IV
Jayna Berringer had recovered somewhat from her bruised jaw. The doctor had given her painkillers and some injections and told her to take it easy. Knowing her, that was impossible. She had changed out of the blue velvet Elizabethan gown and into a light green sheath. She even took the time to place a silver rose pin on her left shoulder. Despite her soft appearance, beneath the elegance laid one of toughest façades Steve ever knew. Jayna was not going to let someone attack her and get away with it.
"The wheels are turning in your head, Jayna," the top cop told his young assistant. "What's going on?"
"That bullet was meant for me," Jayna stated. Steve stared back at her, stunned.
"Meant for you?" he asked.
"Look at my dress." She pointed to the blue velvet Elizabethan gown. "Claire Treadway was wearing a similar dress, made of silk but in same shade of blue. It was different in style, being from the Renaissance, but a hit man might not know the difference. He would have been told to shoot a woman in a blue dress and that was that."
"Then that explains Treadway's outburst," Steve replied, "if he was involved in the hit."
"Could it be that he blamed me for the world knowing about his wife's affair with Keesling?" Jayna straightened the rose pin. "I was only the one who found out about it and even then, I didn't tell the reporters anything."
Steve got up and straightened the carved figurines on Jayna's mantel piece. "The truth doesn't matter to a man like Treadway. There has to be more to it than revenge. What else did you find out when you uncovered the affair?"
"That Claire Treadway had a bank account under a false name in the amount of ten thousand dollars," Jayna said. "The money was a bribe from Keesling to Grayle. I was in the middle of building a case against them. The affair was already public knowledge."
She got up and went to a cabinet. She pulled out a box and took it to the coffee table. She pulled out some notebooks and files.
"What are you looking for?" Steve asked.
"Claire's statement when we questioned her." Jayna found the paper and skimmed it for the information she needed. "Here it is." She handed the statement to Steve. "Claire was done with Keesling and was going to go back to her husband."
Steve read the statement. Claire talked all about her relationship with Keesling, which she had broken off six months earlier, she explained. She and her husband reconciled and were patching things up. Was Treadway still angry about the affair and not about to let it go? Steve wondered. There was some more information they needed, which would help everything become clearer.