Twenty-three-year-old Jane Bell (born Helen Burns) is an outsider in Thornfield Estates. A native of Phoenix, Jane has escaped her turbulent childhood in search of a new life. Jane finds work in Thornfield Estates as a dog walker and becomes enamored of the stability and safety she believes exists in this wealthy community. However, Jane struggles to balance her own journey of self-development with the murder investigation haunting the community.

Jane is ambitious and resourceful, and she attempts to guarantee her own security by strategizing her marriage to the presumably widowed Eddie Rochester. Meanwhile, she navigates the threats of blackmail from John Rivers, an acquaintance from the past, and her paranoia surrounding her part in the death of her neglectful foster father. Jane’s keen instincts help her in these endeavors; although she performs naivete, Jane is quick to sense when something is amiss and eventually uncovers the truth about Bea Rochester’s disappearance.

At the end of the novel, Jane instinctively saves herself from the fire that kills Eddie and Bea. Afterward, she begins life as an independent woman. She finds freedom in the wealth she inherits and embarks on a journey into a hopeful future no longer tortured by the ghosts of her past.