The End of the Marston Siblings.
As he looked around his cell - completely different and frighteningly bleaker than his hotel suites - Stephen Marston hugged himself for reassurance as he looked at the bleak cold brick walls of his cell. The young man was frightened, scared, and completely not like his normal confident and self-assured self. He was terrified since this was his in his future, and there was nothing he could really do about it.
As the one who had actually shoved Diane off the balcony, Stephen had little doubt at all he would receive a lengthy sentence for the murder planned between himself and his sisters. Truly, Stephen didn't know what kind of sentence Karen and Pearl would get, but he hoped when they got out, they would come through it together.
What happened then… Stephen could not guess. He didn't know if their father would accept them back into his life, but Stephen hoped somehow their father would allow them back into the fold.
Stephen sighed as he leaned his head back as he recalled what had made him and his sisters come up with the plan to kill her off. While Stephen and Karen hadn't had as many problems with Diane as Pearl had since they'd had fairly good positions within the family business, but they'd had clashes, and they had always been nasty. Diane didn't like the way he lived his life, in fact she hadn't cared for the way any of the Marston siblings lived their lives.
The arrogance of the woman had grown out of proportion when she had gotten engaged, and once she had then Diane had used that engagement to gain power.
Stephen remembered it quite distinctly. As soon as Diane had gotten their father on her side, she began to make waves. She didn't like how he had other people running around, fetching his meals, doing his laundry and shining his shoes while he, in her words, 'lazed around when there was work to be done.'
In contrast he was often compared to Karen, whom Diane seemed to like; Stephen hadn't taken too kindly to that any more than Pearl had enjoyed being told what to do, and he'd had fun sneering at the woman from behind her back when he saw the look of barely hidden contempt beneath Karen's calm demeanour as the woman slowly but surely crept into their lives and drove an invisible wedge - invisible to their father, but perfectly visible to his children - and his children, though whether or not the woman responsible saw it or not.
It didn't matter now.
Diane was dead.
Stephen closed his eyes as he thought about his own role in the murder; he'd had to physically push Diane onto the balcony after carefully arranging for her room to be placed directly beneath his own to stage the illusion. Stephen would need to live with that for the rest of it his life, and he had felt….different as he had done it. He had learnt since killers did feel different as soon as they committed a murder.
Anyway, back on to topic… Diane did not realise until it was too late how little Karen cared for her as soon as their dad popped the question.
The trouble was the relationship between Karen and Diane started to sour as soon as Diane got engaged. But truthfully Karen had lost her liking for the woman when their father had expressed his desire to marry her. All of the Marston siblings had fond memories of their real biological mother, they did not want another woman to intrude on those memories.
That was the prime reason why they had killed Diane.
Yes, the woman had threatened their ideal lifestyles. Yes, the woman had meddled and shown she was a force to be reckoned with?
They loved their father, they genuinely did; they just did not want someone intruding on their life, upsetting the memories they had and cherished from the time their mother had still been alive. They had it well; their father was rich, the owner of a highly successful chain of hotels dotted about the globe. He and Karen were - was - high in the company. They hadn't wanted for anything.
How did that make them spoilt?
Stephen didn't think they were spoilt, and he knew his sisters felt the same way. And yet that Detective Inspector claimed they were, but that was not right in Stephen's mind. In Stephen's mind, they were just privileged. They'd gone to great schools, been given a phenomenal opportunity; he and Karen worked in the company high up while Pearl promoted it. Who was a Detective Inspector to claim they were spoilt? Who was Diane to interfere in their lives?
Okay, he was not proud about the sexual assault charge, but he had fixed it. Why was everyone going on about it?
But another good primary reason was the idea of their father and Diane having children. Stephen rubbed his face as he remembered how his sisters had bitched about it for hours while he was sitting quietly to the side, thinking angrily about it, the primary thought dominating his mind while his sisters screeched about it once Karen had come out of the fight between herself, Diane and their father over that prenup.
Karen, Stephen and Pearl had all grown up with their father's attention and they didn't want to share him.
In Stephen's mind, DI Mooney and his team had gotten the motivations all wrong. No, the motives to commit the murder had been deeper than what he had believed.
Diane had threatened their lifestyles, yes Stephen gave the Detective Inspector marks out of 10 for that, but he had not thought long and hard about the other motives. Looking at his current situation the way it was, Stephen didn't doubt it would not make a shred of difference; he and his sisters would find themselves locked up regardless.
No, the reason they had murdered Diane was as Pearl had said. They had not wanted her. They had not wanted some stranger coming into their lives, changing things and upsetting the status quo. Stephen admitted he had made a lot of mistakes during his time in the company, lord knew he had, but he could have done without Diane's holier than thou crap. But what they hadn't wanted was to be kicked out of their father's life, and Stephen and his sisters knew that that was what was going to happen.
If Diane and their father had kids, they would soon be the ones their dad prized the most. None of his real children could stomach that. They simply had not wanted to be Marstons in name, but have their father just.…ditch them over another woman, and another kid. The threats to their lifestyles were one thing, that was the real reason they had committed the murders, at least in Stephen's mind. He only hoped his sisters felt exactly the same way.