Chapter 7: The Thing Cassandra Did Next
David called me Thursday morning, and I knew from the first word that something had moved.
"Robert.
The footage was leaked."
I sat forward.
"What do you mean leaked?"
"A clip.
Thirty seconds.
Posted to a private Facebook group — one of those local community pages, about four thousand members.
Someone uploaded it anonymously two days ago.
It's been shared.
I've had two calls this morning from people who recognized Ellen."
"How did anyone get the footage?"
"That's what I'm trying to determine.
The estate manager gave you the only copy on the flash drive.
But the venue's system had a backup server that their tech accessed during recovery.
Someone with access to that server, or someone who was told about the footage by someone with access—"
"Preston Hale."
A pause.
"I can't confirm that."
"He knew we had footage.
He called me the day after Michael did.
He knew enough to try to negotiate before we'd sent anything formally." I stood up.
"Someone told him about the backup server."
"If that's true, it's a serious problem for them.
Unauthorized distribution of security footage — depending on how it was obtained — could constitute a privacy violation.
Possibly worse."
"Can you trace it?"
"We're working on that.
But Robert — the more immediate issue is the footage itself.
Right now it's circulating in a limited space.
If it gets picked up more broadly, it becomes a public matter.
That changes the dynamic significantly."
"In whose favor?"
Another pause.
Longer.
"Yours," he said.
"But it also means Ellen's privacy is gone.
People will know what happened to her.
People she knows.
People you both know."
I thought about that.
"Does Ellen know yet?"
"Not unless you've told her."
I went to find her.
She was in the living room, reading.
She looked up when she saw my face.
"What happened?"
I told her.
All of it.
The clip, the group, the shares, the calls David had received.
She set her book down slowly.
"People have seen it," she said.
"Some people.
Yes."
She was quiet for a moment.
"People we know?"
"Possibly."
She looked at her hands.
"I didn't want that."
"I know."
"I didn't want to be the woman people felt sorry for."
"Ellen—"
"I know that's not rational." She looked up.
"I know what they did is worse than any embarrassment I feel.
But I spent thirty-one years building a life in this community.
I don't want the first thing people think of when they see me to be that video."
"Then we get ahead of it," I said.
"We don't let it define you.
We define it."
She frowned slightly.
"What does that mean?"
"It means we don't hide.
We don't go quiet.
We let David handle the legal side of how that footage got out, and in the meantime, we keep living our lives exactly as we always have."
She looked at me for a long moment.
"You make it sound simple."
"It's not simple.
But it's right."
Her phone buzzed on the side table.
She glanced at it.
Her expression shifted.
"It's Michael," she said.
She answered it.
I stayed in the room.
"Mom." His voice was audible even from where I stood.
"I need you to know — I didn't do this.
I didn't leak that footage.
I don't know how it got out, but it wasn't me."
"All right," Ellen said carefully.
"Cassandra is — she's very upset.
She says people are calling her.
Saying things."
"People are calling me too," Ellen said.
"Saying they're sorry about what happened to me."
Silence on the line.
"Michael," Ellen said.
"Did Cassandra know about the backup server at the venue?"
A pause.
"What?"
"The backup server.
The one the tech used to recover the corrupted footage.
Did Cassandra know it existed?"
Another pause.
Longer.
"I need to go," he said.
"I'll call you back."
He didn't call back.
But David called me two hours later.
"Robert.
The estate manager just contacted my office voluntarily.
He wants to make a statement.
He says the day after you collected the flash drive, he received a call from a woman identifying herself as your daughter-in-law.
She asked him whether the venue retained any additional copies of security recordings.
He told her about the backup server."
I closed my eyes for a moment.
"She knew," I said.
"She knew," David confirmed.
"And someone accessed that server four days ago using a vendor login that had been deactivated six months prior.
The venue is treating it as an unauthorized access.
They've filed a report."
"So she didn't just leak the footage," I said.
"She obtained it illegally."
"That's the venue's position.
Yes."
I sat with that for a moment.
"David.
What does this do to her?"
"It gives us considerably more than a civil matter," he said.
"Depending on how the venue chooses to proceed, and whether the DA's office has any interest — which I suspect they will — Cassandra Whitaker may be looking at criminal exposure."
I had wanted consequences.
May you like
I had planned for consequences.
But I had not planned for this.
