Erika Jayne was once again front and center on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills this week.
On part two of the reality show’s Season 12 special, Jayne was grilled by host Andy Cohen over all things Tom Girardi, frrom her ex-husband’s financial situation to his very curious and unfaithful penis.
Indeed, Erika.
Why did you leave Tom as soon as you knew he was cheating on you?
“The cheating was a part of it, there’s so much more there,” Erika told Cohen in response to this question.
“I said to Tom if you are in love with someone else, divorce me. He said nothing. If you are in love with someone else, don’t make me a bad guy.”
This past summer, Jayne claimed she split fom Girardi in November due to his cheating — and not, she insisted, as a way to hide assets from the couple’s alleged embezzlement scheme.
On this topic, Jayne said Tom had been sleeping around for years, with at leas three mistresses,, while she remain loyal all the way up until the divorce filing.
Jayne also said she wasn’t in control of her finances and that her credit cards would have been cut up if she left Tom earlier.
What about her Bravo salary, though?
“I gave every paycheck to my husband,” Erika said on air. “I’ve handed every paycheck I’ve ever made over…
“I’m telling you I could not leave because I had no access to the money.”
Continued Jayne:
“I was 27 when I went in, he was 60. The power balance is way out of whack. I trusted this man. All of my finances were kept down at the firm and everything was kept there.”
Girardi, of course, has been accused of stealing millions of dollars from past law firm clients.
The nagging question hanging over Erika is whether or not she played a role in this theft.
Did Jayne feel like Tom’s monetary ship was sinking when she walked away from the marriage?
“I felt like he was sinking, not necessarily the ship,” Erika replied.
“There was no talking to this person — trying to get him to answer my questions, being shut out completely. Anger, personality changes. And you can see now — look the man is in a home.
“He’s in a memory-care facility.
“We have seen how disheveled and how absolutely horrible he has deteriorated since I left in November. So what I have been saying is true.”
Jayne really tried to hammer home this point, that Tom has lost all mental capacity.
“He’s on a loop… saying the same stories over and over,” she told viewers.
“He’s a master persuader. And a master performer. He could not have told you anyone’s names here. Not a soul. But he certainly could sit there and entertain.”
Kylie Richards then chimed in and said there’s a “vacancy” in Tom’s head these days.
Andy eventually asked if Erika would still have married Tom knowing what she knows now.
“I’m at a place where I don’t know quite who I was married to,” she responded.
“And I’m trying to — much like everyone else around me — trying to figure out what the f— happened.
“In the law firm and in my personal life and the things I am finding out.”
The allegations against Girardi are heinous. He’s believed to have stolen money from cancer patients, a burn victim and the families of plane crash victims.
As she’s done for so long, however, as she did on the first part of the reunion… Jayne pleaded total ignorance about these supposedly shady actions.
“I really and truly hope that is not true because that is not the man that I married. It does not look good. However, we still need to get to the bottom of it.
“I feel terrible,” she added of her name being associated with the allegations. “This is not who I am. And I hope this is not who he is. I hope he has not done what is alleged here.”
Concluded the embattled star:
“Whatever Tom Girardi did or did not do, that’s on him. But I know a lot of his decision making is being pointed this way now. His life is over. He’s in his 80s, he’s in a memory-care facility, his career is over and done.
“I just turned 50. I cannot allow all of this to destroy me and take me to a place I cannot recover.
“I have to survive this.”