Private Lives

‘I would have tried to help you. One friend to another,’ he said sarcastically. ‘Maybe I could have pushed Tori to give you something else in the movie. But now? I don’t think so.’

Jessica moved her mouth, but nothing came out.

‘I know you youngsters all think the industry is dog-eat-dog,’ said Joe, his voice quivering with anger. ‘You’ll climb over anyone to get what you want. But actually, it’s all about friendship, about helping each other out where you can. That’s how I’ve been friends with Tori Adams for so long, that’s how I’ve got to the top.’

‘Yeah, that and sucking cock,’ snapped Jessica and stabbed the End Call button.

She stood there staring down at the phone in her hand. She couldn’t take it in. The part had gone. She had been so sure she would get it, that it would be her way out of girl-next-door TV star and into the realms of being a proper serious actress. She was screwed, royally screwed. She turned and walked out of the office, straight past Sylvia, who was waiting in the corridor.

‘Jess, what’s the matter?’ she called. ‘Where are you going?’

‘Home,’ she said. ‘To get more stoned than I’ve ever been before.’

34

The courtroom was packed; Helen looked around with satisfaction. It had been her idea to push for a jury trial, and so far it had all gone exactly as she had planned. She wanted – needed – the case to be high-profile to maximise the effect when her client won: Jonathon Balon’s reputation would be restored and Donovan Pierce would once again be the top media law firm in the country. Helen sat next to Balon; to his left was their QC, Nicholas Collins. Behind them were Anna Kennedy and her team, and the rest of the pews were packed with reporters and that weird breed of judicial groupies who brought their own sandwiches and seemed to relish a juicy trial. They were certainly getting their money’s worth this time. Libel jury trials were rare enough, but the Balon trial had extra glamour in the form of the defendant, the glossy society magazine Stateside, and the claimant himself, Jonathon Balon.

Helen watched as Balon stood and walked to the witness box, where he would be cross-examined by Jasper Jenkins, the barrister for Stateside. Balon was the ideal claimant; good-looking but sober, intelligent; jury-friendly. Still, it was hard to read the jury in civil cases of this nature. It was not like a criminal trial, where you could see the horror on the jurors’ faces as they looked at grim photographs of abuse, or listened to the testimony of a battered teenager. But Helen was confident they would win. Stateside were not trying to prove that Balon took money from mobsters. Instead, their lawyers were arguing the ‘Reynolds defence’; that the media could publish information that turned out to be false, so long as it was in the public interest and written in a responsible, balanced manner.

Nicholas Collins had done a fantastic job of pulling Stateside’s case to pieces. Over the past week he had presented a persuasive argument that while Jonathon Balon denied taking money from a powerful London crime family, whether he had or not was irrelevant. Balon was a private businessman who had no dealings with the general public, and therefore it was not in the public interest to expose him. The Stateside piece was just a hatchet job; a scurrilous story for their readers. And that was against the law.

Helen glanced at her watch. It was almost 3 p.m., Friday afternoon. They’d been at it since 10 a.m. this morning and the judge was showing signs of weariness. She hoped that would spur him to cut proceedings short, as she was planning to retreat to Seaways, the Devon home she had bought five years earlier. Graham had been pestering her to go since the trial began: ‘You need a break, darling,’ he’d said. ‘Even you need to relax sometimes.’ He was right, of course; she just hoped he wouldn’t suggest coming along too.

Jasper Jenkins rose to his feet, fluttering through the stack of case notes in front of him.

‘Your honour,’ he said, ‘we request permission to submit additional evidence we did not provide in discovery.’

Helen’s eyes opened wide. What? She immediately sensed danger and her eyes flicked to the judge. Mr Justice Lazner frowned.

‘We have allowed plenty of time for discovery on this case,’ Lazner stated coldly.

Jenkins was undeterred. ‘M’lord, as you are aware, this trial was brought forward by almost one month. We conducted the most thorough discovery exercise we could in the time allotted and thought we had supplied all the relevant documentation. But we can’t let this trial be hampered because of things found out after the expedited timeline.’

Nicholas Collins immediately jumped to his feet in reply.

‘Your honour, last-minute disclosure is both highly unusual and extremely detrimental to the fairness of this trial.’

The judge held up a hand.

‘In view of this trial being brought forward, I’ll allow it.’

Dammit, thought Helen as the court usher took a sheaf of documents from Jenkins and handed them to the judge.

‘I would like to submit into evidence documents obtained from domain registration agency Netstuff.com,’ said Jenkins.

This definitely wasn’t good. Surprise witnesses and evidence were very unusual in any trial, let alone a libel trial. How many times had Helen told her team in the discovery process: ‘Don’t find out everything we need to know. Find out everything.’ Worse, she didn’t like the self-satisfied look on Jasper Jenkins’s face. She’d seen that confident, cocksure expression in QCs before. It meant they were going for the sucker punch.

‘Your honour, we have always contested that the Stateside story on Jonathon Balon was a fair reporting of facts in the public interest.’

Mr Justice Lazner looked unimpressed. ‘I’m aware of what the Reynolds defence is, Mr Jenkins.’

‘Mr Balon’s defence team have spent an entire week attempting to prove that the Stateside story is not in the public interest. They argue that Mr Balon is not a public figure.’

Get on with it, thought Helen with a grimace. Barristers were like actors with a law degree, and this smug bastard was enjoying himself on his little personal stage.

‘But our evidence will show that Mr Balon is about to run for political position.’

Helen glanced across at Balon – had she seen him flinch?