The police were supposed to know how to be delicate. They’d tiptoed between the land mines of marital discord in any number of cases. I was entering the fray without training or experience, so I tried to tread lightly.

“What exactly have the police said to you about Blake? About why they want to talk to him about this woman’s murder?”

Sam stared straight ahead and through the windshield like it was a giant screen. A few shoppers wandered around the lot in the distance. An older man pushing a cart. Two young women in workout clothes laughing and carrying cups of coffee.

Had Sam even heard me? She proved she had by saying, “I’m not an idiot, Ryan.”

“I never said you were.”

“Not in so many words, you didn’t.” She turned to face me. She looked younger than Blake and younger than me. She could still easily pass for a college student despite being the same age as I was. “I know what you all think about Blake and me. That he’s difficult, and I’m naive. That I don’t know what I’m getting into. That we’ll get married, and he’ll just walk all over me.”

“It’s none of my business what goes on—”

“Huh.” She shook her head and looked back out the windshield. Foot traffic was picking up as the morning shoppers came out. “You’re not denying it. You’re just using that dodge. ‘It’s none of my business.’ Well, why isn’t it any of your business, if Blake is your closest friend? If Amanda and I are supposed to be friends?”

“I just mean that what you and Blake work out is between the two of you. No one can intrude on that. And you know, Blake and I haven’t been quite as close—”

She turned to face me again. “And why is that? Why haven’t you guys been as close?”

Rountree had nothing on Sam when it came to conducting an interrogation. She should have flashed a badge and read me my rights.

“We had a baby, Sam. Henry takes a lot of time and energy.”

“And Amanda chewed Blake out. I know that.”

“She’s reconsidering all of that. She was just telling me she needs to look at Blake in a new light.”

“I know. The lampshade-banging thing pissed her off. I get it. The drinking. I’ve always liked Amanda, regardless of how she feels about Blake. She’s right about a lot of what she thinks of him. And I admire her for having a career and then being willing to put it on hold to raise Henry. I want to do that someday. I want to have all of those things. With Blake.”

She presented me with an opening to steer the conversation back to the original matter, so I took it. “That’s why we need to find him,” I said.