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but there was a complete absence of semen. And no signs of trauma – no vaginal damage or tearing.’ He started to say something, but she cut him off. ‘Detective, you and I both know that doesn’t necessarily prove anything.’
    Chris did know this, but it didn’t stop him from wishing it did. Forcible penetration would have meant that they were dealing with a clear-cut rape case, which somehow might have been easier than an apparently motiveless murder/suicide. Not to mention a case of missing identity.
    ‘So what you’re telling me is that there was sex, but it’s likely it wasn’t rape, and might not even indicate a sexual relationship?’
    ‘That’s about it.’ Karen sat back in her chair.
    ‘Right. What I wouldn’t give for a clear cut case,’ he muttered, hoping that Clare’s college friends might be able to shine some light on what was going on.
     
    ‘Sure, Clare was a bit, like … you know, a flirt, but she wasn’t seeing anyone, you know … like, exclusively or anything,’ Clare’s ‘very best friend’ Melanie told the detectives between sobs when they called to interview her on campus. ‘I just can’t believe she’s dead,’ she added, before bursting into tears yet again. ‘This is so, like … massive.’
    Chris saw Kennedy’s expression and suspected his partner, like himself, was wondering how on earth this American high-school jargon had so entrenched itself into the lingo of Irish college students.
    ‘I know this is very difficult for you, Melanie, but when you say that Clare wasn’t seeing anyone exclusively, does that mean that she might have been seeing a number of different guys?’ he probed.
    ‘No way. She wasn’t, like, a slut or anything. How can you say that?’
    ‘We’re not saying that,’ Kennedy soothed. ‘All we’re trying to do is figure out who might have hurt Clare and, as her very best friend, you’re possibly the best chance we have of doing that.’
    ‘Look, all I know is that she didn’t, like, go out with lots of different guys. They digged her but really, she was just as happy on her tobler.’
    The detectives both looked blank. ‘Her tobler?’
    Melanie rolled her eyes. ‘Happy on her own? Tobler one ?’
    ‘Christ,’ Kennedy moaned afterward. ‘I’ll tell you one thing, if my two ever end up talking like that I’ll send them straight off to elocution lessons.’
    ‘Man – that’s so, like, harsh,’ Chris jibed.
    Melanie was insistent that Clare hadn’t being seeing anyone since her previous boyfriend Paul, a fellow student. When the detectives interviewed him, Paul seemed shell-shocked by what had happened but was helpful and courteous.
    ‘We went out for a couple of months, but when Clare started studying for her finals, we kind of drifted apart,’ he told them.
    Now, only days into the investigation, the detectives were fast approaching a brick wall. Everyone they’d spoken to had painted Clare Ryan as a normal, happy-go-lucky girl who was close to her family, had lots of friends and, according to her lecturers, was an extremely diligent student.
    Having interviewed everyone in Clare’s immediate circle, they still had no clue as to who the dead man might be, or why he had ended Clare’s life as well as his own. And because most of the guy’s face was missing and there was no chance of carrying out a reconstruction job, there was little else to help identify him.
    While the funeral would normally be held soon after the body was released from the morgue, it hadn’t yet taken place because the parents were having problems locating close family abroad. Chris was certain that when it did, there would be a pretty impressive turnout.
    In the meantime, because of the victim’s profile, the media frenzy had already begun in earnest. While it was almost expected that inner-city scumbags would go around shooting each other, violent deaths in so-called ‘polite society’ was simply not acceptable to the general public, and the