My Fight to the Top

by Michelle Mone

‘They are having an affair,’ I swore to Ilene.

  ‘Michael? I don’t think so. What makes you think that?’ she said.

  ‘Because they are, because she’s flirting with him constantly and he’s different…’ I broke down. ‘He’s different with me,’ I sobbed.

  The problem was, I had no concrete proof. There were 101 signs and my gut was telling me – that same intuition I used to suss out people growing up in the East End. I became a woman possessed. I had to know to put my mind at ease. Our arguments became so bad that Michael kicked me out of our bedroom. ‘Get out. This is my room,’ he said.

  I grabbed my pillow and moved to the spare room. Maybe it was for the best because I couldn’t lie next to him, imagining what he was getting up to behind my back. I felt sick to the pit of my stomach. I felt so lonely and I remember pouring my heart out one night to Carol Vorderman. We’d been good friends since starring in Celebrity Apprentice together and I often gave her my flat in London if she needed somewhere to stay.

  We were both in our jammies, curled up on my couch with a glass of wine when I started crying. I’d been confiding in Carol for a while that I thought Michael was having an affair but it had all become a bit too much. I was distraught. ‘He wants to get me sectioned,’ I cried. ‘How can he say that to me?’ I shook my head in despair. Carol was really worried about me. She gave me a big hug and tried to calm me down. I had explained to her how it was all just so hurtful. Yes, I’d been unhappy for a long time and, yes, the unhappiness was my fault for staying with him but that was no excuse for what I thought was betrayal. It was a really low blow to be having an affair with my designer, in my guesthouse.

  ‘My friends are starting to question me; my kids think I’m a nutcase. Even my mum and dad are saying, “There is something not right about our daughter.”’

  ‘You need to put your mind at rest,’ Carol said. ‘If he’s telling everyone you’re a nutcase and need to be sectioned, you need to find out the truth for yourself.’ I started playing around with the idea of hiring a private detective. Carol told me she knew some friends who could put me in touch with someone.

  ‘On second thoughts, that won’t be necessary,’ I said wiping the tears from my eyes. I guess there was still a part of me that thought we could work things out. I was dreading my 40th on 8th October – I wasn’t in the mood at all. How was I going to be able to put on a brave face with everything that was going on? I suppose I’d become an expert in throwing on a smile when I had to perform.

  Michael asked me at the last minute, ‘What do you want?’

  I’d made a massive effort for his 40th. I’d even got Leona Lewis to sing at his party and then I took Michael and all our friends on holiday to Barcelona. ‘What do I want? You have to ask me?’ I replied. ‘Can’t you be creative yourself? I was so angry and hurt. I ran through a load of party options in my head and I kept coming back to the place that I felt would help me through this difficult time. Somewhere that gave me strength. ‘Michael, I would like nothing fancy,’ I started. ‘I would like to have my 40th in the place where I grew up. The place that means so much to me. The place that taught me everything.’

  I remembered my mum’s words: ‘Michelle, remember where you came from, who you are.’

  ‘I want my birthday in Coia’s Cafe on Duke Street.’

  Michael was taken aback. ‘Coia’s Cafe in the East End? You don’t really want to have it there. What’s all the press going to think, what are all our friends going to think?’

  I stood my ground. I defended my turf. ‘I don’t care what everyone thinks. I don’t care if the press writes, “The bra tycoon has her 40th in a café that sells ice cream, curry sauce and chips.” That’s where I want it to be,’ I said.

  I couldn’t have wished for a better birthday. All my friends showed up. My mum and dad loved it. My family were thrilled and most of them could get there just by walking across the road. The only person who didn’t come was Sam, thank god. The menu was ‘Michelle’s favourites’: curry sauce and chips with pink champagne and pudding was a knickerbocker glory. I wanted to show the people of the East End that I had not forgotten where I was from. Some of them might have thought that just because I was successful I’d turned my back on them. I’ll never turn my back on them, never. That’s who I am. I’ll never pretend to be someone I’m not.

  22

  CAUGHT RED-HANDED

  Stay strong, be positive. We all struggle sometimes.

  ‘Remember, you should never step over the line when it comes to your staff,’ I warned Michael at the work Christmas party in 2011. I was so embarrassed. Michael and Sam had been flirting with each other all afternoon. She’d been giggling into his ear and flicking her hair. Michael had been ignoring the rest of the staff. It was a Christmas get-together and we were supposed to be going around the team to give them all a bit of time. He only spent time with Sam. I felt awful. I felt humiliated in front of everyone. I wanted my husband to come home with me at 7 pm and we had a massive argument.

  ‘You should leave now. Let the team get on with it as they can’t enjoy themselves as much with us being around,’ I insisted. I left on my own. I couldn’t sleep until I knew Michael was home. It got later and later and all the while my anxiety levels got higher and higher. I was pretty much pacing the bedroom by the time I eventually heard the taxi pull into the drive and then the two of them giggling. Michael had come home with her at 3.30 am.

  That was it – that was the final nail in the coffin for me. I’d had enough of this heartache. No one makes a fool of me. I confronted Michael and we had this explosive argument. We barely spoke for the week leading up to Christmas Day. Things were so tense between us. I was still sleeping in the spare room and I was still raging with him but I was determined to make it a good day for the sake of the children.

  I pulled Michael aside to make a truce. ‘Please, let’s make this a good day for the sake of Rebecca, Declan and Bethany,’ I pleaded.

  Michael agreed that we would talk and get on, which was a massive relief. He got on with making the turkey – he was always the chef of the house. I ran around, cleaning up and making everything look perfect for the kids and the family who were arriving any moment. Michael took the turkey out of the oven to cool down before carving. He then just walked out of the house – walked out on us on Christmas Day.

  ‘Michael,’ I screamed after him.

  ‘Dad, Dad, where are you going?’ all the kids were crying. He just got in his Porsche and left. I burst into tears. I didn’t have any words left. It was truly awful. I was crying and the kids were crying. It took me back to the heartache and tears when I was growing up and we spent Christmas in hospital by my dad’s bedside.

  My mum and dad arrived in the sea of tears. It felt like someone had died. ‘Michelle, what’s happened?’ my mum said, trying to get some sense out of me.

  ‘He’s left us,’ I sobbed.

  ‘Oh, Michelle,’ Mum said and cuddled me. There was nothing much she could say; the damage had been done. It was the worst Christmas I’ve ever had in my life. The dining room was all set up but no one ate there. The kids sat at the kitchen table but I was too distraught to have dinner.

  I knew then, that our marriage was over.

  Michael and I had our ups and downs but I would never ever have left him. I would never have filed for a divorce and I would have kept going, kept fighting.

  Michael came home the next morning on Boxing Day and we agreed it was over. ‘Well, if it’s over, I’m going to announce it,’ I told him.

  Michael shrugged and said, ‘Do what you want.’

  I called one of the few people in the media I trust, who I could actually call my friend. Mark Hollinshead is managing director of the Trinity Mirror and the Daily Record. He could immediately hear in my voice that something was up. ‘What’s wrong? Why are you wanting to see me on Boxing Day?’ he asked.

  ‘I just need to talk to you, Mark,’ I fought back the tears.

  ‘Sure, I�
��ll meet you for a coffee at 2.30 pm,’ he agreed.

  I was waiting for him at the back of a wee coffee shop called Beanscene in the centre of Glasgow. As soon as Mark sat down, I burst out crying.

  ‘What’s wrong, Michelle?’ he said, looking distressed. I don’t think he had any idea what I was about to tell him. On the outside, Michael and I came across as the perfect couple who had managed that rare feat of holding down a marriage while running a business together. It was the image that we had projected to the media for all those years.

  ‘Michael walked out on us on Christmas Day. The marriage is over,’ I told him. He was shocked. ‘I need you to help me,’ I said, wiping my tears away.

  ‘Yes, of course. What do you need me to do?’ Mark asked.

  I took a deep breath. ‘I need you to help me write a press release.’ I felt that if I didn’t write something now there was a chance it could keep going and there was no going back for me now. I’d had enough. There was a way out now and I wanted to take it. Mark helped me and I felt a huge relief that I had made the decision to send it to all the news desks. I know some people reading this will think, Why did you feel you had to tell the world? By announcing to the world we were over, there was no going back, I could finally draw a line under it and move on.

  I made sure there was no mention of Sam. I wasn’t doing this out of spite but for closure. The press release read: ‘It is with regret that we report that Mr Michael J Mone and Mrs Michelle G Mone OBE have decided to separate. There are no other parties involved and the split is amicable. Michael and Michelle’s focus will be the welfare of their children, which is their main priority. They will continue to work together in their business, MJM International. This is a private matter and they would appreciate their privacy and that of their family being respected at this difficult time.’

  There were paparazzi camped outside my house for days, but I kept a low profile. Unfortunately, I had a business to run, and the show had to go on – with Michael. The marriage was over but the war between Michael and me had only just begun.

  Losing all that weight had given me the confidence to see that I deserved better. It was like the final piece in a jigsaw puzzle I hadn’t been able to spot until now. I wasn’t going to take any more shit. I confronted Sam, head on. The first day back at work, I called her down into my office.

  ‘I’m going to ask you something, and I want you to be honest with me,’ I started.

  ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh,’ she said nervously.

  ‘You’re having an affair with my husband, aren’t you?’ I said. I was calm and collected but seriously pissed off.

  She immediately broke down crying, ‘Oh, my god, I would never do that,’ she said as she turned pink. ‘How could you think such a thing. I would never consider going out with my boss. You are my friend. I would never do that to you. I’m having boyfriend issues too. We’ve split up and he won’t marry me,’ she went on.

  I finally broke my silence. ‘Okay then, if that’s what you say and if it’s true then I’m sorry for asking you,’ I said calmly.

  Sam left and my PA came in after her. ‘I told you she’s not having an affair with him,’ my PA said.

  ‘She is, she one-million-per cent is,’ I said. I just needed to prove it now.

  Sam was going to Hong Kong with Michael and our head technical and operations guys in three weeks’ time to sort through some production issues at our factories. I was going to flush them out like rats. I announced to Sam: ‘I think I’ll come on this trip with you.’ She was taken aback at first as I didn’t normally come out to Hong Kong but then she acted like my best friend.

  ‘Oh, that would be so good,’ she beamed. ‘We can have time together. We don’t spend enough time designing. It would be so good for you to be there. I can’t wait,’ she gushed.

  I was upset, but I was trying to trap her, so I threw on a smile. ‘Okay, so you really want me to come?’ I said, double-checking.

  ‘It would be amazing,’ she beamed.

  ‘Okay, let me look at my diary,’ I told her.

  I rang my PA while I was in the car to see if she could look into flights. She called me back. ‘I can get you on the same flight,’ my PA said.

  ‘Book it,’ I said. There was no stopping me. I phoned Sam back and announced the good news. ‘I’m on the same flight,’ I said over loudspeaker.

  I could hear the panic in her voice. ‘Oh, no, oh no you can’t,’ she spluttered.

  I trapped her. ‘Sorry?’ I asked.

  ‘You can’t come. I mean, we’ve got meetings all planned. I meant I wanted you to come, but not on this trip.’

  What? ‘That’s not what you said to me an hour ago,’ I fired back at her. I got back to my office and I went to chat to my head of sales in her room with my PA. I could see straight into Michael’s office as the whole place was made up of walls of glass.

  I was telling the girls that I was going to Hong Kong and then I turned around to see Michael charging out of his office. He came running like a bull towards us.

  Oh fuck. Oh Jesus.

  Michael grabbed me in front of everyone. ‘You fucking bitch! You’re not coming to Hong Kong,’ he yelled. He had his briefcase with him and he slammed it into my chest. ‘If you come to Hong Kong, I quit. I need to be away from you. I don’t want to be with you.’

  I was trembling inside. ‘Sam told me she needed me there,’ I said, trying to stay calm.

  ‘Sam doesn’t need you there, I don’t need you there and you better cancel your flight or I’ll resign,’ he threatened.

  I wasn’t going to be bullied. ‘Resign all you like,’ I said.

  It exploded into a massive argument. I broke down in tears. My PA and head of sales, Margaret, tried to step in, ‘Enough, Michael. Leave her alone,’ they begged. Michael left and the girls came rushing to my side.

  Why was he so determined not to have me there?

  I phoned Carol Vorderman and asked her for that number. ‘Who’s that guy you know?’ I asked her for the number of her friend’s private detective. I gave the detective the dates that Michael and Sam were going to Hong Kong along with flight numbers and everything he would need to get me some proof that they were together. I needed that reassurance because Michael had been telling me that I was going nuts. I needed to show my family and my friends that I wasn’t making this up. I had to know that I wasn’t going mad.

  I counted down the days until they left, crying myself to sleep every night. I was still in the spare room while Michael slept in the master bedroom. When he left for Hong Kong I went to London for business meetings. The detective was planted at the airport, ready to capture my husband and Sam as they came off the flight.

  Carol tried to cheer me up by taking me for lunch at Scott’s in Mayfair. We were sitting on the terrace outside when I got a call from the private detective. ‘I need to see you,’ he said with urgency.

  I told him I was happy for anything to be said in front of my friend, but the detective insisted on seeing me privately. He turned up at Scott’s and approached our table with a big brown envelope. My heart sank like a dead weight. ‘I think you should walk with me,’ he said sombrely.

  ‘There’s a park across the road,’ I said, leaving Carol for a moment.

  It was a cold but sunny day. We walked into the park and he told me how sorry he was as he handed me the envelope. I peeled it open to find pictures of Michael snogging Sam at the airport in front of my team and pictures of her going back to his hotel room. Deep down I knew that my marriage had been over for a long time but the pain I felt when I saw the photos was indescribable. My knees buckled and I fell to the ground crying. Carol ran over and wrapped her arms around me.

  As I made my way back to Scotland with the pictures in my handbag, grief turned to anger. Michael and I had been together for 22 years and he was behaving like this only four weeks after we split up. What hurt me was the deceit, the lies, and the fact he had made me out to be mad. Even my friends had started to doubt m
y sanity. The fact that my team were in the pictures while he was kissing made it ten times more painful.

  Mum was there to give me a hug as soon as I got home, and then I told Rebecca the news. ‘Your dad is seeing Sam,’ I said. She was old enough to know what was really going on.

  ‘My dad wouldn’t do that,’ she snapped. Rebecca phoned Michael on his mobile and put him on loudspeaker.

  ‘Listen, darling, I swear on your life I’d never do that to you, I’d never kiss Sam. She works for me,’ he promised.

  More lies.

  Rebecca turned on me. ‘My dad said you need to be sectioned. You need to see a doctor,’ she shouted, echoing her father’s words.

  I had the pictures in my bag, but I couldn’t let on until Michael got back because I wanted to get him first. My head was all over the place. I cried out that my own daughter didn’t believe me and then I just saw red. Him lying to Rebecca, our daughter, was the final straw. I just went mad, absolutely crazy.

  I charged through the kitchen, grabbing a knife and a keyring and I went to town on Michael’s brand new Porsche Panamera in our driveway. Michael was so anal about his cars: if I scraped a wheel he would go on about it for a week. I swear he cared more about those cars than me. You fucker, I thought as I scratched his beloved £100k Porsche to shreds.

  I charged next door to my guesthouse that I’d let Sam live in, out of the kindness of my heart. All her clothes were crumpled at the bottom of the wardrobe. I was shocked at the state of the place. Michael was OCD about cleanliness just like me. How could he find a girl who leaves her room like this attractive? I scooped the clothes up into my arms and threw every single item of hers out of the window and into the garden. I picked up the dressing table and threw that onto the drive too. I was like a banshee.

  Meanwhile, Rebecca and my mum were screaming for me to stop. ‘You can’t do this, Mum,’ Rebecca cried.

  ‘I’ve done it,’ I said dusting my hands off.

  ‘You’re mad. He’s not having a affair,’ Rebecca shouted, as she started collecting Sam’s clothes into black bin bags.