• Chapter One …

    Okay, so keeping with the flow of society, one would think that when seeing a fight brewing or even an explosive show of anger (minus the punching), one would just shy away, the classic bystander effect; I won’t try to help because someone else definitely will. You know, if one were to use their brain they would realize that that’s not how it is. Rarely does it ever turn out that way. Oh if only there WERE happy endings like that.

    No. Since when did she ever stick to the normal flow of society? So she dressed normal, at least what people saw as normal, but she never stood by or even walked by two people about to get into it. She had gotten a broken nose once for being the Good Samaritan. People were too absorbed in their own lives to even attempt to help those strangers in the street.

    So when a total stranger, at least to her, walks up to her friend all red faced, hands balled into very large fists, yelling obscenities like there’s no tomorrow, of course she’s going to step in.

    Slipping in between her friend and the offending force, which probably had his own gravitational pull judging by the size of him, she held out her hands. Her shopping bags at her feet and her purse swinging precariously from her outstretched arm.

    He ran right into her hands and nearly off balanced her. His bulging eyes, if it was possible, bulged even more as he looked down his rather large, somewhat squished nose at her.

    “Who the hell do you think you are?” he shouted at her.

    “Mory, don’t. lets just go before he hurts one of us,” she heard her friend say. She knew that she had to be shaking in her boots. She was such a kind spirited person, and any thought or threat of violence scared her.

    “Ah Katy I don’t think this person is going to just let us walk away without doing or saying something,” she turned ever so slightly to look at her, “Who is he anyways?” she asked out of the corner of her mouth.

    “Get out of my way, I would like a word with my girlfriend!” he commanded. She wanted to laugh, like she could be commanded to do anything.

    “Correction, ex-girlfriend Dan,” Katy said in her soft, barely above a whisper voice.

    “Right,” Morgan looked right at him, well to be more accurate, right up at him, “you may want to think before you do something you’ll regret, because you see that nice brick building over there, yeah that one… That happens to be the RCMP headquarters. Standing here in front of the Metro Center, just a hop skip and a jump away threatening physical violence would have to be the stupidest thing you could do.”

    “Get out-” she cut him off, “I will not move, so either you keep going that way until you have a brain in your head and some calm thoughts to fill it before you try getting near Katy again, or just forget about ever talking to her.” Her words seemed to have struck a nerve, because Dan’s jaw moved up and down, probably attempting to say something, but nothing came out. His eyes narrowed, shooting daggers at Morgan but he growled something that sounded strangely like another obscenity and walked away towards Scotia Square.

    “I think he should give up those steroids, if he gets any bigger he’ll start attracting asteroids like honey attracts flies,” she smiled widely.

    “I don’t think…” Katy trailed off as Morgan picked up her fruits of the days shopping trip.

    “Relax Kat, I’m kidding.” Katy smiled wearily and they began their walk back to her apartment.

    Morgan looked at her friend out of the corner of her eye, she really was breakable. The china cup her mother prized more than anything else was less breakable than she was. The fact that they were friends and had been since their mothers met fifteen years ago always made her wonder, how?

    Katy’s mother was very religious, she was the quintessential example of a God fearing woman. Morgan had actually ran and hid the first time she’d ever met her. Of course spouting verses from the bible at the top of your lungs at an eight year old was never the greatest way to say hello, Especially when the look in your eye was that of a murderer and not a kind and caring woman. She really loved her God, Morgan had to admit that.

    Katy wasn’t as bad as her mother, but she didn’t practice Christianity like her mother. Morgan highly suspected that the force feeding her the religion from diapers on might have made Katy feel like she never had anything to herself. For the last eight years Katy’s been a practicing Buddhist. Love one and all as they all and the whole bit. She even guessed that Katy had gone on a pilgrimage one Christmas, years ago. She never asked where she’d disappeared to for those two weeks.

    Her own mother was a very hard headed woman, determined and never had time for church as a grown woman. She helped the family farm grow and expand until it became a very lucrative business, taking on a life of its own. Her father also worked the farm, attending to the physical labour while his wife managed the money side of things. She often thought of them as a perfect match; they never fought, she loved balancing the books and he loved doing the hard demanding labour, simply because he knew that Joan McBride never liked to touch the filthy farm equipment.

    That’s not to say that they weren’t Christians, they most certainly were, but they weren’t as “outspoken” as Katy’s mom. They prayed, they feared him and his magnificence and they feared life without him and the order he brought to a world the Devil liked to play with.

    Morgan herself, well she was somewhere outside both boxes, she didn’t believe in any gods, goddesses or the devil and demigods. She was more of a “I believe whatever I want” kind of a person. To her many problems were caused by religion, even though the vast majority of them were interconnected in some small way. That’s not to say she thought those who practice one were crazy or even stupid for doing so, just that being more open minded and accepting might make the world a slightly better place to live.

    When it came to the family business, Morgan had freed herself of that long ago. She had loved the life style growing up, but her adventurous nature caused a yearning within her, one that needed more than what small town farm life could offer her.

    She graduated from high school with a scholarship to Kings College. Being a journalist was always her dream and she had every intention of becoming one, whether or not her parents wanted to support that dream. She moved in with her aunt in downtown Halifax.

    She had fully expected the city culture to shock her and her small town girl values, but it didn’t. In fact she had only lived with her aunt for two years before moving into a small house outside Cole Harbour. Her parents had told her that city life would brainwash her and she would forget her roots, but she had actually shied away from the city in favour of a small town. Only this one was much better than Windsor, this one had an ocean bordering it.

    That had been another dream of hers, to live by the ocean or at least closer to it than she had growing up. She liked the wide open fields of green grass, the cows lazing about in the sun, the road lined with flimsy fences that for some unknown reason the cows never bowled over. She loved the rows upon rows of potatoes and turnips, the bushes of berries in the woods hundreds of yards away from the house and the danger the dirt roads often posed in the dead of winter.

    She missed a good deal of that, but in her new small town, she had the ocean spreading forever outside her kitchen window. She could see the sunset and where the ocean, like a patient lover, awaited the soft kiss of the sun as it sank below the horizon. She had beautiful birch trees and pine trees surrounding her, she even had a garden that didn’t contain a single vegetable or fruit. She had a cozy little deck and not rickety old boards you thought would break when the bare minimum of pressure was added. She would always love her childhood memories, these were the things she was never going to forget; forever caged within her heart and mind.

    She never felt guilty for leaving home, like so many of her friends had. Farming was in their blood, no in their souls and that’s why they went back to it. Farming might be in her blood, but it wasn’t at the very core of her being. Her soul craved the unknown and the dangerous, not the humdrum life on the farm. Of course she could appreciate the hard work everyone did, her parents most of all, but as she had told herself many times before, these hands were meant for something else.

    Now, some people told her that journalism wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Obviously they had never met her and heard her aspirations. It was also likely that they didn’t truly want to be in that field of work if they thought it was a dull, going-nowhere job.

    You needed to be ambitious, excited, open to everything new and the information it presented you with. You had to be able to go after what you wanted. Circle like a shark, as you’re often referred to, and attack. She had to laugh when she was told to think of a back-up job. She had every intention of going somewhere in this business, using her superior snooping skills and becoming the best damn investigative journalist the world had ever seen. Of course that dream was promptly snatched out of her hands and was cut, burned and thrown in the ocean two months ago.


    *******

    “You’re such a baby Joe, honestly it won’t kill you to be away from Mrs. High- Maintenance for two weeks,” she said tossing him the half eaten box of muffins from Tim Horton’s.

    “You don’t know that,” he said nearly missing the box as it slid through his hands. Morgan looked at him like he was out of his mind and in need of a good whack to the head.

    “Joe, you are a grown man, she is a grown woman you’ll live trust me. Besides, where else am I going to find the best damn photographer to take the shots for my article?” she asked smiling as he rolled his eyes. Yes! She’d won this one, that was sixteen to fifteen.

    “You always pull that. When you find yourself a man you’re going to have his ego so big it’ll drive you nuts,” Joe shook his head a smile on his face.

    “It’s a good thing you’re not annoying when you’re ego is the size of the Grand Canyon or I’d have to drop you like yesterdays headline.

    “Yeah…” he ran a hand through his tousled blond hair, “What did you say this story was about?” he asked.

    “Drugs, the US Boarder, public safety, you know the usual,” she said waving a hand like it was going to be a breeze.

    “Mory, if it were the usual you’d leave it to all the interns, I still know you better than most,” he said eye brows raised as he approached her desk.

    “Hey, settle down cowboy, you’re taken. So what if there’s more, if I told you would you come?” she asked as she stood and came around to meet him. She had to turn her head up to look at him. Joe wasn’t a violent man but by God he could squish you like a bug if he wanted to.

    He stopped an inch or so from her and looked down at her thoughtfully, “Probably not. You’ve got a point, so I don’t need to know?” his perfect blue eyes continued to stare at her.

    “More like you don’t want to know until we get there,” she patted his shoulder and reached behind her for the manila folder sitting in the centre of the chaos that was her desk. She pushed it into his hands.

    “Damn, I was kind of hoping I’d get to do some persuading,” he smiled deviously. Morgan smacked his shoulder as hard as she could. It didn’t actually hurt but he winced anyways.

    “Honestly Joe, I may not like Taylor but I think she’d be very interested in the thoughts going through your head,” she told him threateningly. He held up his hands still holding the folder and laughed.

    “Relax, I’m only kidding. Besides the woman would probably hang up on you if you called,” Joe turned away to grab his things from the desk on the opposite side of the room.

    “Meet me at the airport at six tomorrow morning,” he waved at her as he left. Morgan ran to the door, “Don’t be late!” she added.

    *****

    Blood all over her hands, guns shooting from every direction, very small, very cramped space. Oh yeah this was about as good as it could get. If it weren’t for the fact that the blood on her hands wasn’t hers, the gunfire that reverberated off the walls of the warehouse, wasn’t from the latest action flick and the very cramped space in which she and a very unconscious Joe had hidden themselves, was a shipping container filled with bathroom appliances. Just perfect.

    She was beginning to think that talking to the farmer back in Maine wasn’t the greatest idea. She highly suspected he’d been hiding something, that sixth sense every journalist and reporter has and everything; this just confirms it all. His loud booming voice could be heard over all the gun shots screaming at them or the members of the gang that had involved themselves in his drug operation, she wasn’t sure. She wasn’t even sure what gang had decided they wanted more than just a measly ten percent of the profits.

    She knew Joe had been shot, badly too. Her left hand was the only thing keeping him from bleeding to death right then and there; of course she was never good at diagnosing things so she could be wrong. That assumption could just be the fear coursing through her veins at the moment making her think the worst.

    “Who the hell am I kidding, it couldn’t get much worse than this!” she told herself as she searched for something, anything that would help. Oh yeah Morgan just wait until they find you, open those doors and say “Here take a shower and get all cleaned up before you do us in, better yet can you install a toilet? I have to use the washroom” she grabbed some kind of pipe and dragged it closer to her. Useless against their nine millimetre hand guns, shot guns and semi-automatic rifles, but hell, all hope was lost at this point anyways right?

    At once she could here her mother screaming inside her head, “Hope isn’t lost Mory you just forgot to put a leash on it! It’s like a dog, let it out of your sight for even a minuet and it’ll run off on you.” She laughed to herself and checked Joe’s pulse again. It was weak, but it was definitely there.

    “Where the hell is my phone?” she whispered to herself as she rummaged around her pockets and in her bag with her free hand. It wasn’t in either of them. Damnit! It must have fallen out before the all out ‘war’ began. If hope was a dog, like her mother always said, then it better come the hell back with her cell phone.

    When she looked down at Joe again he was all but drained of his colour and his breathing had become twice as slow as it had been a moment ago. Oh please God, she thought, I promise I’ll never do anything crazy like this again if you just get us out of here! She never really prayed but there were just certain times one had to, and this was one of them.

    Honestly, you would never think that the portly old man who called himself Clyde, would even be in the business of exporting containers full of cocaine into Canada. No he had struck her as more of a home grown marijuana type of old guy. Just goes to show that old dogs do learn new tricks when money is involved.

    Course who would of thought that such a man would have an arsenal of automatic and semi-automatic guns and a roster of employees from the local county jail. This world was really going down the tubes if grandpa’s everywhere were turning to drug dealing to make extra cash.

    ‘Young lady you and yer friend better come out of there. Yer in an awful lot of trouble darlin’ now come on,” it had taken almost two whole minuets to realize that the shooting had stopped. So Clyde had killed all those young burly looking men. Go figure, but there was still no way in hell she was moving from where she was.

    “I said get come on out now!” he yelled again. She heard some faint whispering, apparently he was closer than she thought. There were three containers and a whole crap load of boxes, so they would have to look in and around everything first before finding her. Then again they did have a thirty-three percent chance of finding her container.

    “Joe if we get out of this alive I will buy you all the beer your stomach of steel can hold,” she muttered hoping he would come around.

    Her chest heaved up and down in quick short breaths. The panic she’d been holding back was now starting to take over. She was beginning to hyper ventilate and tears streamed down her face faster than she could wipe them away. Heavy foot steps were getting closer and closer echoing the slow loud thump of her heart as she held her breath.

    Then all at once she heard the warehouse deliver bay doors slide open and many heavy feet pounding the concrete along with loud authoritative voices shouting to the Clyde and his men.

    “Put your weapons down1 Put them down now!” She almost jumped up and ran out right then so she could hug the police officers, but she couldn’t move.

    “Help, in here!” she called as loud as her voice would let her. There was some commotion and then shuffling of feet as someone came to the unlatched door of the crate.

    “Drop your weapons!” they shouted at her. She didn’t move her hands but she looked at the gun pointed at her face and shouted right back.

    ‘I don’t have any weapons but a goddamn pipe to defend myself! I’m a journalist and my friend is going to die if you don’t get someone to help him!” She heaved in and out, her hand still pressed firmly to Joe’s wound, her other hand wrapped tightly around the pipe she’d found. Lifting it she tossed it over and watched it slide to a halt at their feet.

    “Now please help him,” she said the emotion inside getting the best of her. The sobs shook her petite frame making her blood smeared self look even more pitiful than she already was.

    ******

    “You endangered your life, you endangered Joe’s and you put a giant hole in the integrity of this paper! Morgan you were one of the more promising young journalists here but you were also the stupidest one. I can’t have you working here anymore. Pack up your desk and get out of her before I have you escorted out.” She’d never seen Roger so red, but he was livid. Eyes bulging, his finely trimmed hair a mess and his face was redder than a cherry red viper.

    “Fine Roger, fine,” she muttered as she stood up and left his office. She still felt horrible, even two months later. Joe had lived, but she felt guilty that he had almost died because of her and Roger had just made it ten times as bad.

    When she got half way down the all, Joe hobbled over to her. He hadn’t said anything to help her, not that she deserved it, so why was she angry at him? Perhaps it was just the expectation of help that comes with having a best friend. Of course it is conveniently lacking in times of need.

    “ Aw Morgan, I’m sorry honestly,” he said putting a hand on her shoulder. She stopped and shook it off before turning and giving him a cross between an angry and a pained glare.

    “No you’re not. Just go home to Taylor Joe and forget about it,” she said before continuing on to gather everything from her desk. He still stood there when she glanced back at him.

    “Come on Morgan!” he called.

    “Good-bye Joe.”