Chapter 18
Karen Alvarez felt the vibration, looked at her phone’s screen, and said, “Elizabeth? Why haven’t you called back before now?”
“I was at a funeral in Seattle. I turned my phone off. After that, the main people all got together in a kind of reception with food. It took all afternoon, and I wasn’t going to take calls during that either.
Then I had to catch a plane home, and my phone wasn’t on during the flight.
By the time I got home it was after midnight.
I knew you wouldn’t be in your office, and I wasn’t about to call another lawyer at that hour if you were.
And so here I am, returning your call. What’s so important? ”
“I sent someone to see Jane.”
“If you want me to help defend you or your client, I’ll clear my calendar. Is this call encrypted?”
“Yes. But it wouldn’t have to be. The client isn’t like that.
He’s a perfectly law-abiding, innocent person.
His former boss is not. He’s already tried once to be rid of him.
He sent some thugs to kidnap him and drive him out into the desert, presumably to kill him, but he escaped.
So I sent him to Jane. The problem is that he’s at the house, and she doesn’t seem to be the Jane we know. ”
“You mean she’s changed?”
“No. I mean literally. It’s a tall, dark-haired woman, but it’s not the woman we went to school with. It’s a person who seems to be posing as Jane.”
“Oh my God.”
“I was calling to ask you if you have a phone number that’s safe to use to call her—the real Jane—and warn her that this is going on.
My client also said that the imposter Jane had four men there with her, all of them Russians.
He said that after a day of listening to her, he thought maybe the tiny eccentricities or tonal variations in her speech were similar to their accents. ”
“What did you tell him?”
“I told him to get out. To run.”
“Good. That was the right thing to do, Karen. Have you called Jane?”
“I did, but I never got an answer. Then I thought maybe the number I was calling was ringing, but the imposter was just sitting there listening to the voicemail, so I didn’t leave a message.”
“I think the last number she gave me is a burner, a throwaway phone,” Elizabeth said. “Let’s hope she’s got it with her. It’s 716-555-0119.”
The third morning just before noon, Jane heard the sound of Carey’s car turning into the driveway.
She picked up May and walked to the garage while he was standing by the open trunk and taking his suitcase out.
She stood on tiptoes and gave him a kiss and then moved in close so his embrace could take in both her and May.
“You make me glad to be home,” he said. “How’s everything here?”
“Good. Getting better every minute,” she said. “Have you had lunch?”
“No.”
“Great. I’ll make us something nice.”
He took May from her, extended the handle of his wheeled suitcase, and walked with Jane to the house. When they were inside the kitchen, Carey held on to May and he and Jane talked.
After the smell of food had begun to alter the air of the McKinnon house, Katie drifted into the kitchen. She stood there for a moment and then said, “Hi, Carey. If you want to take your suitcase upstairs, I can hold May.”
Carey said, “Good idea. Thanks. I’ll be back in a few minutes.” He handed May to Katie. She watched him as he took the suitcase and walked quickly to the stairs.
Katie turned to Jane. “There’s a phone in the bookcase in the den that’s been making the signal that you have a text. I don’t know if it’s—”
Jane said, “Thanks, Katie. I’ll see who it was.
” She turned off the stove and hurried toward the den.
She had a few different phones for different purposes.
The one on the shelf in the den was a burner phone set aside for calls from a few relatives or special friends.
She hoped this call was some kind of friendly check-in, and not another emergency.
She unplugged the phone and read the text. “Call me. Urgent. Karen.”
Jane felt as though she’d had the wind knocked out of her. She touched the number on the phone screen, heard the ring signal, and then, “Jane?”
“Yep. It’s me. Hi.”
Karen said, “I sent a guy to see you. He got to your house, then called me and said there was a tall dark-haired woman there. Was it you? There were also four men there who were Russian.”
“Do you believe him?”
“Yes. I told him to run. I called the number of your old house, but nobody answered. It occurred to me that they must be afraid anybody who calls will realize she’s not you.”
“Thanks, Karen.”
“What can I do? Should I call the local police, or maybe the FBI?”
“Do nothing. I’ll have to handle it my own way. And thank you. I don’t know when we’ll talk again, but we will.” She hung up.
She put the phone down on the desk in the den, went back to the kitchen, turned the stove back on and took a stack of plates out of the cupboard, set them on the counter, put food on three plates, and set them on the table as Carey returned.
She said, “You two get started, and I’ll be back in a few minutes. ”
Carey sat down, and so did Katie. Jane set May in her bouncy chair by Carey and hurried to the back stairway, which led up to the attic.
The house had originally been the main building of the first McKinnon’s trading operation, and the third level was where he had stored valuables received in transactions with her ancestors.
She reached the second floor, opened the door of what looked like a closet near the end of the hallway, stepped inside, and went the rest of the way up the ladder that was attached to the wall.
She stepped to a spot where the thick, rough boards of the peaked roof met the vertical side wall capped by a wide shelf.
She reached the shelf and pulled down two bags, each the size of an airline carry-on.
She looked into the first and verified it was all there—twenty-five thousand dollars in hundred-dollar bills, three passports with her picture in them but different names, a packet of credit cards and driver’s licenses from different states, a Glock 17 pistol, and three loaded magazines.
The other one had the same variety of items, with Carey’s picture on the identification.
She took the bags and stepped back to the ladder.
Jane went down the short ladder to the second floor, and closed the door.
She walked back along the second-floor hallway to the bedroom she and Carey had shared since their marriage, set the two bags on their bed, and then went back downstairs to the kitchen.
Carey and Katie were just finishing their lunch of chicken, mashed potatoes, broccoli, and squash and were amusing May, who was still in her bouncy chair.
Jane spent a few seconds looking at the three.
They were only eight or ten feet away from her, but they were still in the old, normal life.
It was as though they were separated from her on the other side of a glass wall.
She had already passed into another phase, maybe even another life.
She saw them all become aware of her at once.
“Finished?” she said, and stepped into the kitchen.
Carey said, “I’ve got to say, this is a wonderful lunch. I don’t know how you’re always ready for these things.”
“Well, I did know your flight number. No secret. Uh, Carey, I’ve got to talk to you for a minute. Katie, can you please keep May happy?”
“Sure,” she said.
Jane took Carey’s hand and they went upstairs to their room. Carey sat on the bed and looked at the two bags on the bed beside him. “What are those?”
“Go bags. One for you, one for me. I started them when we got married, and I’ve kept them up to date since then.”
He stared at her for a few seconds, then stood up.
She walked herself into his arms and they hugged each other, rocking from side to side for a long time. “I’m sorry, Carey. I’m so, so sorry.”
The hug ended. It changed nothing, accomplished nothing, and became unbearable to them. Jane said, “We’ve got to get started.”
“Tell me what’s going on.”
“We’re all going,” she said. “We have to. It’s all my fault, of course. If this is the end of everything, please understand that you have nothing to regret. I would have happily stayed with you every day and night for the next fifty years, and wished we had more.”
“This can’t be,” he said. “I can’t believe what I’m hearing.”
“We don’t have unlimited time. I got a call from Karen Alvarez.
A man who was in trouble went to her in LA, and she realized his problem wasn’t legal help, so she sent him to me.
He made it to my old house. There was a woman there who pretended to be me.
He called Karen and said things seemed wrong.
There were four men with this woman, all of them Russians. ”
“This can’t be the same people as before,” he said. “They’re all dead. Maybe it isn’t the end of the world. It could be squatters. We could call the police. You don’t have anything incriminating there anymore, right?”
“They didn’t all die,” she said. “This woman didn’t. I thought she did, maybe even that the rest of her gang in California had killed her for running away and letting the others die. But obviously I was wrong.”
“How can you know?” he said.