“Hel o,” he said. He had blue eyes, dark lashes, and an almost feminine mouth. She couldn’t stop cataloguing his features, as if she could find the answers to al of her questions in his face. How was it possible that he should look so normal?
“I’m Sean.” Sean paused and waited for Hannah to introduce herself. When she didn’t, he continued. “This is Hannah. We’ve both been assigned to work on your case.”
“It’s good to meet you both,” Dandridge said. “Thank you for your work.” He took a seat on one side of the table and they sat opposite him. He rested both arms on the table and leaned forward. “Where’s Rob? I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“He’s tied up,” Sean said. “With the hearing next week, he’s been working on motions and preparing arguments. He wants to be here, but he also wants to do his best work for you.”
“I get that,” Dandridge said. “But I need to prepare too. I’m going to be in court next week, with Pierce and Engle and al of the rest of them out to get me. To get that needle in my arm.” He tapped at his inner right elbow with two fingers of his left hand. The movement was sudden and unexpected and despite herself, Hannah flinched.
Dandridge’s eyes went to her briefly before returning to Sean. “I need to talk to Rob. Get my head straight before it al kicks off.”
“I know,” Sean said. “Rob knows that too. He’s going to try to get down tomorrow, but worst case he’s booked a video meeting. And you know we’l have at least an hour with you in Yorktown, pretrial.”
Dandridge grumbled. “That video conferencing tech is a heap of shit. It works maybe a third of the time, if you’re lucky. The rest of the time you get hooked up to the wrong meeting, or the audio goes out.
And I don’t trust the prison not to listen in, do you?”
Sean grimaced. “Maybe not.”
“And fucking Yorktown. The last time I was there they broke my ribs. They gave me internal bleeding. I was lucky not to lose my goddamn liver. Going back there is going to make my PTSD worse, you know that? I don’t know why Rob didn’t get a change of venue. I mean, given everything . . . You know, even the feds saw that I was set up. How does it make sense to send me back to the same prosecutor and the same court system that sent me down in the first place? You tel me that.”
There was no way to answer that question.
“We found Neil Prosper,” Hannah said. She wanted to hurt him, even if it was only in some smal way.
“Wel , goddamn. You found Neil?”
“He changed his name and moved to North Carolina two days after you were arrested,” Hannah said. “He hasn’t been wil ing to talk to us. He won’t answer our questions. He hasn’t backed up your alibi.”
Dandridge’s expression darkened and he shook his head.
“Goddamnit. Goddamn. Pierce got to him. You can take that to the bank.”
“Rob is thinking about subpoenaing him,” Sean said.
Dandridge shook his head. “There’s no point. Neil’s not going to go up against Pierce for me. We never had that kind of friendship, not even back in the day. And now? After eleven years? I don’t think so.”
“We should at least try . . .” But Dandridge just kept shaking his head darkly and Sean let his voice trail off. There was silence for an uncomfortable moment.
“Wel ,” Dandridge said in the end. “What else have you got for me?”
Sean shifted in his seat again. “Most of the arguments in court wil be about pul ing apart the old evidence that they used to convict you. It’s real y about pointing out to the court—to a new judge who wil be very aware of the media glare—just how weak and unreliable that evidence is. And we’l be putting you on the stand to talk about the beating Pierce gave you, that wil be new.”
“What he did was beat me to a pulp. I was pissing blood for a month afterward. And I went cold turkey in their jail. No support. It’s a goddamn miracle I didn’t die.” His expression darkened. “Maybe that’s what they wanted. Wouldn’t that have wrapped things up nice and neat? Junkie rapist dies in prison. So sad.”
If she could have, Hannah would have curled her lip. So much for Angie Conroy’s belief that Dandridge and Prosper didn’t use heavy drugs. No one went cold turkey from weed and the occasional E tab.
“So we don’t have photos to prove your injuries, unfortunately, but we do have the medical report from when you were transferred to Sussex I State Prison. That shows the fractured ribs beginning to heal, and at least records that you reported the other internal injuries.”
Dandridge leaned back again in his chair but he let his right arm rest against the table. He had a habit of doing that. Resting his right arm on the table, palm up, then cupping his left palm over the inside of his right elbow as if to protect it. “What I don’t get is why we don’t have anyone else ready to go on the record about how he beat them. There’s no way I was the only one. Pierce knew what he was doing. His deputies didn’t even blink when he hit me the first time.”
“We’re stil working on that,” Sean said. “There were two old formal complaints on the record apart from yours, but one of the complainants is dead and the other we’re stil trying to find.”
The conversation continued, with Sean trying to sound upbeat and Dandridge complaining that they should be doing more. That any PI worth his salt would have found the other complainant now and if the Project was wil ing to spend some money they would get better results. One smal part of Hannah’s brain was stil listening to that conversation, stil cataloguing it. But the other part of her brain, the larger part, was utterly frozen. Dandridge had taken to opening and closing his right hand, like someone getting ready for a blood test, or a junkie preparing to find a vein. And every time he opened his right hand, she could see a thick, silvery scar, running diagonal y across his palm.
“What happened to your hand?”
“What?” Dandridge said.
“Your hand. How did you get that scar?” Hannah’s mouth was bone dry.
He looked confused for a second, then shrugged. “I was a kid. I was five. I think I put my hand through a window, but I don’t real y remember.” He looked irritated. There was a moment’s silence.
“Uh . . . can we talk again about Jerome Pierce and the interrogation?” Sean said. “Can you take me through who was in the room, before and after the beating? I’d like to know—”
“They fired the nanny,” Hannah blurted out.
Dandridge stared at her. “What did you say?”
“I didn’t . . . I didn’t mean . . .” Hannah shook her head. She tried to push her chair back, but it was fixed to the floor. Her heart was racing painful y now, and her lungs felt tight. She couldn’t take a deep breath.
“How did you know about my nanny?” Dandridge said. He was looking back and forth between Hannah and Sean, clearly expecting some sort of explanation.
“I didn’t . . . I just assumed . . .” It was no good. Hannah stood up.
“I have to go, I’m sorry.”
Sean looked at her, openmouthed.
“I’m sorry,” she said again, but insistent.
“If we cal the guard, that’s it. Mike wil have to go back to his cel ,” Sean said.