Echo Burning

two million bucks in the bank,” Walker said. “All hers, effectively.”
    Reacher glanced at Alice. She nodded.
    “He’s right,” she said.
    “Now look at the last clause of the minutes,” Walker said.
    Alice turned the page. The last clause concerned reversion. The trusts would become discretionary once again and return the funds to Sloop’s own control at a future date to be specified by him. Unless he first became irreversibly mentally incapacitated. Or died. Whereupon all existing balances would become Carmen’s sole property, in the first instance as a matter of prior agreement, and in the second, as a matter of inheritance.
    “Is all of that clear?” Walker asked.
    Reacher said nothing, but Alice nodded.
    Then Walker passed her the taller pile.
    “Now read this,” he said.
    “What is it?” she asked.
    “A transcript,” Walker said. “Of her confession.”
    There was silence.
    “She confessed?” Alice said.
    “We videotaped it,” Walker said.
    “When?”
    “Noon today. My assistant went to see her as soon as the financial stuff came in. We tried to find you first, but we couldn’t. Then she told us she didn’t want a lawyer anyway. So we had her sign the waiver. Then she spilled her guts. We brought her up here and videotaped the whole thing over again. It’s not pretty.”
    Reacher was half-listening, half-reading. It wasn’t pretty. That was for damn sure. It started out with all the usual assurances about free will and absolute absence of coercion. She stated her name. Went all the way back to her L.A. days. She had been an illegitimate child. She had been a hooker. Street stroller, she called it. Some odd barrio expression, Reacher assumed. Then she came off the streets and started stripping, and changed her title to sex worker . She had latched onto Sloop, just like Walker had claimed. My meal ticket, shecalled him. Then it became a story of impatience. She was bored witless in Texas. She wanted out, but she wanted money in her pocket. The more money the better. Sloop’s IRS trouble was a godsend. The trusts were tempting. She tried to have him killed in prison, which she knew from her peers was possible, but she found out that a federal minimum-security facility wasn’t that sort of a place. So she waited. As soon as she heard he was getting out, she bought the gun and went recruiting. She planned to leverage her marks with invented stories about domestic violence. Reacher’s name was mentioned as the last pick. He had refused, so she did it herself. Having already fabricated the abuse claims, she intended to use them to get off with self-defense, or diminished responsibility, or whatever else she could manage. But then she realized her hospital records would come up blank, so she was confessing and throwing herself on the mercy of the prosecutor. Her signature was scrawled on the bottom of every page.
    Alice was a slow reader. She came to the end a full minute after him.
    “I’m sorry, Reacher,” she said.
    There was silence for a moment.
    “What about the election?” Reacher asked. The last hope.
    Walker shrugged. “Texas code says it’s a capital crime. Murder for remuneration. We’ve got enough evidence to choke a pig. And I can’t ignore a voluntary confession, can I? So, couple hours ago I was pretty down. But then I got to thinking about it. Fact is, a voluntary confession helps me out. A confession and a guilty plea, saves the taxpayer the cost of a trial. Justifies me asking for a life sentence instead. The way I see it, with a story like that, she’s going to look very, very bad, whoever you are. So if I back off the death penalty, I’ll look magnanimous in comparison. Generous, even. The whites will fret a little, but the Mexicans will eat it up with a spoon. See what I mean? The whole thing is reversed now. She was the good guy, I was the heavy hand. But now she’s the heavy hand, and I’m the good guy. So I think I’m O.K.”
    Nobody spoke for another minute. There was just the omnipresent roar of the air conditioners.
    “I’ve got her property,” Alice said. “A belt and a ring.”
    “Take them to storage,” Walker said. “We’ll be moving her, later.”
    “Where?”
    “The penitentiary. We can’t keep her here anymore.”
    “No, where’s storage?”
    “Same building as the morgue. Make sure you get a receipt.”

    Reacher walked with her over to the morgue. He wasn’t aware of taking a single step. Wasn’t aware of the heat, or