a carefully judged undertone. “They said probably this week.”
“Ah, lovely,” Rafferty said. “Not that much time, so. The way it works, right? if that cord was wrapped tight around Dominic’s neck, he’ll have left skin cells on it, all along the center length. That means DNA. It’ll be degraded, obviously, after being down a damp tree for ten years, but our techs are first-rate; they’ll still get there, it’s just taking them that bit longer. And if someone was pulling on those loops, same thing: he’ll have left skin cells all over them.”
“Hang on,” I said. I wanted just a second where I could think without their eyes on me. I wanted a smoke break. “Wait. If that was my hoodie cord, if, then my, my skin cells would be on it anyway. On the ends. Right where the loops are.”
“And,” Rafferty said, ignoring that, “we’ve tracked down the hoodie manufacturers. They’re finding us the specs on the cord they used for that model, so we can see if it’s consistent with what we’ve got. If it’s not, that doesn’t mean much either way—maybe there was one odd batch, or maybe the cord got replaced along the way—but if it’s a match, that’s interesting.”
“That hoodie wasn’t—I didn’t keep my stuff locked up. It was just lying around. Even if it, if that’s the cord, anyone could’ve taken it out. At a party or anywhere. Dominic could’ve.”
“And garroted himself?” Kerr inquired, with a grin. “I’m not sure that’s a thing, man.”
“We’ve heard from multiple sources,” Rafferty said, “that Dominic was a right prick to your cousin Leon. Leon told us himself, sure. He didn’t want to, he dodged around it for a while—which is interesting; like we were saying before, ye’re protective of each other, right? But he let it slip in the end.”
I just bet he had. I tried to keep my eyes off Rafferty’s, find familiar objects that would turn this real. Chipped red enamel teapot on the windowsill, checked tea towel hanging askew from the handle of the oven door. Ruffled orange marigolds in a cracked mug.
“He wasn’t a nice fella, this Dominic, was he? The stories people told us . . . I thought I’d seen a bit of bullying at my school, but man, some of this stuff gave me the shivers.” Screwing up his eyes worriedly, rubbing at his jaw: “How come you didn’t tell us that, last time? You said Dominic was ‘a good guy.’ Got on with everyone.”
“I didn’t know. About the bad stuff. I knew he sometimes gave Leon a bit of grief, but I thought it was just minor crap.”
“Half your school told us about it. You’re the person who was closest to Leon, and you’re telling me you missed the whole thing?”
“Leon didn’t tell me. No one told me. I don’t read minds.”
Rafferty cocked a wry eyebrow at me: Come on. “D’you feel like shit about it?” Kerr asked me. “I would.”
“What could I have—” That hum in the air, pressing into my ears. Kerr picking something off a side tooth, hard curious eyes on me. “What was I supposed to do?”
“Well, put a stop to it,” Rafferty said reasonably. “I wouldn’t say you’re the type to stand by and let your cousin take that kind of shite. Amn’t I right?”
“Probably not. If I’d known about it. Only I didn’t.”
They left that there for a moment. Kerr examined whatever he had found on his tooth. Rafferty balanced his phone carefully on its edge on the table.
“I’d bet,” he said—almost absently, all his attention on the delicate business of the phone—“I’d bet money that you only meant to give Dominic a scare. You don’t seem like a killer to me, not at all, and I’ve met plenty. You were only planning on shaking him up a bit, nothing serious, just warning him: Don’t you ever fuck with my cousin again. Which needed doing, and there’s not a decent person in the world who’d think less of you for it.” Glancing up at me, golden eyes lit to wildness by a rogue streak of sun: “I’m serious about that, man. I wasn’t just talking, before, when I said sticking by your family is the most important thing in the world. If even half the shit we heard about Dominic was true, then you had to put a stop to it. You had no choice.”
Jasmine creepers swinging dizzily outside the window, back and forth. A watercolor off-kilter on the wall, swallows in a