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“Andrew told me he would prove he was telling me the truth. That he had the documentation and that he was going to go to the FBI with the information. So he left me in the motel and told me he’d be back in an hour. I didn’t know what else to do, so I called them. They told me I had to if anyone ever asked about the foundation. They said they owned me. They’d paid for me. And they said they could take it all away just as easily as they’d given. They never said it, but I knew that meant they’d kill us if we betrayed them. I had to protect my children.”
She bowed her head and started crying again and Jack took my hand in his under the table.I was tired, and I wanted nothing more than to leave this place and never set eyes on Jane Elliott again. She was weak and a disgrace, and she was just as much to blame for the murders of Jack’s men as anyone.
“Finish it out, Jane. Who did you call?”
She was resigned now as she answered. “I called Genny. She’s my contact. There’s a chain of command.”
“Then what happened?”
“I relayed all the information that Caine had told me and that he was going to get proof. Genny hung up the phone and maybe fifteen minutes later I got another call. The woman didn’t identify herself, but I could tell by the way she spoke that she was the one in charge. She knew things about me. Personal things that she wouldn’t have known unless I’d been under surveillance.”
“Do you have your phone on you now?” Jack asked. “Is it the same one you had then?”
Jane dug through her purse and held up the phone. “It’s the same.”
“It’s possible we can trace the callers. It’ll give us something besides circumstantial evidence.”
She handed it over and Jack stuck it into his shirt pocket.
“What did she say to you?”
Her breath hitched against and quiet sobs shook her body. “She said that I had to kill him. Kill Andrew. I was still so angry and hurt by the things he’d said, and she played on that. She told me he was setting me up and that everyone would think that John died a traitor if I believed his lies. She told me that was all my girls would remember about their father, and she said the only reason Andrew had been sleeping with me was because he thought I was just as guilty as John and needed to get close to me to prove it. She said a man like him would never be interested in a woman like me otherwise.
“I—I believed her.” Jane’s eyes were drenched and searching, as if she wanted us to understand why she took a knife to a man. “And then she reminded me that the organization owned me and I had no choice but to do what she said or face the consequences. She said my girls had sure looked cute walking to school that morning. She even described what they’d been wearing.” Another choked sob broke through and she covered her face with her hands.
“Andrew came back to the room a little while later with a legal size envelope full of papers. I told him I didn’t need to see them. That I believed him and that I was sorry.” She swiped the tears from her face and managed to look up at us, and her lips trembled as she tried to gather herself. “He told me he loved me and that he would protect me, but all I could think about was what would happen to my children if I didn’t do what she said.
“Andrew always carried that big knife in his bag, and he’d left it in the roomwith me. So while he was gone I put it under the pillow and knew there was only one way to kill him. He was a big man, and I knew I couldn’t overpower him. So I seduced him instead.” Jane looked at her hands again like they didn’t belong to her. They were fine boned, delicate, and smooth. Hardly the hands of a killer.
“So I did it.” The words barely came out as a whisper. “I did it for my children and I live with the nightmares of the surprise in his eyes as he realized whatwas happening.” She laid her head down on the table and her entire body shook as she wept.
“It’s too late for all that now, Jane.” Jack’s voice was sharp, and I could feel the anger vibrating from him. He no longer felt sympathy for this woman—pity, yes—but not sympathy. “Who came to help you get cleaned up?”
Jane satup but slumped in her seat, defeated. “I’m so sorry, Jack. Don’t be angry with me. Please. I need your help.”
“Then finish it out.”
“I don’t know who they were. I was so scared. In shock. And there was so much blood. It was everywhere. I got sick and had to run to the bathroom. All I could think about was getting the blood off. I climbed in the shower and turned the water on as hot as it would go, and then I just laid there as Andrew’s blood washed down the drain.”
Her voice was almost robotic now as she relayed the rest of the events. “Two women showed up out of nowhere. I don’t know how they got in the motel room, but they werejust there all of a sudden. They wore gray jumpsuits and they doused me in some kind of chemical. It got all the blood off, but it burned my skin. But not even the pain really got through to me.
“They cleaned the drains and used the same chemical on the bathroom to clean up all the blood and my handprints. They wrapped my hair in a protective cap and dressed me in a jumpsuit to match theirs. They put gloves on my hands and plastic booties on my feet, and then we went back into the room where Andrew was.
“It didn’t even seem real.He just lay there on the bed, his eyes staring blankly at the ceiling. And God—the blood. I wanted to be sick again, but I wasn’t. All I could do was stare at his body and try to come to the terms with the fact that I was the one who’d done that. I honestly don’t even remember holding the knife. It’s like it was someone else.”
I shook my head in disbelief. When she went to trial she’d probably say that exact thing to give her a chance at diminished capacity. My anger was risingby the minute, and I wanted nothing more than to put my fist through something. But Jack rubbed the back of my hand with his thumb and I knew he wanted me to keep silent for just a little while longer while she got the rest of it out. I remembered then that Carver had asked Jack to keep his line open. She was making a full recorded confession.
“They cleaned the knife and all the surrounding areas with the cleaner and then they planted strands of hair and other things on his body. I was told they paid off the office manager and a couple of vagrants across the street to say they’d seen Andrew go in the room with another woman. A blond prostitute. Witnesses came forward from a bar down the street and said they’d seen him leave with a woman who matched the same description as the one the manager and vagrants gave. These people have so much power. You understand now why I don’t like to leave my house.”
“Yeah, I understand.”
I felt sick inside and I could only imagine how Jack felt. This was more than personal to him. “Did Andrew have a tattoo?” I asked her.
“Not by the time we started sleeping together. But there was a scar on his back, just above his shoulder blade where he said he’d had one removed. I knew it was the same one you all had. The one that matched John’s. Andrew didn’t want me to see it and remember John.Remember that they’d been as close as brothers once. So he had it removed. For me.”
“Can you give me a description of the women who cleaned you up at the motel?”
Jane had control of herself now, as if confessing her sins had lifted a weight off her shoulders, and she trusted Jack when he said he’d help her. She was just about to answer when the front windows of the restaurant exploded. Shards of glass and wood flew toward us and people screamed as the air filled with acrid smoke.
