It was the first time Evan had ever awoken assaulted by meowing and claws digging into his bare chest. He’d imagined male cats were above begging and caterwauling like this, but obviously, Kieran wasn’t. The cat scratched his shoulder, nudging him to wake up with short, insistent meows, demanding to be fed.
“Man, you’re as nagging as a wife,” Evan muttered, then grinned and ruffled the cat’s fur.
He was reluctant to get out of his warm, cozy bed. Even though it was almost too short for him, paired with a fluffy duvet and pillows, it was comfortable. Evan remembered how small everything had seemed to him when he’d first arrived in Dublin and had been looking for a place to live. Compared to his spacious townhouse in Sacramento, most houses and apartments in Europe seemed tiny. The more modern buildings were larger, but the older ones, like this flat, could have fit in his living room back in the USA.
Sighing, he pushed the duvet aside, cat and all, looking at his watch as he sat up. It was 6:15. Might as well get an early start to a busy day.
He walked barefoot on the parquet floor to the kitchen, Kieran on his heels. Only when he opened the fridge did he realize he hadn’t had a chance to buy any cat food. Or any food, period. There wasn’t a crumb left from last night’s pizza dinner.
He glanced down into accusing green eyes.
“Give me a break. I didn’t exactly plan your staying here, Majesty.”
The cat stared at him, unblinking. Evan focused on the contents of the fridge and took out everything he found—a piece of hardened cheese, a few slices of deli ham, four eggs, and half a carton of milk. Not exactly a feast, but it could feed both him and the cat. Inspiration struck, and he reached into the cupboard he used as a mini pantry. He found two cans of tuna, which he grabbed triumphantly.
“See? You won’t starve.”
He waved the cans in front of the cat, who continued to stare up at him, uttering an impatient meow from time to time.
Evan opened a can, put the contents on a small plate, then stacked a few paper towels on the floor, so the polished wood wouldn’t get stained. He barely had time to put the plate on top of the paper towels before Kieran started wolfing down the fish.
Satisfied, Evan turned on the old-fashioned stove and started preparing his own breakfast, mixing most of the ingredients on the table into an omelet. It wasn’t much to look at, but as he sat down to eat, he decided it was delicious. Kieran seemed to think so, too, since after he finished the tuna, he convinced Evan to hand over some omelet as well.
The kitchen had a door that led into the backyard, and Evan left it open a crack, enough for Kieran to go outside when he had to. It had occurred to him the cat might leave and not come back, or worse, go out on the streets and get hit by a car, but he figured he was doing the best he could for the feline. Keeping him locked up in the house wasn’t better than him having access to a patch of grass and fresh air. Besides, the cat didn’t seem at all tempted to wander off. After his first outing in the cold morning air, Kieran rushed into the house and jumped straight on the radiator, closing his eyes in pleasure, no doubt as his butt was getting warm. Then he started licking the mud off his paws, his furry face scrunched up in disgust. Nope, it didn’t look as if he would be going out too often. He was a house cat, through and through.
Evan showered without bothering to shave. Luckily, the stubble and beards were fashionable these days. If he were to give a crap about this stuff, he supposed he’d be considered trendy rather than lazy. Truth be told, he preferred his face shadowed by stubble since he thought a clean-shaven face made him look too young or, even worse, not enough of a badass. One didn’t have to look rugged to be a good cop, but he thought the rough edges suited him and his personality better. He couldn’t understand why some men these days went to salons to get manicures, waxed their body hair, wore flowery clothes in bright pastel colors, or man buns. He shook his head as he pulled on jeans and a thick black sweater. Maybe he was too old school or simply too old. Either way, he’d wasted enough time on trivial thoughts. It was time to make a plan.
While he waited for the car to heat up, he decided to go and talk to Patrick’s friends first. His gut told him this was a dead end, but he had to follow up on Patrick’s alibi and get a feel for the two men whose names and addresses Patrick had given him.
As expected, no leads resulted from the couple of hours he spent tracking down and talking to Patrick’s buddies. One of them didn’t even know Shannon. The other friend had made her acquaintance only briefly. Evan knew men didn’t talk much about relationships, especially steady ones. Maybe they bragged when it came to casual sex or hot affairs, but when he questioned Patrick’s friends, he didn’t get any vibes that Patrick had talked much about Shannon with either of them or that they cared about Patrick’s girlfriend. Sure, they expressed their sympathy and outrage regarding what had happened, but that was no more than the average person’s reaction to tragedies that happen to someone else.
Afterward, he stopped to buy a large coffee, then drove to the Garda headquarters. Next on his agenda was digging into Shannon’s electronic devices to learn more about her life, friends, connections, and habits. As he sat at his desk and went through the information on her social media accounts, he wondered why she had used a dating website. She had been beautiful, had a good education, a decent background. Men would line up to date such a woman. Browsing through her photos, he noticed plenty of flattering comments and likes under each one. She hadn’t been one of those women who posted dozens of selfies every day, but she had a generous amount of photos online, and it was obvious she liked to take artistic pictures. She hadn’t been just an amateur photographer but a creative one. Evan noticed her evolution over time.
Like most creative people, she seemed to get bored easily. She must have dyed her hair black recently because in earlier photos, she was a blonde, in others, a redhead, and the list continued. She equally liked color and black-and-white photos, flamboyant and simple settings. The life story he saw studying her social media account was interesting and far from boring. Her smile would light up an entire city, as would her quiet beauty when she was in a serious pose. Apparently, she liked to travel, but judging by the number of photos taken abroad, her budget hadn’t allowed her to take many trips outside Ireland.
She had photos of herself alone, of her and Patrick, her and her parents, her and friends, her and Kieran. Evan smiled sadly when he looked at a black and white photo of Shannon and Kieran. She held the cat lovingly close to her cheek, his face almost lost in her cloud of blond hair. Both pairs of eyes were slanted in an expression of blissful love. It looked like a gorgeous picture in a magazine, a symbol of happiness and beauty.
Evan began to read the comments, as he had done painstakingly for every picture. The same “Gorgeous,” “Wow,” “Stunning,” hearts and flowers he’d encountered so far. Only one comment drew his attention because it wasn’t a flattering one. It was an angry face emoji from someone called Black Dawn. The comment was dated March eighth this year. Shannon hadn’t replied, which was in a way more insulting than if she had.
Evan’s eyes narrowed as he leaned closer to the monitor, his senses alert. Who was this person? He clicked on the profile, hoping to shed some light over Black Dawn’s identity, but the information was very skimpy, and the profile picture portrayed a black panther, fangs bared. Sort of sinister, though not unusual for social media.
Evan stared at the screen, trying to decide if this was a lead or if he was seeing something suspicious when it wasn’t the case.
“Black Dawn… Who the hell are you? What the hell are you? Not a fan of Shannon’s, that’s for sure.”
When he checked, he noted that Black Dawn was not on Shannon’s list of friends. Scrolling down the profile, he saw this person hadn’t been active in weeks. There was no data on his or her sex, age, nationality, or anything concrete. There were some public posts from the account owner, most of them comments on blog posts and articles. What was frustrating was that Evan was unable to tell if Black Dawn was a man or a woman. The one thing obvious about him or her were several personality traits that transpired from the words written—unhappiness, frustration, an overall hatred of most people, a deep bitterness of a person who had nothing good to say about anyone and had a lot of bad things to say about everything and everyone. Whether it was a comment on a political post, an article about a well-known movie star, or a how-to guide on achieving success, Black Dawn always had to badmouth something or someone. His or her comments were more ramblings rather than arguments, and although he/she had an impressive command of the English language and seemed to love using complicated words, the long rants didn’t have clear logic. Black Dawn was repeatedly rebuked by other users but always replied and got into arguments with everybody.
“Chelsea would have a field day analyzing this freak,” Evan murmured.
He was glad to have an excuse to call her tomorrow and ask her to come in; however, he wasn’t sure this wasn’t just a waste of time. After all, it was only a comment. The world was full of people with the need to offend others in order to feel better about themselves.
This looked like another dead end. Finally, he’d caught a glimpse of someone who possibly disliked Shannon, but he had no idea how to track down this person who called himself or herself Black Dawn. At first glance, the comment implied Black Dawn was jealous in some way of Shannon. Was this the reason someone had decided to kill her? Or was it a man she’d scorned in some way? Was it someone from the dating website, a man whom she’d rejected? Someone who had developed an obsession with her?
Could it be someone envious of her job, her appearance, her social relationships, or financial status, or some other reason, more or less logical? He had no idea if this was indeed a lead or a waste of time, but he had to check it out. He had to track down Black Dawn. Even the choice of the nickname implied something gloomy, menacing, like a shadow lurking in the background, ready to strike.
Evan searched the history on Shannon’s laptop and accessed her profile on the website where she and Patrick had connected. In her profile picture, she was a dark blonde, wearing a red dress that showed enough curves to entice the imagination. No doubt this photo and the data in her About section had attracted many potential partners, eager to connect with such a beauty. Since she had her ID and password saved in her computer, Evan didn’t have to invest the time and effort it took to request access to her account in order to get them.
Grateful for this break, he started methodically to go through the matches and messages. There were plenty, and he noted Shannon was always polite and diplomatic when she’d declined a date. She’d also accepted several, all from men, which meant he would have to dig and find out their identities and question each one.
Hours later, he stretched in his chair and rubbed his tired eyes. He’d gone through most of the messages, skimmed over the bits that seemed unimportant for now, and focused on the ones that had potential. In total, he’d summarized she had accepted meetings with three men other than Patrick O’Leary. He couldn’t be sure if she’d gone through with the dates, but the next logical step was to track down each of these men and question them. He stared at their profile pictures, one by one. Who could tell if any of them was a killer? Not by looking at them, that was for sure. Ted Bundy had been as charming and good-looking as he’d been twisted.
Blowing out a breath, Evan tried to think of a plan to discover the identity of the men. He only had some photos that might or might not be genuine and some names that might or might not be bogus.
“Frigging piece of cake.”
He decided to get a sandwich or something to serve as fuel through the next hours when a folder landed on his desk. Glancing up, he saw Nóirín. The candy bar she was munching made his mouth water.
“Tell me you have some ground-breaking lead in there,” Evan pleaded. “Siobhan said she found faux leather fibers on Shannon’s throat. Not sure what that means, but have you any clue, any brand?”
Nóirín made a scoffing sound. “It’s a fancy way to say fake leather. I can only tell you the killer wore gloves, but the fibers are so common I can’t give you a brand. It’s a cheap, common material you can buy in any low-priced shop, probably all over the world. Other than that, I’ve got nothing. Sorry, Yank.”
Evan plowed his fingers through his hair. Working on the computer for so long, combined with the cold, cloudy weather, had placed him in a trance-like state.
“Don’t apologize. You can’t create evidence that’s not there.” He pushed his chair away, stood, and stretched his numb muscles, then looked at Nóirín. “Where can I get one of those?” He nodded at her candy bar. “I need a break and a meal.”
“I suggest ye get a real meal, a hot one. There’s a pub a couple of blocks from here. I can give you the address if you want. They make a savage spicy chicken soup. Amazing, very good,” she translated, laughing at his weary expression.
“Oh. I’m behind with my study of Irish slang.” He smiled, grabbing his jacket. “Give me the name of the place. Savage soup sounds too good to resist.”
It didn’t take him long to find the pub. It was located on one of the main streets, and because it was nearly four, he quickly found a parking spot. People had had lunch hours ago, and it was way too early for dinner.
The pub was small and cozy, sporting less than a dozen wooden tables covered by green tablecloths, all crammed into the traditional Irish setting. The light from shamrock-shaped lamps was dim, the pints were large, and the music cheerful, as though to defy the moody weather. Evan thanked Providence that he found a free table, flashing a genuinely grateful smile to the young redheaded waitress waiting to take his order. He asked for the soup Nóirín had praised, and since he was very hungry, he also ordered bacon and potatoes with butter and garlic bread.
While he waited for the food, he looked around at the faces surrounding him. Not for the first time since arriving in Ireland, he felt a twinge of loneliness. He wasn’t a social guy, had never had many friends back in the States, but at least he knew whom to call if he was in the mood to have a beer with a buddy. Here, he didn’t know anyone other than his colleagues at the Garda.
His thoughts flew to Chelsea, and he realized she was the person with whom he’d had the longest conversation since arriving here. He liked her. She was scary smart, not to mention hot as hell. He had to admit her mind both intimidated and fascinated him. He wondered if he should invite her out for a drink one of these days but waved away the thought. He didn’t really know her, and it wasn’t a good idea the get involved with someone at work. Hell, he wasn’t sure it was a good idea to get involved with any woman right now. It was painful to accept he was having trouble trusting his own judgment again when it came to women. He had his hands full with this case anyway.
The soup was indeed savage, so spicy it made him sweat, and the delicious golden crispy potatoes were served next to crusty bacon covered in paprika. The aroma of garlic and spices almost made him dizzy. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had such an amazing meal.
As he finished his dinner, he decided to make a detour since he was going to put in some overtime anyway. He drove to a nearby shopping center. After some hustle and bustle, he bought a black rainproof jacket with a hood and thick lining. While he was there, he also bought a couple of sweaters since his California wardrobe didn’t include many of those. To make it a day, he did a quick run into the supermarket to stock up on groceries and cat food. Even though it felt foolish, he also bought something that looked like a mutant textile mouse for Kieran. The line between domestic and ridiculous could be so thin.
By the time he returned to work, most of his colleagues were checking out. But Evan wanted to put in a couple more hours. He had no idea if his hunch regarding Black Dawn was worth pursuing, but eventually, he was going to follow his gut and do it. It was a lead worth following; however, his immediate priority was to track down the men from the dating website. He might have a better chance with one of them. Reaching for the can of cola he’d picked up on the way, he got to work.