by Alexa Land
The flight had also included two long layovers, so in all, I’d spent nearly twenty hours getting to Ireland, and I was exhausted. I’d dropped onto the mattress as soon as I got to my room. The lavish, sage green suite was amazing, as was the view out my windows of a sprawling park called St. Stephen’s Green. But that huge bed with its wondrously soft linens was the best thing by far. I loosened my tie and said, “This is the most comfortable bed I’ve ever been in. If only you were here with me, then everything would be perfect.”
“I’ll be there to enjoy it with you Thursday. We’re not leaving for the country until Friday, so you’ll have a chance to show me around Dublin a bit. I’m looking forward to seeing where you grew up.”
“It’s going to be a pretty short tour,” I murmured as my eyelids began to close. “I guess I can show you the apartment where my parents used to fight, and the playground where I was beat up for my lunch money.”
“I hope there are some good memories there, too.”
“We can make some after you join me. I miss you already, Ignacio.”
“I miss you too, Cam. Get some rest, I can tell you’re fighting to stay awake.” He was right. We said goodbye, and I drifted off almost immediately.
*****
“After all the times you criticized me for not always following the straight and narrow, and now this!”
I frowned at my father as I climbed into the passenger seat of his fairly new, silver Nissan sedan and asked, “What are you talking about?”
He gestured at the hotel’s beautiful, terra cotta-colored façade, along with its grand entryway and doorman. “No way could you afford a place like this on a copper’s salary, not unless you’re on the take.”
My frown deepened. “Not that it’s any of your business, but my boyfriend booked this hotel for me and is picking up the bill.”
“Ah, so you got yourself a sugar daddy.”
“Hardly! He just wanted to do something nice for me.”
“Yeah? So, what’s Mr. Moneybags do for a living?”
“He’s a painter.”
“What, like houses?”
“No. Not like houses. He’s an artist.”
“Well, aren’t we fancy.”
“I’m already sorry I came to Dublin, and you and I have only been together for thirty seconds.”
I glanced at my father’s profile as he pulled into traffic. He’d aged very little in the last few years. His dark brown hair was sprinkled with a bit more gray than I remembered, and his waistline had broadened a bit, but other than that, Declan Doyle really didn’t look like he was fifty-nine.
“We wouldn’t be having this discussion if you didn’t always have to put on airs,” he muttered.
“Believe it or not, my choice of lodging doesn’t have a thing to do with you, Dad. I’m dating a great guy, and he decided to treat me to a nice hotel. Period. End of story.” I shifted the small case on my lap and put on my seatbelt, then turned my attention to the traffic, which seemed heavy for the early afternoon. Not that I’d spent enough time in Dublin over the last few years to have any idea what was typical anymore.
We drove in silence for a few minutes, and I passed the time by looking for familiar landmarks. But we weren’t in my Dublin. We were in a posh neighborhood with elegant Georgian architecture, made even nicer at that time of year with tasteful Christmas decorations. It actually reminded me of some parts of San Francisco, in the way the buildings were packed side-by-side in an effort to cram as much as possible into the desirable heart of the city.
After a few minutes, we passed the National Library with its imposing Victorian rotunda, and then we skirted the edge of Trinity College with its grand, historic buildings. I actually remembered both of them from field trips as a child. Mostly, I remembered feeling like we’d been taken to a different planet, instead of another part of the city we called home.
Eventually, my father said, “We’ve not gotten off to a good start.”
“Imagine that, when all you did was accuse me of being a crooked cop who takes bribes.”
“Well, how else could I explain such a flashy hotel? You hadn’t told me you’d bedded one of the feckin’ Rockefellers.”
“I was going to invite you back to the hotel for a few beers after I finish my investigation, but obviously that’s a terrible idea. I’d just end up apologizing for the overly posh marble floors while trying to justify staying someplace that doesn’t rent rooms by the hour.”
“I can only imagine what that place would charge for a pint! No matter though, because I’ll take you out for a bite after you finish. My way of saying thanks for all of this.”
I muttered, “Alright,” and kept my eyes on the traffic.
We crossed the River Liffey and continued to head north. There were some fairly distinct economic differences between the northern and southern ends of Dublin, and the river more or less marked the divide. My father was a Northsider all the way, and he wore his blue collar roots as a badge of honor, while dismissing the wealthier Southsiders as spoiled and flashy. No wonder he loved my choice of hotels.
All of Dublin was crowded, especially the neighborhood I’d called home the first eleven years of my life. I knew we were close to our old apartment when we passed an open-air market lined with produce stalls. The vendors vied for customers by calling out the daily specials in their thick accents, and the sidewalks were choked with pedestrians. On the next block, we passed our old, four-story apartment building. It didn’t look like much, but then, it never had. I tilted my head to glance up at the windows of what used to be our home.
My father tried to break the silence between us by asking, “So, how long have you known this painter?”
“About three months. His name is Ignacio, by the way, and you’ll get to meet him later in the week. We decided to combine this trip with a bit of a Christmas vacation, so he’s taking the red-eye to Dublin Wednesday night.”
“That’s pretty spur-of-the moment, since I only called you about this a day ago. No trouble getting that much time off from work?”
“Let’s just say I’m not exactly the arson investigation unit’s most valuable player these days.” I was instantly sorry I’d said anything, since I had no intention of telling my father about what had happened a year ago.
“What’s that about then?”
“Nothing. It’s not important.”
My father glanced at me and said, “You could tell me if you’re having problems at work. You don’t always have to paint your life as bein’ all sunshine and roses.”
“I don’t do that.”
“You do, actually.”
“Well, is it any wonder? If I told you I had issues at my job, you’d probably just throw it back in my face, then slip in a dig about it serving me right for going into law enforcement in the first place,” I said. “And by the way, I’ve been in this line of work for the better part of a decade, so you really could let it go already.”
“But you could have done anything you put your mind to with those good grades of yours. You could have been a doctor,” he said.
“I could have, but I chose to go into forensics.” I knew I was being defensive, but after a lifetime of my father’s digs and criticisms, that defensiveness tended to happen automatically.
We drove the rest of the way to my father’s pub in silence. The fairly nondescript brick building was in a working-class neighborhood on the northern edge of town, less than ten minutes from where I’d grown up. Its neighbors to either side were a chip shop and a laundromat, and they were separated from the pub by a pair of parking lots. Behind it was a high, cement-block fence, and the other side of the street was lined with duplexes that looked like they’d been built in the 1970s.
The pub’s exterior appeared to be intact, but I asked, “Is it structurally sound?”
“Yeah. I wouldn’t be sending you into a building that was about to come down on top of you.”
We parked behind the pub, and I pulled some fabric boo
ties over my shoes, then donned a pair of latex gloves. “Just so you know,” I said as I hung a particulate mask around my neck, “regardless of what I find in there, I’m planning to speak to Caroline on your behalf. Even if it was arson, I don’t believe you did this. The pub was your pride and joy, and I just can’t imagine you torching it.”
“You’re right about me bein’ innocent,” he said. “But you’re wrong about the other thing.”
“What other thing?”
“I love this pub, but it ain’t my pride and joy. You are.”
My father had never said anything like that to me, not once in thirty-two years. Even though it floored me, I cleared my throat and tried to play it off with, “You’re becoming sentimental in your old age.”
“I suppose I am.” He unlocked the back door and asked, “Want me to go in with you? I can show you where the police said the fire started.”
I stuck a few things in my pocket, including some evidence bags, in case there was anything the investigators had missed that should have gone to a lab. Then I picked up my high-powered flashlight and shone it through the back door as I said, “You definitely need to stay out here. I’ll be able to determine where the fire started on my own. It shouldn’t take long, either. From what I see so far, it looks like the fire department put it out quickly, so the damage is fairly contained.”
“That they did. A couple of the lads from the fire house are regulars, and they got here inside of five minutes.”
“Who called them?”
“Mrs. Pavel across the road. She got up to let her poodle out around three a.m. and smelled the smoke. When she went out front to investigate, she could see the flames through the windows and wasted no time calling it in.”
“Did you have a hardwired fire alarm in the building?”
“Yeah, but it didn’t go off. The fire department said the system was so old that something must have shorted it out.” That in itself was suspicious.
I stepped across the threshold and shone my flashlight around the blackened interior. The pub was fairly spacious, with rows of booths along three of the four walls. To my left was the door to an office, and a big, antique bar was straight ahead, near the front entrance. It was a little singed, but it looked salvageable.
Most of the tables and chairs had been totally destroyed, which was my first clue that it was arson. There was no obvious ignition source in the center of the room, and they were burned far more than their immediate surroundings, suggesting they’d probably been doused with gasoline and lit on fire. I stepped around them carefully and panned my light over the walls and ceiling.
Since a pair of booths to the left of the bar had burned more completely (and therefore longer) than anyplace else, I assumed the fire had probably started there. When I went to investigate, it became even more apparent that the fire had been set intentionally. The arsonist hadn’t even really tried to make it look like an accident, or if he had, he’d failed miserably.
The booths were on a wall that didn’t contain any electrical outlets, baseboard heaters, or anything else that might have ignited on its own. Since the wall behind them was still relatively intact, I could also rule out a problem with the wiring. Just like the tables and chairs, the burn pattern indicated the booths had been sprayed with gas or some other accelerant and then set on fire.
Even though there was no doubt in my mind that the fire had been deliberate, the question of who was responsible remained. I didn’t believe it was my father, so who was left? Not his business partner Jack, obviously, who’d had as much to lose as my dad. Was it just some fledgling firebug who’d selected the pub at random? Or someone from my dad’s shady past, come to even up an old score? Neither of those explanations sat right with me, though.
I did a slow lap all around the building, not that I really expected to find any clues. The local police had obviously been thorough and professional, despite what my father thought of them. In the office, which had suffered smoke and water damage but hadn’t burned, I was surprised to find a picture of my dad and me on his desk, taken when I was maybe five or six. Beside that was a framed photo of an attractive woman in her fifties, with golden blonde hair twisted up in a loose bun. I assumed that was Caroline, though she looked a lot different than the woman I vaguely remembered from my childhood.
After one more thorough sweep of the building, I went back outside and said, “You need to think about possible suspects, Dad, and put together a list for the police. There’s no question this was arson. Who would have a grudge against either you or Jack?”
“Jackie never mixed with the sort of people who’d do a thing like this. I’m the only person he knows with a criminal record, and as I’ve made it abundantly clear, I didn’t do this. Besides, I bought him out last year, so anyone wanting to lash out at Jack would probably know not to target the pub.”
“Oh. Well, give it some thought, Dad. Try to recall anyone that might have a beef with you, even disgruntled customers.”
“I’ve been doing that, Cam, ever since the police said it was arson. Even though I didn’t believe them, it still got my wheels turning, but I’ve come up blank.”
“Was there any sign of breaking and entering?”
“No. The fire department said the back door was unlocked. I was the last one here, and I’m always careful about it, but I guess I forgot.”
“Do you have a burglar alarm?”
“Nah. I know this neighborhood looks rough, but it’s full of decent, hard-working people. I never thought anyone would break in and try to rob one of their own, and I sure as shite never thought anybody’d try to burn the place down.”
“Well, I’m sorry I wasn’t any help.”
“You were though, son. I needed someone I could trust to confirm what the police told me. Now I just need to figure out who the hell did this.”
“It could have been a random incident, maybe the work of a pyromaniac. Have there been any other suspicious fires in the area?”
“No, nothing like that. I would’ve heard about it.” My father locked the back door and headed for his car. “Come on then, let’s go find someplace to get a drink or six, since my pub is out of commission. I could murder a pint right about now.”
“You’re planning to rebuild, right?”
“Yeah. My two priorities right now are gettin’ Caroline to take me back and starting the work needed to get my pub up and running again.”
We both got in the car, and as he started the engine and pulled onto the street, I said, “Don’t you think it’s a bad sign that Caroline was so quick to think the worst of you? I mean, you’re talking about marrying this woman, but her response to the loss of your business was to accuse you of arson and to shut you out. How are you going to build a future on such a shaky foundation?”
“But don’t you see, sonny? I spent the first fifty-odd years of my life on the wrong side of the law, and while I know I’ve changed, she has every reason to doubt me.”
“It sounds like you’re making excuses for her.”
“I suppose I am,” he said. “There’s a tendency to do that when you love someone.”
*****
I returned to the hotel around eleven p.m. and glanced at my watch, which was still on San Francisco time. It was early afternoon back home. I stripped down to just my briefs, brushed my teeth, and climbed into that warm, fluffy bed, and just as I started to reach for my phone to call Ignacio, it beeped. When I looked at the screen, a huge smile spread across my face. Ignacio’s message was simply: Hey. You awake?
I called him right back, and when he answered, I said, “I miss you.”
“I miss you, too. Want to video chat?”
“Absolutely.” I hit the icon on my phone, and when Ignacio’s handsome face filled my screen I said, “It’s so good to see you.”
“You too. I’m in your apartment.” He angled the phone around to show me. The tinsel tree was lit up and sparkling on the counter. “I was lonely in my hotel room, so I came here. I hop
e that’s alright.”
“Of course. That’s why I gave you a key.”
He asked, “How’s it going in Dublin?”
“Okay, I guess. It’s good to see my dad, even though he’s exasperating. I went to his pub and confirmed it was arson, and tomorrow, I’m going to try to talk to his girlfriend. I still don’t know why he thinks she’ll listen to anything I have to say. After that, my to-do list is complete, and I’ll just be waiting for you to arrive so we can go wherever it is we’re going.”
“I’m still figuring out exactly where we’ll be, but plan on a few glorious, uninterrupted days somewhere rustic.”
“How rustic?”
“Well,” he said, “I’m hoping for indoor plumbing, but after that, all bets are off.”
“And what will we do in these primitive conditions?”
“Maybe I’ll draw a bit, and you can play your violin, and in between we’ll fuck for hours and hours.”
“That sounds amazing. Though technically, we could do all of that in this great suite you booked for me, and it would include the added bonus of room service.”
Ignacio smiled at me. “One day in a luxury hotel, and I’ve totally spoiled you. That’s fine, though. You deserve some spoiling.”
“My dad thought I’d hooked up with a sugar daddy when he saw where I was staying.”
Ignacio chuckled at that and muttered, “Dios.”
“Before that though, he accused me of being a crooked cop and accepting bribes.”
“What!”
“I know. I was thrilled, believe me. I will say though, we managed to have a nice evening.”
“What did you do?”
“We went to a pub and got drunk. Well, he did anyway, and then he proceeded to tell me all about his relationship with this woman he’s in love with. He’s a notorious conversation hog, so I barely got a word in edgewise. That’s okay, though. I think he really needed someone to talk to.”
“You’re a good man, Cameron.”
“No I’m not. This visit was years overdue, and it took the excuse of a fire for me to finally break down and come see him. I just got so tired of never measuring up to his expectations. He reminded me today that I could have become a doctor, like I haven’t heard that from him ten thousand times before. But then….” I paused before saying, “He called me his pride and joy, which is completely unlike him. It’s just so confusing. I never know where I stand with my father.”