Page 4 of Original Sin

Wilson looked slightly taken aback by the blunt, attractive woman seated across from him, but quickly rallied.

‘Well Ms Garrett, you’re an experienced journalist, one assumes,’ he said. ‘So I don’t need to remind you of the privacy laws at issue here. Sean Asgill was enjoying a night out in a private place and that privacy has been invaded.’

Tess looked at him, determined to stand her ground, particularly after Wilson’s snipe about her experience. In fact, Tess had been in this situation many times before. Andy Davidson didn’t do much hands–on editing and was more often to be found schmoozing politicians and publicists; he certainly never dealt with Rottweiler lawyers. It was Tess who was sent to deal with them, and, as barely a week went by without some celebrity publicist or media lawyer threatening the Globe with injunctions, Tess knew the law backwards.

‘I’m well aware of the law, Mr Wilson,’ said Tess, counting the points off on her slim fingers. ‘Number one, and correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t this incident involve heavyweight drug usage? Heavyweight illegal drugs, I might add? Number two, it didn’t happen at Mr Asgill’s private residence; in fact it was at a public event, and a morally controversial public event at that.’

Wilson smiled thinly. ‘That’s rich. Your newspaper talking about morals.’

Tess took a sip from the glass of water in front of her. ‘This is a drug overdose at a sex party, Mr Wilson. It’s not as if we stormed into the Pope’s bedroom. You and I both know that no judge in England will grant an injunction on those photos based on privacy. Besides, as your client is very high profile, I believe we could argue public interest, given the circumstances.’

‘Please, this is a young, vulnerable man who ingested ketamine mistakenly,’ said Wilson in a more conciliatory voice.

‘Vulnerable?’ snorted Tess. ‘Well, I don’t know Sean Asgill, but from what I read he’s hardly Tiny Tim. He’s a playboy whose fast living has finally caught up with him.’

Mark Wilson’s face was impassive but Tess knew she had got him. He stared at her for a few moments, then shrugged slightly.

‘I take it you haven’t written your splash story yet?’

‘Not yet.’

‘Who owns the photographs?’

She paused for a moment. ‘We do,’ she said. Actually, this was technically true, even if the paper was unaware of it. Tess was paying cash–strapped Jemma a one–hundred–pounds–a–day freelancer rate and hiding the fee in her office expenses. That meant the Globe owned the copyright to Jemma’s photographs, although no one except Tess and Jemma – and Sean Asgill’s people – even knew of their existence. Mark Wilson nodded slowly.

‘Well, I’m sure we can work something out,’ he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a cheque, placing it carefully on the desk in front of Tess.

‘One hundred thousand pounds,’ he said simply. ‘It’s yours if you kill the story, give the photographs to us, and forget any of this ever happened.’

Tess stared down at the table, feeling her heartbeat increase. She knew deals like this had been done before: celebrities paying to have photographs taken off the market. Some of the most amazing, career–shaking exposés and inflammatory pap shots were fated to lay forever unseen, tightly locked in the vaults of newspapers. But this was different; this cheque was made out to her. None of her colleagues knew about the sex party photographs, no one knew that the paper technically owned the copyright, and Jemma had already been paid for a week’s work. Although her friend could potentially get tens of thousands for them if she realized the international impact this story could have, Tess knew she could fob Jemma off by saying there were legal problems with the story. But could she? Almost involuntarily, her hand moved forward, her fingertips resting on the cheque. What she could do with a hundred grand! Pay off the mortgage. Buy a sports car and a brand–new designer wardrobe. Go on a fantastic two–week break to somewhere incredible: Le Touessrok, the Amanpuri, somewhere hot and luxurious where she could have a beach butler and personal masseuse. Or she could simply refuse the bribe, run the story, and take the glory. What should she do? What would her father have told her to do? She tried to lift her fingers, but found her hand didn’t want to move. Finally, reluctantly, she breathed out.

‘I can’t help you,’ said Tess, pushing the cheque across the desk towards him.

Wilson raised an eyebrow. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

Tess nodded.

‘Then make sure your mobile is turned on over the weekend,’ he said briskly as he got up to leave. ‘And you’d better war

n your lawyer.’

*

Tess walked home. It took over an hour to stroll from the Globe office, close to Lambeth Bridge, to Battersea, and on balmy summer nights she did it regularly. But tonight, feeling so unsettled, so confused, she just wanted to clear her head. She set off along the river, the cold wind pinching at her cheeks.

A hundred grand she thought. Today I turned down a hundred grand. No matter how hard she tried to tell herself she had done the right thing, a small voice inside Tess’s head kept nagging away at her: ‘You bloody idiot! You coward! You just weren’t ruthless enough to take the bribe.’

An even more depressing thought had also occurred to her: what if Mark Wilson had some sort of sway with a judge and did manage to get his injunction to stop the photographs being published? Then there’d be no big fat cheque in her bank account, no story, and a humiliatingly blank front page on Sunday. Tess Garrett would have failed. She had brought herself up to be tough, spending her entire twenties surrounding herself with a hard protective shell, so that sentimentality would not get in the way of her ambition. But did she really have half the mettle she thought she had?

The worst thing was that she couldn’t even talk it through with anyone. She certainly couldn’t discuss it with Jemma, and Dom would have gone through the roof. For years, they had dreamed of buying a smart flat over the water in Chelsea, the sort of place Dom’s posy public school friends were now living in. A hundred thousand pounds wouldn’t buy them that, of course, but paying off the mortgage and having full equity on their current home would put them in a strong position to finally trade up to the apartments that twinkled on the other side of the Thames.

Tess was now walking past the New Covent Garden Market where she loved buying armfuls of beautiful flowers on weekend mornings. Suddenly she could hear the soft purr of a car engine behind her. Glancing over her shoulder she saw a shiny black car hugging the pavement. What the hell? Tess began walking a little faster, her heart beating a little quicker than usual, but the car overtook her and stopped thirty yards ahead. Tess didn’t scare easily, but she was still unsettled. The street was dark and, on a cold night like this, she was the only person walking. As she drew level, the rear window of the Mercedes purred down.

‘Tess Garrett?’ called a voice.

Tess stopped and warily looked into the car. Leaning towards the window was an elegant, sixty–something woman with fine–boned features and a cloud of champagne–blonde hair that fell to the sable mink collar of her coat. She looked familiar, but for the moment Tess could not place her.

‘Meredith Asgill,’ said the woman with a faint nod. ‘I’d very much like to talk to you. It’s a cold night, isn’t it? Perhaps you’d like to step inside the car.’