Charting Robin and Ryan’s Relationship
Ryan Murphy is a handsome Met officer, and his understanding of the pressures of Robin’s work should make him an ideal boyfriend. But will the same resentments and jealousy that destroyed her marriage doom this relationship too?
a disembodied voice said,
The Ink Black Heart, Robert Galbraith
‘DCI Ryan Murphy here for Robin Ellacott.’
Robin Ellacott first meets Met officer Ryan Murphy as she’s recovering from her short marriage and painful divorce from Matthew Ellacott. She’s also still uncomfortable after she froze during a near kiss with Strike outside the Ritz.
Murphy comes to the office in Denmark Street to take Robin’s account of her meeting with artist Edie Ledwell, who has since been murdered in Highgate Cemetery (The Ink Black Heart). He’s a pleasant looking man, over six-feet tall and classically good-looking, with wavy brown hair, but when they first meet, Robin’s thoughts are consumed by the fact she had to turn Edie away when she came to the agency for help. When Edie’s brother and agent approach the agency to discover the identity of her online harasser, ‘Anomie’, all her attention is taken up by the case and the circle of friends and collaborators who worked with Edie, so when Ryan calls her, she takes a second to remember who he is.
….in which she could savour to the full her realisation that she was the most romantically inept woman in London.
The Ink Black Heart, Robert Galbraith
Robin might also be distracted because she has just had an encounter with Strike’s ex, Charlotte Campbell, during which she’s learned about Strike’s relationship with jewellery designer, Madeline Courson-Miles, for the first time. Robin is shocked and struggling to acknowledge her feelings for Strike in the aftermath, when Ryan calls with a quick question about the case. When Ryan asks Robin out, she thinks it’s just to discuss work. He explains he’s asking ‘in the date sense’. The call ends with them both embarrassed, and Robin castigating herself as the most romantically inept woman in London.
As the investigation into Edie’s harasser and her death unfolds, Robin is also dodging Hugh Jacks, a divorced man she met while skiing, and flirting with Preston Pierce, aka Pez, an artist and model who knew Edie, for information. Strike might not listen to the sound of Robin snogging Pez during their conversation in the pub, but flirting with Pez, while pretending to be her more confident and sexually experienced alter ego, Jessica Robins, seems to give Robin a bit more confidence.
Ryan Murphy is back on the scene after the Denmark Street office is bombed and offers to give Robin a lift back to her new flat in Walthamstow. On the way the conversation is pleasant and easy, Ryan makes her laugh, and tells her about his upcoming trip to San Sebastian in Spain to see his sister. At no time does he mention his previous invitation for a drink, nor does he make her feel uncomfortable in the small space of the car, and Robin is grateful for both these things. In a spurt of bravery, she tells him about her recent divorce, her lack of romantic experience, and explains that was why she misinterpreted things when he asked for a date. Ryan asks if he can take her out after he comes back from Spain, and Robin agrees.
Murphy might get drunk and tell a racist joke. He might patronise Robin, who was a detective with no formal training. He might even make a rough pass – although Strike didn’t like the idea of that at all.
The Ink Black Heart, Robert Galbraith
Strike, lying in hospital after the dramatic end of the investigation into Edie Ledwell’s death, realises his feelings for his partner are more profound than he’s admitted to himself before, and finds himself hoping that Ryan will do something to ruin his chances of a relationship with Robin as quickly as possible. His hope that Murphy will get drunk, though seems forlorn. Ryan has already told Robin he is in Alcoholics Anonymous, and though he has no problem being around people drinking, he doesn’t himself.
‘How’re things going with Ryan?’
The Running Grave, Robert Galbraith
‘Good,’ said Robin.
‘What’s it been now? Seven months?’
‘Eight, said Robin.
‘Hm,’ said Ilsa, now smiling down at her baby.
By the time Ilsa and Nick Herbert invite Strike and Robin to be godparents for their new baby, Benjamin, Ryan and Robin are an established couple, much to Strike’s silent dismay. Pat, the office manager, obviously likes him, which irritates Strike as he feels, irrationally, that everyone at the agency should feel as hostile to Murphy as he does.
Ilsa tells Robin that Strike hates her new relationship, and asks if Robin wants children, as Ryan obviously does. Robin brushes the question off.
After her marriage, divorce and believing her feelings for Strike could never be reciprocated, no matter what Ilsa says, Robin finds it a pleasure and a relief to be with Murphy. He’s handsome and intelligent, and they have investigative work in common. Their sex life is also considerably more satisfactory than it was with her ex-husband. However, there is though, she recognises, a certain guardedness in their relationship. It takes Robin six months to tell Ryan about the brutal rape that had ended her university career, and she’s careful not to talk about her business partner too much. She also doesn’t say that a major factor in the failure of her marriage was Matthew’s persistent jealousy and suspicion of Strike. For his part, Ryan never talks much about his drinking years and has given Robin what she suspects is a sanitised account of the way he and his ex-wife had split up. Still, now a private life without jealous rows and grinding resentment makes a very nice change.
‘What’s Murphy’s view on this?’
The Running Grave, Robert Galbraith
‘What the hell’s it got to do with Ryan?’ said Robin, with an edge to her voice.
Recognising his strategic error, Strike said, ‘Nothing.’
Robin makes a convincing case for going undercover at Chapman Farm, the base of operations for the cult-like Universal Humanitarian Church (The Running Grave), but Strike knows one of the reasons he agrees to the plan is his hope a long separation will put pressure on her relationship with Ryan.
Robin does end up fighting with Ryan about her decision. When he realises how long she might be gone, he acts as if Strike has forced her to take the assignment, then, on hearing Robin wants to do it, and Strike tried to talk her out of it, Ryan asks if that is because Strike is going to miss her. Robin storms out of the bar they are in, and Ryan follows to make a fulsome apology near the Eros statue in Piccadilly Circus. Her ex-husband, Matthew Cunliffe, proposed to her in exactly this spot the day before she started working for Strike.
As the film they were going to see, Hail Caesar, is already half over they go for an Italian instead, and part, superficially at least, on good terms. Robin though can’t escape her feelings of deja vu. Murphy continues to warn of the dangers of going deep undercover, and takes the day off to spend the day with her just before she goes in. This leads to a near argument, as Robin has already made work commitments for the day.
I had a long phone conversation with your mother last night. She’s worried about you, but I talked her down.
The Running Grave, Robert Galbraith
Robin’s long stint undercover at Chapman Farm is a fearsome ordeal, emotionally and physically. The letters and the chocolate, she gets from Strike are a lifeline but the notes he passes on to her from Ryan can leave more complex feelings in their wake. Knowing Ryan and her mother are worried only adds to the guilt and fear the UHC are inculcating in her, and as the weeks pass, she finds herself thinking much of her partner than her boyfriend.
When she manages to escape, Ryan is in Spain with his sister. Her parents come to stay, and Robin feels smothered. She also, she tells Strike, thinks Ryan’s been winding them up, telling them how worried he was all the time she was at the farm. Linda, Robin’s mum, tells her how much she likes Ryan – and Robin has to pretend not to hear the unspoken ‘but not Strike’, and asks if she thinks Ryan would like children, mentioning he always asks after Robin’s niece, Annabel.
When Ryan rushes back from Spain, she’s truly happy to see him. She’s forgotten not only how good looking he is, but how kind. His questions about her time undercover don’t have her mother’s hectoring undertone of accusation and outrage, and he reassures her about the accusations the UHC are making in the wake of her escape. They end up exchanging ‘I love you’s, but Robin is immediately uneasy. Has she just lied, or is she overthinking?
‘But you still spent the night there.’
The Running Grave, Robert Galbraith
As the investigation into the Universal Humanitarian Church becomes even more dangerous, Robin is forced to spend the night on the office sofa below Strike’s flat. Ryan’s jealous questioning irritates her. Wanting to keep the peace, she tells him Strike is seeing a lawyer, deciding to worry later about what will happen if Ryan learns his brief affair with Bijou Watkins is already over.
Ryan apologises, blaming his jealousy on his breakup with his wife, and plays a crucial role in the capture of a killer, and though Strike has heard rumours of Ryan’s behaviour when he was drinking, he has the sense not to say anything directly to his partner. As the investigation ends, and Strike tells Robin about the last emotional bombshell Charlotte left in her wake, Robin is leaving to spend the weekend with her boyfriend.
‘I could ask Ryan,’ Robin suggested. ‘Although he’s kind of snowed under at work just now,’ she added,
The Hallmarked Man, Robert Galbraith
When Strike and Robin are asked to investigate the identity of a man found in a locked silver vault some months later, Ryan is dealing with a difficult case of his own (The Hallmarked Man). He still provides the detectives with vital information through and when he mentions Strike’s girlfriend, the lawyer, Strike plays along. Robin is dealing with fresh trauma. The trial of UHC leader Jonathan Wace means she is constantly reminded of the time she spent at undercover, and she has a medical emergency which forces her to think about prospects in her life. Then Ryan begins pressuring her to buy a house with him.
As the complex investigation unfolds, Robin finds she is relieved when a house purchase falls through. Ryan’s difficulties at work turn out to be more serious than he is saying, and Robin is shocked by sudden flashes of his temper, as well as irritated by his apparent gossiping with her mother when they spend Christmas in her hometown of Masham, North Yorkshire.
Strike adds to Robin’s difficulties when his previous behaviour provides fodder for his critics in the tabloids. The investigation grows more complicated and dangerous, and in the midst of it all, Robin discovers his struggle at work is not the only secret Ryan has been keeping…
