Page 66 of Private Lives

‘Yes, and my catchphrase is “Think of the six-pack”.’

It was 10.30 p.m. by the time her friends finally left. Anna scraped the plates into the bin, drained the leftovers from two bottles of wine into one glass and returned to the sofa. Outside, it had finally gone dark, and the solitary lamp in the corner cast a low glow around the room. She’d overstretched herself, three years earlier, buying Rosemary Cottage, a tiny whitewashed terraced house in Richmond, but it was the best decision she’d ever made. She couldn’t quite hear the river, and the frequent roar of the aeroplanes on their way to nearby Heathrow wasn’t ideal, but sometimes she would just close her eyes, pretend she was in some gorgeous little village in the Cotswolds and let all of her worries fall away. Not that it was quite working tonight. There was one worry that was overriding all the others at the moment: the fear of losing her job. And after such a public failure, would she find another one? Media legal work hadn’t been hit as much as some sectors in the downturn – you could always rely on actors and sportsmen to make a mess of their lives – but firms were certainly tightening up, making do with the employees they had rather than taking on more staff. And if she had no job, there was the real possibility of losing this wonderful little house. The thought of how things could unravel so quickly made her shiver.

‘Come on, Anna,’ she whispered to herself. ‘Stop being the victim.’ That was what Cath had said, and it was solid advice. What was really so bad? She had a fab house, nice legs and a good brain, didn’t she? She smiled to herself. That could be her dating profile for Match.com.

Pulling her iPad off the coffee table, she switched it on, typing ‘Match.com’ into Google.

‘Start Your Love Story!’ it instructed.

‘I need a fag,’ she mumbled, reaching down for her handbag at the foot of the sofa. Rummaging inside, her hand immediately touched something crammed in the top. It was the brown envelope Ruby Hart had given her in Green Park. She’d meant to sift through its contents back at the office, but by the time she’d got back to her desk, Ruby’s claims had seemed more ridiculous and irrelevant to her own life than they had when she had spoken to her.

She lit her cigarette and hesitated a moment before she put the iPad beside her, and tipped the envelope out on to her lap. There was surprisingly little inside. Some newspaper cuttings, a copy of Amy Hart’s post-mortem report and a photograph of a pretty blonde girl, no more than nineteen or twenty. She speed-read the document and immediately saw that Ruby was right: the tabloids had shown some interest in Amy’s death in the days after it happened – ‘Soap Star’s Girlfriend Tragedy’ – but after the inquest there was nothing in the press except a tiny story in the Globe reporting that there had been an inquest into the death of ‘a party girl linked to soap star Ryan Jones’.

Anna looked at the date of the story: the Saturday that the whole world had run with the Sam Charles exposé. Amy Hart’s death was lucky to make page seventeen. Anna knew only too well that the Globe had devoted most of the paper to Sam and Jessica.

She stared down at the newsprint, hearing Ruby Hart’s words in her head. I know what sort of law you do, Miss Kennedy. You cover things up for rich people. She smarted at the memory. She knew she hadn’t gone into media law for any more noble purpose than that it had seemed exciting, well paid and interesting. She was a news junkie – it was one of the things she had in common with Andrew – and life as a media lawyer was a thrilling way to be in the heart of it.

But Ruby had made her professional life sound so immoral; and it embarrassed her to know that that was what the young girl thought of it.

What harm can it do to look into this a little? she asked herself, studying one of the early stories more closely. It had run a photo of Amy walking hand in hand out of a nightclub with Ryan Jones. She was barely recognisable from the natural girlie blonde in the family snapshot. Her hair was longer, a brassier blond. A micro-mini showed off long legs in towering heels. This girl was confident, glamorous, in control.

What a waste, thought Anna, feeling a sudden desire to help Ruby Hart. She stubbed out her cigarette, picked up her iPad and typed ‘Ryan Jones’ into Google. There were dozens of tabloid stories about him: a dalliance with a busty reality TV star, a recent drink-driving conviction, an involvement in a punch-up in a west London pub, even a racist outburst at the Notting Hill carnival.

Hmm, nice guy, she thought, sipping her wine as she read on.

In a rare case of life imitating art, soap bad boy Ryan Jones was accused yesterday of attacking a musician and ‘hurling racist insults’ at her during a fracas at Sunday’s carnival. Ryan Jones, who plays car mechanic Jamie Doyle in Barclay’s Place, has been at the centre of a controversial storyline in the soap following the arrival of an Asian family in the street, culminating in the arrest of Jones’s character for arson following a suspicious fire. ‘People should not confuse what happens on their TVs with what happens in real life,’ said Blake Stanhope, Mr Jones’s PR representative . . .

Anna felt herself miss a breath. She reread the last line of the news item more slowly. Ryan Jones was represented by Blake Stanhope.

Time seemed to stand still as the significance of what she had just read sank in, then her pulse started racing. She Googled Blake Stanhope’s own website and scrolled through his clients section. Ryan wasn’t listed. Then again, Blake would have had hundreds of clients over the years, some of whom he dealt with personally, others who’d be handled by his team.

She stared at the grainy photograph of Amy and Ryan in the newspaper cutting. He was a thug and a bully if you believed the stories about him. But could he have been involved in Amy’s death? Was Ruby Hart right that he’d pushed her down the stairs? And had he instructed Blake to minimise the press coverage of his summons to the inquest?

Her mouth had gone dry as she’d thought it through. If Blake was acting for Ryan and had wanted to bury the story, why not kill two birds with one stone by leaking the Sam Charles story to the press? That way he netted himself a fat fee for the exclusive on Katie and Sam’s sexploits while also ensuring Ryan Jones would be kept out of the spotlight.

Anna frowned. Was she being paranoid? A little voice in her head told her to calm down. But no. This was exactly the sort of win-win PR coup that Stanhope could pull off.

She felt angry, used. A spike of injustice swelled in her throat.

You bastard, she thought, staring at Blake Stanhope’s earnest black-and-white photograph on the website.

Her eyes drifted to the photo of Amy Hart. Pretty, smiling, hopeful.

She hadn’t been able to help Sam Charles, but maybe she could somehow help Amy.

She picked up the phone and called the number that had been scribbled on the back of the brown envelope.

‘Ruby? It’s Anna Kennedy.’

‘I knew you’d get back to me.’ She could almost see the young girl smiling down the telephone.

‘I want to help you, Ruby. I want to help you find out the truth about your sister.’

‘Did you read everything I gave you?’

‘I did,’ said Anna, already wondering how she could achieve her next step. ‘And I think it might be worth me meeting with Ryan Jones,’ she said, realising it was her turn to kill two birds with one stone.

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