Sadie King (Patsy Kensit) finally achieves her goal in next week's Emmerdale, when she deals a potentially fatal blow to the marriage of Caleb and Ruby Miligan (William Ash and Beth Cordingly). At the behest of fellow scumbag Joe Tate (Ned Porteous), Sadie's main focus has been to obliterate the marriage of her 'best friend' Ruby, and she's using a lethal combination of manipulation, alcohol and seduction to do it – convincing Caleb that Ruby is an alcoholic while convincing Ruby that Caleb is controlling her.
Ruby has decided to go sober, something Sadie needs to fix in order to keep her plan going: 'It's such bad behaviour!' Patsy confirms. 'She keeps getting her these mocktails and shoving alcohol in them without her knowledge. Ruby thinks it tastes a bit strange, but she's got no idea whats really happening.'
Spiked Mocktails and a Well-Timed Text
Next week sees those spiked mocktails, a well-timed text and a light-footed Ross Barton (Michael Parr) combine to hand Sadie a massive victory, when she finally beds Caleb. 'They're in the pub and Sadie's flirting with Ross, he starts doing a ballroom dance, like a samba, and she grabs Ruby and throws them together,' Patsy explains. 'Ruby's had a few of these mocktails which have been spiked, so she's falling all over the place.'
'Caleb comes into the pub because Sadie texts him to say, Listen, I think you should know… He comes in and sees Ross and Ruby on the floor – Sadie's really manipulated him coming in there to try and damage their marriage.' And damage it she does: she later lets Caleb believe that a drunken Ruby has gone home with Ross – leading him to declare their marriage over and have sex with Sadie.
Sadie's Motives and Guilt
'I think that she's come back to the village, and she's really taken a hit in life, and she needs money, so I think that that is certainly driving her, it did last time too,' Patsy explained as to why Sadie is being so cruel. 'She likes an affluent lifestyle, and so I think she wants that back, she also looks at Caleb and Ruby's marriage and it's painful for her because she would love what Ruby has.'
Is there any guilt over what she's doing? According to Patsy, there is. 'Because Ruby's been really kind to her, 100% I think she does [feel guilty]. The old Sadie would just squash her like a fly, but Sadie sort of struck up a weird, good relationship with Ruby, so it's more complicated – I can't reveal too much, but later on we will see she's adamant about her sorrow for hurting Ruby, and it's genuine.'
What's Next for Sadie
Caleb's stomach drops when he realises that Ruby and Ross didn't sleep together, and soon, Ruby gets wise to Sadie leading Caleb to believe that they did, but according to Patsy, Sadie is confident that she can turn the tide back in her favour. 'She's got a plan,' Patsy said. 'She's like a horse with blinkers on—she's very motivated by money and very used to the art of manipulation.'
While clearly, Sadie and Ruby's friendship will be destroyed when Ruby finds out the truth, is there anyone else Patsy could see Sadie bonding with? 'I'd love her to have a relationship with Mandy [Dingle] because I get on with Lisa Riley really well. She has a beauty bar, so it would be great if Sadie had a storyline where she had money to invest in that.'
Off-screen, Patsy is having a wonderful time in her second village stint. 'Will and Beth are brilliant,' she beamed over her co-stars. 'From the start coming in, I had a lot of stuff with Nicola [Wheeler] and she was so amazing to me. Now I'm filming lots with Will and Beth and again they are so kind. I've learned so much from them. It's been a joy, we've really got on, everyone's lovely. It's a really lovely show.'
