Ryan Feeney

For other uses of Ryan, see Ryan (disambiguation).

Feeney, Ryan

Eve Dallas’s former partner. Father figure. Captain of EDD.

He noticed Eve as a rookie officer when she arrested Isaac McQueen (New York to Dallas) and trained her in Homicide, later making her his partner till he made Captain and moved to EDD. For Eve, Feeney was the father she never had, though neither Feeney nor Eve had ever mentioned this aloud, both being mortified of having emotional conversations. During Ceremony in Death they had misunderstandings regarding Eve’s case implicating Feeney’s deceased best friend in a drug scandal, though Roarke helped them get over it. Feeney was Eve’s mentor, her guide, her idol as a cop and whenever she had any difficulty with a case, he was her sounding board.

He was married to Sheila Feeney, of whom Eve was terrified, like she was of Anna Whitney. It was mentioned that Feeney had at least two children and was also a grandfather, though names of his family members were not mentioned.

Introduction

Introduced in Naked in Death as the other investigator, with Eve Dallas, of the Sharon DeBlass homicide (February 13, 2058).

Descriptions

• He was a small, stubby man with small, stubby hands and rust colored hair; he had a wide, rumpled face and drooping camel eyes. His face was homely.
• A wiry-haired man with a hangdog face, the beginning of jowls, and ears that were slightly too big for his head; a compact body and a rumpled face; a hangdog face with wiry rust-colored hair and bushy red eyebrows.
• He had bony elbows (which Eve found endearing) and droopy brown eyes.
• Wiry ginger hair threaded with silver and a saggy face. His face was rumpled and hair was a gingery scrubbing brush mixed with silver.
• He shuffled his feet when he walked.
• His ginger hair with its generous dashes of gray sat on his head like an electrified cat; he had a comfortably droopy face and wiry eyebrows.
  • Feeney said that his wife said that his face was lived in.
• Nearly a head shorter than Roarke, with the explosion of the mixed ginger and silver bush of his hair... droopy eyes, mournful expression; Eve called them geeks born of the same motherboard.
• He looked comfortably rumpled, has droopy eyes in his saggy face, and wire brush of silvered ginger hair.
• He had a basset-hound face and a wiry thatch of ginger and silver hair.
  • In June 2060, he’d had his hair chopped recently, but it did little to combat the spring of ginger and wires of gray that spooled through it. His face, weathered and worn, drooped like a sleepy hound’s.

Personality

• He was a history buff and said he loved the gossip channels.
• He blushed (going red as a hybrid beet); the back of his neck turned cherry red. Feeney sticks his hands in his pockets when he’s uncomfortable.
• According to Eve [regarding Feeney and Mrs. Feeney], “He loves her a lot. You know how he’ll talk in that long-suffering way about ‘the wife.’ He’d be lost without her. I know how that is. I know how he’s working this right now while she’s probably knitting a small compact car.”

History and Family

• Feeney’s sister-in-law went to the Paradise Salon for her twenty-fifth anniversary. He said it cost near as much as his kid’s wedding.
• His parents lived in New Jersey.
  • He said he, and his wife, were planning to head to New Jersey, to their son’s place, for a cookout in Kindred in Death.
• In Ceremony in Death, we learned that Feeney’s mother made him learn Latin as a kid. She had delusions about him becoming a priest.
  • In Glory in Death, Feeney, a good Catholic, winced at the use of profanity in church.
  • In Salvation in Death, Feeney said he was “mostly” Catholic.
• Feeney indicated that he picked Sheila up in a bar.
• Feeney had a grandchild “that” age (Coyle Swisher, age 12 or Nixie Swisher, age 9?).
  • Feeney’s kids had grown up, and there were grandkids now. Eve was never quite sure of the number.
  • At least one of his children was a girl. In Loyalty in Death, Feeney said he brought his daughter to the Plaza Hotel tea room on her sixteenth birthday.
  • In Betrayal in Death (May, 2059), Feeney told Roarke his firstborn son was as old as Roarke.
  • In Born in Death, he was wearing a baggy and faded New York Liberties jersey his grandson gave to him.
  • In Celebrity in Death, Feeney said he had a granddaughter who was learning pottery and made him a lopsided bowl for his candied nuts.
  • In Taken in Death, he said a couple of his grandkids had Jamborees, the toy PPC that Henry MacDermit used to help the police rescue him and his twin: “I told them I could make them up something, but they had to have the store-bought.”
• In Indulgence in Death, Feeney said his grandmother made great lemon meringue pie, with little beads of sugar on the meringue.
• In Obsession in Death, Feeney said the two murder scenes (Bastwick and Ledo) were as “clean as my aunt Crystal’s parlor.”
• In Vendetta in Death, Feeney said his father’s hall pass was/is Eloise Callahan.

The Job

• Feeney said Dallas was the best cop he’d ever worked with.
  • There was nobody on the job, nobody with a badge Eve respected more than she respected Feeney. Feeney felt the same about her.
  • Feeney told Eve, “I saw good, solid cop the minute I laid eyes on you.”
• Feeney called Dallas “ace” and often called her “kid.”
• In Glory in Death, “He put a paternal hand on [Eve’s] shoulder.”
• The DeBlass murder was the second time Feeney had seen death by firearm. About fifteen years ago (c. 2043), on the Lower East Side, a guy at a party shot five people with a twenty-two before he realized it wasn’t a toy.
• Feeney was protective, even sentimental about the IRCCA.
• When Feeney became a Captain, he requested EDD. E-work had always been his specialty, and his passion, so his request for the Electronic Detection Division was a natural.
  • Tibble described Feeney as the numbers whiz, the electronic genius.
  • According to Eve, nobody but Roarke does a search and cross [check] faster than Feeney.
• Feeney had been in charge of the first task force assigned to find and apprehend The Groom.
• He might have been old enough to have fathered most of his detectives (in EDD), and his idea of fashion ran to making sure his socks matched, but the color and buzz of EDD fit him like one of his wrinkled suits.
  • All his department were boys to Feeney, regardless of chromosomes.

Interesting Facts

• Spelled “Feeny” (typo) in Salvation in Death
• He habitually carried around a bag of sugared nuts. (cashews, almonds)
• He liked Irish Whiskey.
  • Tibble promised Feeney a bottle of Irish whiskey if he broke the Morse case (his computer) by midnight.
• He organized Roarke’s bachelor’s party.
• Dr. Engrave gave Feeney a nice flat of pansies for his wife.
  • He smelled like a fancy green salad after he put on the cologne his wife gave him for their anniversary.
  • Mrs. Feeney gave him a pair red earmuffs for Christmas.
• Feeney takes his coffee light and sweet.
• In Betrayal in Death (May, 2059), Feeney mentioned to Roarke that he was going to need his eyes fixed again. In Seduction in Death (June, 2059), he said he had to take a couple of hour’s medical to get it done (the eye fix).
• He was going on vacation in Remember When (September, 2059).
  • In Divided in Death (c. September 20-24, 2059), he had only been back from his Bimini vacation (at Roarke and Eve’s beach house) for a couple of days.
• Has a mug with “MINE” printed on it in murderous red.
• He had a good stony stare; Eve had modeled her own after it.
• Feeney was sick with a cold March 19, 2060 (“dog sick”).
• His lucky shirt was sea-sick green, and covered with maniacally grinning pink flamingos (according to Feeney it’s won him eight hundred and twenty-five dollars). He won an additional twenty-five dollars at Roarke’s casino in Vegas (during Charles’s bachelor’s party).
• “Good cop” was Feeney’s highest praise.
• When Charity Mimoto played Springsteen, Feeney told Eve, “Nice to hear a classic, and hear it played with some style.”