Chapter 27 – DAMON
DAMON
Icould have let it end in her office, the phone imaged, the lawyers loosed, the clean corporate removal that never becomes a story.
I did it in the ballroom instead.
It took legal the better part of two weeks to be ready, and I spent them saying nothing publicly, which nearly killed me.
They imaged the phone within the hour, the wire went back to an account that went back to Emily through one tissue-paper layer, and forensic accounting, once it knew what it was looking for, found the rest, the wording she'd sent Raina the night before the gala, the second payment released the morning the coverage held.
Counsel wanted a settlement and a sealed exit. I told them the first lie in this story had been told to three hundred people with cameras running, and the truth was going to get the same room.
Same ballroom, near enough. Same board, the same press we'd let in, a livestream to the same floors, witness for witness. I stood at the podium I'd held during the worst quarter of my life, and on the screen behind me, where we'd once run the data that was going to save us, I ran the texts.
Raina's name redacted at her lawyer's request, the hospital's name redacted, nothing else.
You could hear the room stop breathing.
"Months ago a frightened woman stood where I'm standing and accused our drug of putting her father in the hospital," I said.
"Every word of it was scripted, paid for, and aimed, by our own head of research, who then volunteered to lead the response to the crisis she built.
The science was never in danger. She knew that.
It was the point. You cannot stage the debunking of a true accusation, in her words.
" I let that sit. "Brighton had been picking at our trials for months and the rest of what we found is now with prosecutors, and I won't get ahead of them.
But the corporate crime is not the part I'm ashamed of. "
I'd written the next part over and over and thrown every version away, and in the end I just said it.
"She found a family with a dying father and turned their worst year into a prop.
A man watched his own daughter accuse a medicine on the news from a hospital bed, and the woman who arranged it slept fine, and for months I let that woman tell me who everyone was.
Including my wife." The room was very still.
"The worst decision I made this entire year wasn't made in a lab or a boardroom.
It was made in a room like this one, the night I stood next to my wife while she was insulted, and said nothing, because the person doing the insulting had made herself indispensable. "
I took a deep breath, looking into the camera.
Looking at her, even though I knew there was a damn good chance she was never going to see this.
This wasn't about hoping she would forgive me, or making some grandstanding attempt to get back in her good graces.
I didn't deserve that. But I needed her to know, and this was the only way I could reach her.
The only way I could make sure the world knew exactly who she was, and what a fool I'd been to throw her away.
"Madeline, my wife, was right about all of it," I said slowly.
"The first night of this crisis she asked me whether anyone had verified the accusation.
I want that on the record. This company was founded on the people it helps, the people who trust us with their health, and Madeline is the one who's always remembered that.
She's the one who's always encouraged me to be the man I want to be.
A man she deserves, even if I've fallen incredibly short of that over the last eight years. "
Emily wasn't in the room. Her lawyers had advised her not to be, which I took as the first sound advice anyone had given her in a year. It didn't matter. Emily didn't matter. The room she'd played like an instrument heard every word, and the floors watched on the stream.
Maybe Maddie was watching somewhere too, but I doubted it. I needed to say it anyway.
"I want to be clear that while Dr. Cavendash was conspiring with Ms. Playne, the person who is truly responsible for this mess is me," I said calmly.
"I am responsible for this company, and over the last several years, it has lost sight of its original purpose.
The focus has been on profit, and that's on me.
But things are going to change. I firmly believe our products are safe, and the independent trials will show that. "
I paused, trying to stay focused when my mind was hundreds, maybe thousands of miles away. With Maddie, wherever she was.
"But I'm also inviting a fully independent panel to conduct a full audit and bring everything to light, so the public can be equally confident.
And I want to also be clear that I hold no malice toward the Playne family.
Ms. Playne was manipulated by a bad actor in her most difficult moment, and a trust has been set up to pay for all of Edward Playne's medical bills, as well as to make sure the family is able to move forward and beyond this mess comfortably.
And privately. I'm going to ask that the press give them the time and space to do that. "
"I'm also," I continued, staring straight into the camera once more, "going to ask for the space to focus on setting things right.
Both professionally and personally. I will be stepping back from my professional duties for a while once the trial is concluded.
To say I'll be taking this time to work on my marriage would be expressing entitlement, through the assumption that I still have a marriage to work on.
My wife walked away and it took her eight years when I've been giving her reason since day one.
The reason she finally did it is because, after putting up with my obsession with work, and my lack of appreciation, and my lack of boundaries, she asked one thing of me.
Without words, with a single look, she stood in a room where she was being unfairly ripped apart, and asked me to defend her.
To stand by her the way she always has with me.
And I failed her. I failed to perform the most sacred duty I have, to protect my wife.
And I will spend the rest of my days regretting it whether she ever gives me a chance to prove I can be better or not.
God knows she's already given me enough. "
It was the first time I'd ever stood in this room, or any room in my life, and been completely, brutally honest. I just knew better than to think it was a guarantee of getting her back, but if there was even a chance, honesty was the only place to start.