The Murder Rule(64)

“I’m not sure what to do,” Hannah said. “Do I just go over there?”

“Maybe we should both go,” Sean said.

Hannah shook her head. “I think, if the aim is to keep things low-key and nonconfrontational, we’d better be as unintimidating as possible.” She stood up, straightened her shirt. “Wish me luck.” She didn’t wait for Sean to naysay her. She walked across the bar. Nel y Furtado was playing on the bar’s speakers and the music gave a lift to her feet, gave her hips a swing she hadn’t intended. Al three boys looked up at her approach and there was a suggestion of appreciation, a hint of anticipation.

“Hi,” she said, directing her attention at Sam.

“Hi,” he said. He looked surprised and pleased. He sat up a bit straighter on his stool.

“You’re Sam, aren’t you?”

Surprise and a hint of confusion on his face. “Yes,” he said.

“My name’s Hannah. I’m a law student at the University of Virginia. I’m real y sorry to interrupt your night with your friends. But I wondered if you’d let me buy you a beer and talk to me for a few minutes about the Michael Dandridge case.”

He flinched—whatever he had expected from her it hadn’t been that. She felt rather than saw his friends move closer. They’d either heard what she’d said or picked up on the change of energy.

“I promise I’m not here to make you uncomfortable, or change your mind about anything. I can’t imagine what you and your family have been through.” The horror of what he had been through struck her suddenly and she realized that despite her words she hadn’t truly given thought or time or brain space to him. To what it must have been like to lose your mother in that brutal way, when you were just a little boy. It might have been the beer or it might have been the strain of the situation or the fact that he suddenly looked so young, but she found that her eyes were fil ing with tears. “I’m sorry . . .”

“It’s okay,” he said. “Yeah . . . I mean, we can get a drink.”

“Are you sure? Thanks. Real y. Thanks a lot.” She felt the disapproval of Sam’s friends as she turned away. She felt it in their silence, in the moment Sam took to reassure them before he fol owed her to the bar. She chose two stools a little away from the other drinkers.

“What can I get you?”

“Uh . . . one of these would be fine,” he said. He held up his beer bottle, which was almost empty. Hannah thought briefly about the fact that he was underage and went ahead and bought the beers anyway.

“So look, Sam. I’m working with the Innocence Project. It’s something I volunteer for, you know? The Project . . . they’re pretty convinced about Dandridge’s innocence.” Hannah held up one hand.

“I’m keeping more of an open mind. I want you to know that I’m not here with any kind of agenda. But my boss, the guy who runs the Project, he’s convinced that Dandridge didn’t kil your mom. That it was someone else. And he has some questions about the photo ID

the police did with you. I guess . . . I was hoping to talk to you, to see if there’s anything you want to say about that.”

The bartender had delivered the beers and taken Hannah’s money, but she lingered nearby, wiping a counter that was already clean, or at least as clean as it was going to get. Hannah caught the barmaid’s eye and she wandered away. But Hannah didn’t miss the fact that when the bartender reached the far end of the bar, she took out her phone and made a cal .

Sam drank from his bottle of beer. In the photographs and chats online he had been al bravado and banter. Here in person he came across as much younger, less sure of himself.

“I don’t know,” he said. “You know the police don’t want me speaking to you guys. Sheriff Pierce says I don’t have to. My grandparents would be pissed if they knew you were here.”

“I’m real y sorry about that,” Hannah said. “And Sheriff Pierce is right. You don’t have to talk to anyone you don’t want to talk to.”

He cast her a sideways look. “You’re not very pushy, are you? I thought you guys would be . . . I don’t know. Pretty rabid about stuff.”

“I care about what happened to your mom. And I want to know the truth. But I genuinely don’t have an agenda beyond that. Look, Sam, I just transferred into Virginia. This case, the Project, everything is al new to me. Maybe if I’d been working for the Project for a year like some of my friends, I’d feel differently. But I haven’t and I don’t.”

“Is he one of your friends?” Sam asked, nodding over her shoulder toward Sean. Hannah turned around. Sean looked back at them, smiled reassuringly.

“Yes,” she said.

“How come he’s not over here talking to me?”

She smiled. “I think we both thought we would have a better chance of you talking to me.”

“Because you’re pretty?” Sam said. He flushed when he said it, but he held his ground.

Hannah made a face. “Maybe. Or maybe it’s just that I’m a girl. I don’t know. It feels awkward now.”

He laughed a little and she felt a bit easier.

“Sam, can I ask you, the photo ID . . . ?”

“Yeah.” He looked down at the bar.