at least buy us some time.’

*

Almost an hour had passed by the time David rang back.

‘I’m putting you on speaker,’ Cristy told him, ‘Connor and Clove are here.’

‘Hey, guys,’ David said. ‘Here’s what I’ve got. Apparently the detectives have requested sight of the journals. I’m not sure if it was prompted by last night’s pod, but I got the impression they were interested to hear your views, and obviously they know you’ve seen the unpublished entries.

‘Not quite as helpful,’ he continued, ‘was that even if the journals claim that the Winters sisters sent Janina’s car off the road, the Procureur – prosecutor – thinks it still might not be seen as a strong enough motive for Sadie to act the way she did. For some it might, but it’s felt that a good lawyer would be able to trash the theory in a trial, if it came to that. So, as things stand, the chances of the police acting based on the unreliable nature of the journals alone are not very high.’

Seeing her own disappointment reflected in the others’ expressions, Cristy said, ‘Well, at least they’re not completely throwing it out.’ Maybe she wished they were: how hopelessly conflicted she kept feeling over this.

‘They’re not,’ David agreed, ‘and actually, there’s more. I had a chat with Victor Dubois this morning – you’ll remember he’s head of the law firm Mia uses – and he told me that it wasn’t Mia who sought the injunction on the journals, it was Sadie.’

Cristy stilled as she took this in, trying to work out what it could mean. The most obvious explanation chimed with what Sadie had always said, that she wanted to protect her aunt – after she’d vented her fury by practically demolishing the sitting room and kitchen, of course. But why had she never mentioned she was behind the injunction? She must have known they’d understand, had even been expecting it.

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