The Rational Faculty (Hazard and Somerset: A Union of Swords Book 1) by Gregory Ashe

Author:Gregory Ashe [Ashe, Gregory]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hodgkin and Blount
Published: 2019-11-27T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY

NOVEMBER 3

SATURDAY

7:12 PM

FOR SOMERS, THE REST of the day felt like being dragged through shit. He spent a lot of it working the crime scene: a storage unit belonging to Carl Klimich, where the adjunct professor had hanged himself from an exposed joist. He had used a belt, good leather, and the material had stretched and cut into his throat. Dr. Boyer came and examined the body, and then she had them cut him down. She wasn’t ready to pronounce it a suicide, not automatically, especially considering Carl’s connection to the recent murder. But she said it looked pretty open and closed.

Now, at home, Somers ran a plate under hot water. In his mind’s eyes, he kept seeing Carl. Not his blackened, swollen face. His hands. Carl had wrapped his wrists in the bondage tape—not tying them together, but wearing the tape like bracelets. His nails were broken from clawing at the belt; at the last minute, he must have changed his mind, but it had been too late.

Somers loaded the plate in the dishwasher and picked up the next one. They had gotten nothing valuable from the crime scene. No note. No explanation. And while Carl’s death did seem to indicate that he had played some role in Fabbri’s murder, it didn’t close the case. The man who had stabbed Jim was still out there, still free. And Somers’s one thread had just been snipped. All those hours spent in the storage unit, with the November sun like gold and the smell of shit lingering in the air, all for nothing.

Hazard had gotten home shortly after Somers, unwilling to explain where he’d been because he still hadn’t been able to get in touch with his client. They’d eaten a quick dinner: pasta, a jar of red sauce, frozen meatballs, frozen broccoli. Somers had done most of the talking because he was going to count Hazard as part of the team until Cravens revoked her earlier decision. Hazard, for his part, nodded and frowned, occasionally interrupting to ask questions.

As Somers loaded the last dish, he stretched up onto tiptoes, popping his back. Night had fallen, broken only by the starlight glow of a street lamp between the next row of houses. Against the darkness, the glass became a kind of mirror, and Somers could see himself: the messy hair, the cheekbones, the hollow of his throat. He could see the line of flesh where, on Carl, the belt had cut in. He wondered if this was why Hazard was always staring at the glass: it was a mirror, and it wasn’t. You could see yourself laid over the world like a transparency. It was kind of like being a ghost.

Somers pulled the plug and let the soapy water drain from the sink. He ignored the window after that; suicides always fucked him up.

He found Hazard sprawled out on the sofa, a stack of papers next to him, his dark hair held back with a rubber band. Somers climbed onto the sofa, stepped over Hazard, and squeezed in next to his boyfriend.

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