‘A picture of Steve Moore? God, I don’t know.’
The sound of Barbara Gavan’s children fighting in the background blasted down the phone line. The inspector waited while she thought about his request.
‘Would you pair be quiet, I’m on the phone! I’d have to go through my old photo boxes, Inspector. Neither myself nor Pauline were on anything like Facebook back then, so I don’t think there’s anything online. I certainly don’t have any pictures of him about the house. For obvious reasons.’
‘I understand,’ Tom said. ‘Take a look for me and if you do find one, just pop into the garda station in Waterford City and they’ll scan it into the system.’
Barbara promised she would.
‘Any joy?’ Michael asked.
‘She’s going to go through her old snaps, see if she has anything. Something may turn up from his old job yet – an ID picture on his file maybe, but this way will probably be quicker. Right, let’s make a run for it.’
The rain was falling solidly, the streets of Trim almost deserted as ill-prepared, under-dressed shoppers and tourists dashed into cafés and stores in search of shelter.
Tom had struck lucky; he’d found a parking spot a few doors up from the restaurant where Stephen McCabe, Fiona Holland’s boyfriend, worked.
A waitress met them at the door and informed them that the restaurant wouldn’t open for another hour.
‘That’s fine,’ Michael said. ‘We’re looking for Stephen McCabe. Is he working today?’
She eyed the two men suspiciously.
‘Why are you …?’
‘Gardaí,’ Michael cut her off.
Her features hardened.
‘He’s in the kitchen. Wait here, please.’
‘No, we’ll come with you,’ Tom said.
The busy kitchen was in full preparation mode. Steam rose from pots and pans and heat blasted from the ovens.
‘Stephen,’ the girl called. A man chopping vegetables at one of the counters turned. He took in the visitors standing on either side of the waitress, dropped the knife and barrelled towards the door at the back of the kitchen.
Michael was too quick for him. The detective had raced competitively in his teens and now played Gaelic football three times a week. As he grabbed the fleeing man, McCabe swung at him, a nasty left hook that caught the side of Michael’s head.
The inspector was upon him then, and with two against one, McCabe didn’t stand a chance. He dropped his arms in defeat. Tom pulled them behind his back and slapped the cuffs on.
Michael felt the side of his head, his fingers skimming the graze that had been inflicted.
‘You little dickhead,’ he said, looking at the blood on his hand. ‘We have you bang to rights now.’
Stephen turned his head and spat on the floor.
‘Fucking pigs. What do you want with me?’
Tom spun the man around until he faced him.
‘Where’s Fiona Holland, Stevie boy?’
‘How many fucking times? I never laid a finger on her. I can’t even remember the last time I saw Fiona. She was just some young one I was shagging. A bit of fun.’
The inspector drummed his fingers on the edge of the table. They’d brought Stephen McCabe back to headquarters to interview him. Linda McCarn sat beside Tom, studying McCabe intently. She peered at him over glasses on the tip of her nose, tutting every so often. So far, though, she hadn’t said a word and her silence was putting their suspect on edge.
They still had no photograph of Steve Moore to prove if the man in front of them was one and the same.
‘So, you didn’t see her on the day she went missing? Because there’s a witness who saw her leaving your house that afternoon.’
‘Who?’
‘That doesn’t matter.’
‘Maybe she called by and I wasn’t in.’ He shrugged and examined his nails.
McCabe was good-looking. Sculpted cheekbones, big baby blues, wavy blond hair and olive skin. But he had a mean-looking mouth and a vicious tongue.
Linda broke her silence.
‘She was a tad young for you, wasn’t she – Fiona? Do you like them that age? Impressionable?’
McCabe chewed the inside of his cheek.
‘What’s it to you, Granny? Do you think I should be shagging oul’ wans like you? Like a bit of rough, do you?’
Linda’s features remained placid.
‘Oh, darling. I wouldn’t hire you to cut my grass, let alone tend to my bush.’
Tom’s mouth fell open, but it was nothing compared to McCabe’s reaction. He was so astonished at the retort that his eyes bulged out of their sockets.
The psychologist was at her best when she contrived to unnerve the other person in the room. Well, she’d certainly accomplished that with McCabe.
‘Is that why you hit her?’ Linda continued. ‘Because she gave you lip? Don’t you just hate it when women answer back? Sometimes you just have to slap that cheek out of them.’
McCabe shook his head, slowly. He was still recovering.
‘I don’t hit women.’
‘Not even a little bit?’
‘I said, I don’t hit fucking women!’
‘Enough!’ Tom banged the table. McCabe jumped. His front was slipping. The inspector knew his sort. The bravest man in the world with somebody weak and vulnerable. He wasn’t so hard when confronted by people who weren’t afraid of him.
‘We know you were hitting Fiona Holland. I only had to see you in action back in the restaurant to know your default setting is to lash out. Why did you run from us?’
‘You’re going to try to pin this serial-killer shit on me, aren’t you? I read the papers. You think somebody has taken Fiona and that it’s the same person who killed those other girls. But I didn’t hurt her, or anybody. I never even met any of those women.’
‘Really? What job did you do before you went to work in Trim? Where did you live?’
‘Dublin. I worked in restaurants here, too.’
‘Ever lived in Waterford?’
‘Waterford?’ McCabe’s expression was one of bewilderment. ‘I’ve never even been to Waterford.’
‘So you didn’t know Pauline O’Hara?’ Tom leaned in, examining the other man’s face closely for tells.
‘I knew it. I fucking knew it. She’s one of them dead ones, isn’t she? What sort of sick bastard do you think I am? I’ve changed my mind, I want a solicitor.’
The inspector sat back.
Was McCabe telling the truth? It was hard to know. He was a scumbag, but, on the face of it, a relatively banal one. And yet, the man they were looking for had to be an exceptional liar to have gotten away with his crimes for so long.
‘We’ll sort out legal representation,’ Tom said. ‘But why don’t you just talk to us, before we go down that route? You’re going be charged for assaulting my colleague, but any cooperation you give us can be offered as a mitigating circumstance. Do you understand that? If you’ve done nothing to Fiona, it can only help your cause if you tell us what you know.’
McCabe glared down at his clenched fists, eyebrows furrowed. He was torn between wanting to seem tough and not wanting to get sent down for thumping a detective.
The pragmatic side won out.
‘She was at my house that day,’ he confessed, begrudgingly. ‘We argued. I can’t even remember what over. I was drinking and she was nagging me about something. I might have … pushed her. Then she left and I didn’t see her again. Next thing I knew, she was missing. That’s the truth.’
‘Had she said anything to you beforehand? Had she concerns she was being followed, or anything like that?’
He shook his head.
‘No. But she wouldn’t tell me anyway. Fiona kept things to herself. She was seeing somebody else, as well as me. I knew that. I could smell him on her. She denied it, but I just knew.’
Tom sat up.
‘Do you have any clue who it was?’
‘Nope. But she was getting notions, so he must have been some big shot. I reckon he fathered her brat. I got the sense things had cooled between them after that, but now they were back on.’
‘What do you mean, “notions”?’
‘Getting brave, like. Thinking she could say whatever she liked to me. She would rile me up, just to see how I’d react. Like a fucking child looking for boundaries, then bawling when she discovered what they were. That’s all she was. A little girl.’
‘Who would know if she was seeing somebody else?’ the inspector asked. ‘Friends?’
‘Fiona didn’t have friends. She had people she hung around with sometimes. None of the girls trusted her with their boyfriends and all the lads wanted to do was shag her. And the family won’t have a clue. She used to tell me about that brother of hers – how he’d look at her. Dirty little pervert, if you ask me – probably looking to get into his own sister’s knickers. And the da thinks she’s still ten – calls her princess and all that shit. There’s something not right there.’
Tom was tiring of the man and his mouth. He wanted to finish up and check if that photo of Steve Moore had arrived.
‘Tell me, Stephen,’ he said. ‘Did you ever give Fiona a bracelet like this, or see her wearing one?’
He held up the evidence bag, straightening it out to reveal the silver charm bracelet inside.
‘Nope. Never gave her anything like that. The only thing I ever gave that little slut was a length of me—’
‘Thank you,’ Tom interjected. ‘That’s all I need for now.’
‘No.’ Linda shook her head. ‘I can’t see it. He’s a little shit and he might just beat some poor girl to death one day by accident, but no. I can’t see him as a serial killer.’
They’d retreated to the inspector’s office, leaving McCabe with a free legal aid solicitor.
‘We’ll know if he’s Steve Moore in a couple of minutes, anyhow,’ Tom said. ‘I’ve just got a text saying a photo has arrived from Waterford. What did you think of his description of Fiona’s brother, Fergus?’
Linda cupped her mouth and considered.
‘How old is Fergus?’
‘Twenty-three.’
‘And the first victim was six years ago. Fergus would have been seventeen – a bit young, but not beyond the realm of possibility. Maybe he has an unhealthy attachment to the sister and has been taking out his frustrations on other women.’
‘Hmm.’ Tom pursed his lips. ‘But at that age, where would he have kept Pauline before he murdered her? How mobile would he have been?’
‘There’s that. And also, the theory would hold more weight if all the victims looked similar to his sister. You’ve five women of very differing appearance. Your serial killer has an issue with a type, not a look.’
‘The father, maybe?’ Tom suggested. ‘He travels for work. His wife told us that. He’s a strong man. Allegedly worshipped his daughter – maybe she’s an unintentional victim. He snapped because he can’t control her.’
‘Hmm. Look into his background,’ Linda said. ‘A successful business, loving wife, grown-up family – it’s not entirely ludicrous, but it would be one of the more unusual cases.’
The door to Tom’s office opened and Michael appeared. The inspector knew from the look on his face that their theory about Stephen McCabe/Steve Moore had been proven incorrect.
‘It’s definitely not him. Here’s the picture of Steve Moore.’
He placed a scanned photograph on an A4 sheet between Tom and the psychologist. The picture showed Pauline O’Hara’s former partner at a party, one arm draped around somebody who’d been cut out of the picture. He had black hair and small dark eyes, too close together, but a winning smile – quite the baby-faced charmer. He wouldn’t have passed for even a relative of Stephen McCabe.
‘There’s more,’ Michael continued. ‘The local guards in Waterford spoke to Moore’s former employer and they say he took a job with another branch of their wholesale firm. In Galway.’
‘So he’s still in a job where he travels,’ Tom said. ‘Well, that’s something. Just because Steve is not Stephen doesn’t mean Steve is not the man we’re looking for. Am I right, Linda?’
‘Sounds like you’re practicing tongue-twisters, but yes, that makes sense.’
‘Nope,’ Michael interrupted. ‘I can categorically state that Steve Moore is no longer a person of interest.’
The inspector sat back in his chair.
‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’
‘Heart attack, three years ago. Rowing on the Shannon. He’d been taking steroids, apparently.’
‘Right. Well, make sure that good news gets passed on to Pauline’s sister. She could do with some this week.’
Michael left and Tom dropped his head into his hands.
‘Back to square one,’ he sighed.
‘You’ve nothing at all from the bodies or the scene?’ Linda asked. ‘Nothing from that fat oaf who’s meant to be helping?’
‘If you mean Emmet McDonagh, he’s assisting as much as he can, Linda. Honestly, will you two ever kiss and make up? It’s such a tragedy the way you go on, when you have such a ton of history together.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ Linda’s voice was clipped. Tom swallowed, realising he’d made an error. Louise had told him the circumstances behind Emmet and Linda’s break-up, but it was meant to be top secret. The psychologist would know he was lying if he tried to wriggle out of this one.
‘I know, okay?’ he conceded. ‘I know what happened between you two. You wanted to leave your husband to be with Emmet and it caused a rift in your family. He decided against leaving his wife and didn’t tell you why and then you went around shouting the odds not knowing she’d cancer. It’s a devastating story, but it’s in the past. Surely it’s time to forgive and forget?’
Linda glared at him.
‘That’s what you know, is it?’ She stood up abruptly. Her gold bangles jingled on each arm as she threw her chiffon scarf over her shoulder. ‘You don’t know the half of it, darling.’
She strode out of the room, leaving Tom sitting there, puzzled.
There was clearly more to the story.
Unfortunately, he didn’t have the headspace right now to be delving into Linda and Emmet’s convoluted past. He’d two missed calls from Ray. Hopefully that meant something had turned up in Cork.
He was just about to dial his deputy’s number when Michael burst back in, cheeks flushed and eyes wide.
‘We’ve contact, boss. A letter. He has her. The killer has Fiona Holland.’