A STOLEN CHILD

A newly minted Garda helps solve a highly publicized case.

After years as a detective on Long Island, Maggie D’arcy has relocated to Dublin to live with her boyfriend and train for the Garda. Given all her experience, she’s frustrated to be on street patrol, but DI Roly Byrne, whom she’d worked with on several cases before becoming a Garda, wants to expedite her move to detective. Her chance comes when a woman is murdered and her child stolen in the neighborhood patrolled by Maggie and her partner, Jason Savage. Jade Elliott was a gorgeous young model who got pregnant and kept now-2-year-old Laurel but refused to stay with the father, Dylan Maguire, a well-to-do older man who still pays her bills. Finding phone numbers for Dylan and Jade’s sister and mother, Maggie and Jason call around, but none of them have Laurel. Because the crime took place in Maggie's area, Byrne gets her temporarily assigned to the case, whose combination of a missing toddler and a murdered beauty has provoked a nationwide sensation. Using her nose for sleuthing, Maggie follows up numerous leads and turns up some clues, but Laurel remains missing. Jade, who had made some dicey connections in her modeling career, had a mother with mental health issues and an older sister who wasn’t up to helping out. Maggie senses that the sister is hiding something and also suspects Dylan, who has a solid alibi but gives off an odd vibe. Some old-fashioned police work, luck, and hunches will lead to a killer.

Characters you care about plunged into mysterious circumstances.