The Secret Place (Dublin Murder Squad, #5)(61)

I said, ‘Last year. Did you ask the girls were they sexually active?’

‘Course we asked. They all said no. Headmistress sitting right there, staring them out of it, what else are they gonna say?’

‘You think they were lying?’

‘What, you figure I can tell just by looking?’

But there was a grin at the corner of her mouth. I said, ‘Better than I can, anyway.’

‘Like being back in school. “D’you think she’s Done It yet?” All we talked about, when I was that age.’

‘Same here,’ I said. ‘Believe me.’

The grin hardened over. ‘I believe you, all right. And for yous, if a girl did the business, she was a slut; if she didn’t, she was frigid. Either way, yous had a perfect reason to treat her like dirt.’

It was a bit true; not a lot, not for me. I said, ‘No. Either way, she got even more exciting. If she did the do, then there was a chance you might get to have sex, and when you’re a young fella that’s the biggest thing in the world. If she didn’t, there was a chance she might think you were special enough to do it with. That’s pretty big too, believe it or not. Having a girl think you’re something special.’

‘Smooth talker, you. Bet that got you into a lot of bras.’

‘I’m only telling you. You asked.’

Conway thought that over, chewing apple. Decided she believed me; enough, anyway.

‘If I was guessing,’ she said, ‘back then, I’d’ve said Julia and Gemma had had sex, Rebecca’d never even had a snog, and the rest were somewhere in between.’

‘Julia? Not Selena?’

‘Why? Because Selena’s got bigger tits, she’s the slapper?’

‘Jaysus! No. I wasn’t noticing their . . . Ah, f*ck’s sake, now.’

But Conway was grinning again: winding me up, and she’d snared me. ‘You f*ck,’ I said, ‘that’s disgusting, that is,’ and she laughed. She had a good laugh, rich, open.

She was starting to like me, whether she liked it or not. People do, mostly. Not bragging here; just saying. You have to know your strengths, in this job.

The mad part was, a bit of me was starting to like her too.

‘Here’s the thing,’ Conway said, laugh gone. ‘If I was guessing now, I’d guess the same again about Holly’s gang.’

‘So?’

‘The four of them. Pretty girls, right?’

‘Jesus, Conway. What do you take me for?’

‘I’m not calling you a perv. I’m saying when you were sixteen. Would you have been into them? Asked them out, Facebooked them, whatever kids do these days?’

When I was sixteen, I would’ve seen those girls like polished things in museum cases: stare all you want, get drunk on the dazzle of them, but no touching, unless you’ve got the tools and the balls to smash through reinforced glass and dodge armed guards.

They looked different, now I’d seen that board. I couldn’t see pretty, any more, without seeing dangerous underneath. Splinters.

I said, ‘They’re grand. Holly and Selena are good-looking, yeah. I’d say they get plenty of attention – not from the same guys, probably. Rebecca’s going to be good-looking soon enough, but when I was sixteen I might not have copped that, and she doesn’t seem like great crack, so I’d have kept moving. Julia: she’s no supermodel, but she’s not bad, and she’s got plenty of attitude; I’d’ve looked twice. I’d say she does OK.’

Conway nodded. ‘That’s about what I’d’ve said. So why no boyfriends? If I’m guessing right, why’ve none of them got any action in the last year?’

‘Rebecca’s a late bloomer. Still at boys are icky and the whole thing’s embarrassing.’

‘Right. And the other three?’

‘Boarding school. No guys. Not a lot of free time.’

‘Hasn’t stopped Heffernan’s gang. Two yeses, one no, one sort-of: that’s what I’d expect, give or take. Holly’s gang: no, no, no, no, straight down the line. No one takes a second to decide what to say, no one says it’s complicated, no one’s giggling and blushing, nothing. Just flat-out no.’

‘You figure what? They’re gay?’

Shrug. ‘All four of them? Could be, but the odds say no. They’re a close bunch, though. Scare one of them off the fellas, you’d scare off the lot.’

I said, ‘You think someone did something to one of them.’

Conway threw her apple core. She had a good arm; it skimmed long and low between the trees, smashed into a bush with a rattle that sent a couple of small birds panicking upwards. She said, ‘And I think something’s f*cked up Selena’s head. And I don’t believe in coincidences.’

She pulled out her phone, nodded at my apple. ‘Finish that. I’m gonna check my messages, then we move.’

Still giving the orders, but her tone had changed. I’d passed the test, or we had: the click was there.

Your dream partner grows in the back of your mind, secret, like your dream girl. Mine grew up with violin lessons, floor-to-high-ceiling books, red setters, a confidence he took for granted and a dry sense of humour no one but me would get. Mine was everything that wasn’t Conway, and I would’ve bet hers was everything that wasn’t me. But the click was there. Maybe, just for a few days, we could be good enough for each other.