Truth Avenged
Ashley Monahan
Truth Avenged is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, and incidents
are the product of the author’s
creation and used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, is entirely
coincidental.
©2013 All Rights Reserved By The Author
Table of Contents
Preface
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
P reface
“Squirrel, what are we going to do?” a young man with a thick British accent asked, fear in his voice.
“They are going to shoot us down, that’s what’s going to happen,” another young man the same age answered shortly.
“Abe, shut the hell up,” Squirrel, a middle aged southerner, commanded. “Lonnie, it’ll be okay.”
Lonnie took no solace in his words. He trembled in fear.
“We’re going back. This is done. We’re turning aroun—” Squirrel didn’t get an opportunity to sound out the last letter of his thought.
TICK, TICK, TICK, TICK
“What the bloody hell?!” Lonnie covered his head.
“The twats shot us!” Abe yelled.
“Fuck!” Squirrel yelled as the craft shook violently and flames burst from the engine.
“Please forgive me,” Squirrel said to himself already knowing their fate. No more than five seconds passed before another round berated them.
TICK, TICK, TICK, TICK
“Shit! Please God!” Lonnie buckled himself into his station. He glanced over his shoulder and Abe’s face was pointed downward, seatbelt holding him in place, blood draining from his head.
“Abe!” Lonnie yelled. He tried to get out of his seat, but the force of their decline was too great to move, not that he would have been able to reach Abe anyhow. “Abe! No! Please, God, please, no, no! Help us! I don’t want to die!” Lonnie gripped the safety belt and closed his eyes.
“This is it.” A calmness overcame Squirrel. “I love you Adeline.”
Chapter One
RING, RING, RING
The old fashioned wind up alarm clock danced on the nightstand beside her. Without opening her eyes, she reached across the bed and swatted the air on a mission to halt the hellish noise. There was a loud crash and the sound of cat claws losing traction on the polished wood floors below her. Just another Monday morning. She stumbled out of bed and picked up the alarm clock shutting it off. No longer did she take a chance on the plug in alarm clocks or programmable clock on her cell phone. The world seemed to conspire against her many a days. Her phone had magically died on many occasions while she slept, or the power would go off in the middle of the night resetting her plug in alarm clock. The annoying wind up clock was the only sure bet, well, as long as it survived its daily fall.
Her cell phone vibrated on the stand.
“What?” she answered.
“This is your wakeup call sunshine,” the voice on the other end said.
“Thanks.” She clicked the end button and put her cell back on the nightstand. She opened the door adjacent to the bedroom and walked into the bathroom. Cold water hissed out of the sink and she splashed it on her face in an effort to bring herself out of her morning fog.
The cell phone danced on the nightstand again.
“What is it Paul?”
“Chance, you are my only subordinate I allow to speak to me so rudely without repercussion, keep that in mind.”
She yawned. “You know you love me.”
“You’re lucky I do. Listen, I need that piece on my desk no later than eight tonight. Why is it you try to cut the deadline as close as you can?” he said slightly annoyed.
“I write better under pressure. You’ll have it.”
“I better.”
“Thanks for the reminder. Now go back to bed. I’m getting ready to head up north.”
“Where is it you’re going again?”
“You gave me the damn assignment and you don’t remember?”
“Its three in the morning, give me a break.”
“It’s off the Old Rand Mill Road in some TR.” TR stood for Township and Range, it was the way Maine mapped the vast amount of unorganized and unpopulated territories in the state. “I don’t know if the trail is still there, it’s not marked on the new map. I’ll email you the coordinates before I leave.”
“Thanks. Be careful love.”
“Always darling.” She hung up the phone. She and her editor, Paul Marston, had a very unique dynamic. Their relationship may have been strained at work because he was her boss, but it didn’t affect their relationship outside of work. He was the one man in her life who’d always been there for her, well, had been there the most for her.
“Abby, come here girl, breakfast time,” she called the devilish black fur ball. Abby trotted out from the living room meowing at the sight of the food dish in Chance’s hand. Before the food dish could touch the floor, she swiped at her hand.
“Such a starved little fifteen pound cat you are, huh.” The food was gone after a few large gobbles.
Chance took a quick shower then shuffled through her dresser trying to find clothes to wear to her fancy affair. She didn’t miss having to adhere to the newspaper’s dress code. At least with her reassignment she could dress as she pleased. She pulled on a pair of cargo style shorts and a form fitting long sleeved tee shirt. Her dress wasn’t suggestive, but comfortable for her long arduous hike. She looked at her Mainer’s Atlas, a map that showed every road, stream, and pebble in the state, and emailed the directions and coordinates to Paul.
Out the door she went and threw her pack and hiking shoes in the backseat. It was at least an hour and a half drive to her final destination. Giddy up.
She turned onto the rutty logging road and pulled out the map. These roads weren’t on her GPS. A left here, right there, another right and she was on the correct road, she believed. The road was long abandoned and required 4WD to navigate. She looked at her handheld GPS to verify the coordinates and she was spot on. Bingo. There it was. Red blazes marked the trail, though they were very faint and it was apparent they hadn’t been remarked in the past decade. She laced up her hiking shoes and threw her pack on her back. When she was given the assignment to write about an off the beaten path trail she had no qualms, until they gave her the specifics. Then she was less than impressed. Paul asked a Maine Guide for suggestions on a remote trail hike. The jackass of a guide suggested this long forgotten trail. Asshole. She put her map and GPS in her bag. 6 a.m. illuminated the phone’s screen and reminded her how early it was. She needed to be out of the woods by 3 p.m. at the latest to give herself enough time to work up the column. The hike should take no longer than six hours. Plenty of time.
The sky was overcast and a light fog had settled on the ground. The combination made the dense forest both eerie and beautiful. She clicked a few pictures on her cell phone of the movie like scenery and onwar
d she went. As she trudged the trail she kept a close eye on the red blazes. There was no clear trail if one was to look at the ground, so she religiously kept her eyes pointed at the trees marked in red. If she was to get lost her GPS would lead her back, but she preferred to complete the task versus having to be creative with the truth for her article.
She clicked her iPod on and hummed lowly trying to push the discontent out of her mind. She missed reporting the breaking news. Hers was a “gravy” gig according to most of her coworkers, but she didn’t want gravy. She wanted gritty. And not gritty in the “play in the dirt” kind of way, which was her current position.
She’d worked for three years doing the breaking news in her sector of the state, until the newspaper owner’s son graduated journalism school and needed a job. Following that, she was picked to do “Specials” to the paper and bumped from her reporting job. The position entailed being an Outdoor and Healthy Living contributor. Her additional duties included covering events and local bullshit. It wasn’t the hard hitting news that would win awards to grace her wall. No, the newspaper owner’s son, a man whose articles needed a full-time copy editor staffed solely to him, he was the one who was tasked to cover the news. Life wasn’t fair. That’s the excuse Paul gave her when she lashed out at him after he delivered the news of her new assignment. She was the only one who could pull off the Outdoor and Healthy Living columns.
The other journalists, well, most would suffer a heart attack if they were given the assignment. The remainder were not candidates for one reason, or another. Paul didn’t give her the option, she was to do it. Period. So, after griping and making a scene for the others to see through the glass windows of Paul’s office, she accepted it.
Had she been willing to relocate, she could have her hard-hitting reporting job. Paul had his connections, but she didn’t want to move 150 miles south to do so. She was happy where she lived. And she didn’t have it that bad. She had a flexible schedule. They paid for all her travel expenses: gas, meals, and hotels when needed. Even if it wasn’t her dream job, she had a comfortable lifestyle for a twenty seven year old woman in her field.
She turned up the music on her iPod and listened to Maroon 5 as she ascended a steep knoll.
She hummed along to the tune and decompressed.
A few hours passed.
♫Promise me you'll always be,
Happy by my side,
I promise to sing to you,
When all the music dies♫
♫And marry me,
Today and every day,
Marry me♫
Train’s “Marry Me” was the song her iPod chose to play in her ear. She didn’t know how that one got on there, not her favorite. The stupid song blatantly rubbed in her single status.
She had to be near the top of the ridge. It couldn’t be more than an hour to the terminus of the trail, she prayed to herself. She was beat and still had the return trip.
SHUFFLE, SHUFFLE, SHUFFLE
She heard something, or someone, move in the woods near her. She clicked the stop button on her iPod and froze as she scanned her surroundings. Nothing in sight. She held her breath and looked for the source. Likely it was a deer, or with her luck, a skunk. Still nothing.
SHUFFLE, SHUFFLE
“Hello?” She waited for a response. It sounded like footsteps.
“Hello, is there anyone out here?” No answer.
“Hello?” More shuffling. She cautiously followed the noise. It came from a few feet away. The brush rustled in front of her. It couldn’t be that far ahead of her, but she saw nothing. She followed it without thought, drawn in by its mystery. It was definitely larger than a skunk and the sound didn’t follow the pattern of a deer, or moose. The faster she tried to catch it, the faster it went as well. She stopped to access the direction of its source and it stopped as well.
SHUFFLE, SHUFFLE
“What the hell?” She didn’t understand. The noise was close enough that she should be able to see its source. She continued to follow it, losing track of time and her bearings. What seemed like only minutes, had in reality been hours.
The footsteps stopped hastily in front of her. She cautiously walked forward to where she’d last heard it. In the brush ahead was something clearly out of place in these isolated woods. Pieces of dirty metal protruded from the ground. She dropped her pack and curiously walked over to investigate. It looked like a plane—though this was no modern plane. She ran her hand across the dirty metal of the hull and followed it to the cockpit. A large gun barrel protruded from the nose of the plane. She walked around to the other side. The fuselage was sheered in half, broken like a twig. Shards of one of the wings scattered the ground in the area surrounding her. What looked to be a gunner’s station was at the rear.
“What is this?” Chance said to herself in shock. If there had been a plane crash in these woods, it would have come up on an internet search. And the internet didn’t even put Helter Ridge on the map.
*****
Tucker Johnston woke from a sound sleep to the repulsive sound of his work cell phone.
“Hello.” He didn’t attempt to hide his exhaustion.
“Hey Tuck, its dispatch.” A wide awake guy on the other end chirped. Dispatch was the Department of Public Safety Green Division, the center that dispatched for Tuck’s agency, the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. “Sorry to wake you up.”
“Sure you are.” Tuck knew dispatchers enjoyed rousing them from their sound sleep. The dispatchers’ motto was—if we have to be awake, you have to be awake. He sat upright. “What do you have?”
“Missing hiker. Twenty seven year old female. Left at 3 a.m. yesterday, expected to be back no later than 8 p.m. to her work, the Tranton Times, but never returned,” Kevin, the dispatcher, relayed.
“A reporter?”
“Yeah, apparently she was working on a piece for the paper.”
“Where?”
“T18 R06, Helter Ridge.”
“What’s her name?”
“Chance Phillips.”
“What kind of parent names their child Chance?” He yawned. “Who else have you got going?”
“Just you. The OD, Sergeant Kerr, said to give him a call and he’d give you the rest of the info. He spoke to the complainant already.” OD stood for On Duty, the ranking officer in charge of authorizing call outs, aka overtime.
“Okay. Thanks.”
Tucker Johnston had been a game warden for six years. The late night/early morning phone calls were part of the gig. He’d adjusted to the lifestyle, but that didn’t mean it was any easier getting out of bed in the middle of the night. At thirty four, his life consisted of work, work, and more work. It was the reason the space next to him in his queen size bed was vacant.
He dialed.
“Hello.” Sergeant Michael Kerr was as chipper as Tuck.
“Hi Sarge.”
“Did dispatch give you all the details?”
“Twenty seven year old journalist missing while hiking Helter Ridge.”
“Her co-worker called this in. Hasn’t had any contact with her since 3:00 a.m. yesterday. Said she should have been at the paper no later than 8 p.m. to turn in her article, but didn’t show up. Not answering her phone, vehicle isn’t home, doors at her house are locked.”
“Did her co-worker check to see if her vehicle was at the trailhead?”
“That’s what you need to check. She has a black Jeep Wrangler.”
Tuck yawned again. “I’m on my way.”
“Give me a call when you get up there.”
“Alright.” The line went dead. Tuck stared at the red numbers of the clock. 12:30 a.m. He’d fallen asleep only two hours previous and had to be back up and out the door by 6 a.m. It would be a long night. The outside thermometer showed 55 degrees. At least the weather was perfect. He got dressed, laced his boots, and out the door he went. His GMC started without argument and he headed toward the ridge.
The 24 hour gas stat
ion, the only store open in town, called his name as he approached it. If he was going to stay awake for the forty five plus minute ride ahead of him on rough as hell roads, he needed a cup of coffee. He quickly grabbed a large cup of black sludge and back on the road he went.
RING, RING, RING
Damn phone.
“Hello.”
“Tuck, I have a license plate for you.”
“Can you IM it?” The wardens had computers with wireless connectivity in their trucks and used Instant Messenger with others in the department to communicate.
“Will do.”
“Did you try calling her?”
“Ummm, I didn’t, I’ll do it now.” The dispatcher slacked on his end of the job.
“IM her number, I’ll call.”
“Will do.”
“Thanks.” He hung up. He didn’t care what the license plate was. It should be the only Jeep Wrangler parked off of what couldn’t even accurately be described as a road. His Instant Messenger beeped and contained the information he requested. He pecked her phone number into his cell.
“You’ve reached Chance Phillips with the Tranton Times, leave me a message and I’ll return your call as soon as possible. Have a nice day.” Her voice was professional and cheery.
“Chance, this is Game Warden Tucker Johnston. It is about 1:25 a.m., please give me a call at 1-800-658-2200 when you get this message and ask for me. We had, uh, someone concerned for your wellbeing and want to make sure that everything is okay.” He hung up the phone. He kept his truck pointed north; the only traffic he met was an occasional logging truck.
Truth Avenged (Green Division Series Book 1) Page 1