Glory

By Mindy Haig

Banished from his home and left to wander the mortal world until The Judgment Day, Sammael has lived more lives than he cares to remember.

But he can't forget.

Haunted by his memories, he is drawn to places of turmoil, always looking for ways to hasten the day when the Gates of Heaven opened and his father would allow him to return home.

Sammael's act of vengeance at the dawn of man destroyed a love that was meant to be and left his rival broken. What he didn't know was that the strength of that love left him vulnerable to losing his Glory forever.

In 1996, a chance meeting at an innocuous fundraiser renewed that ancient rivalry. Two men pursue the same woman but with vastly different intentions. She must choose between the man who has the world at his fingertips and one who wears his heart on his sleeve. Can true love overcome the burning need for revenge?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mindy Haig
• Release date: Jun 24, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301332281

Mindy Haig

I am a graduate of Rutgers University in New Brunswick New Jersey. I was born and raised in New Jersey so I am very much a city slicker. I moved to Florida to marry my sweetheart after college and marveled at how little there was to do and how much one had to drive to do it! But due to a job change and an abrupt move, we settled in Austin, Texas where the mottos is 'Keep Austin Weird' and I try my best to uphold it! I am the mother of 2 great kids and though writing has always been a pursuit I was interested in, being a Mommy got in the way for quite a few years. I decided I would give it a fair shake in 2009 and I haven't been able to quit since. I have 4 completed novels and I have 4 additional started novels plus 2 sequels all in various stages of gestation. I have a hard time stopping my ideas and when a seemingly great idea hits me - typically just as I am attempting to fall asleep - I am compelled to start an outline. My 2 great talents are: 1. My remarkable ablilty to remember names - which has served me well. 2. My ability to remember lyrics from every song I ever heard in the 70's and 80's - which has not helped me in the slightest. I have a quirky sense of humor and sometimes TV commercials crack me up. I like the notion of things being 'meant to be' or somehow touched by the unexplainable. I also like the effect music has on one's state of mind and the memories a song can recall.

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Breakwater Harbor Books

Presents:

Glory

By

Mindy Haig

Copyright © 2013 by Mindy Haig

Smashwords Edition

Cover Art by Delaney Haig

Shield Image is Public Domain without any conditions

All Rights Reserved

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Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: (March 18, 1996)

CHAPTER 2: (March 23, 1996)

CHAPTER 3: (March 24, 1996)

CHAPTER 4: (March 25 - 30, 1996)

CHAPTER 5: (April 1, 1996)

CHAPTER 6: (April 3, 1996)

CHAPTER 7: (April 6, 1996)

CHAPTER 8: (April 8, 1996)

CHAPTER 9: (April 11, 1996)

CHAPTER 10: (April 13, 1996 - Taiwan, April 12,1996 - USA)

CHAPTER 11: (April 13, 1996 - Evening, Taiwan, Morning - USA)

CHAPTER 12: (April 14, 1996)

CHAPTER 13: (April 15, 1996)

CHAPTER 14: (April 19, 1996)

CHAPTER 15: (The Week of April 21, 1996)

CHAPTER 16: (April 27, 1996)

CHAPTER 17: (The Week of April 28, 1996)

CHAPTER 18: (May 6, 1996)

CHAPTER 19: (May 9 - 12, 1996)

CHAPTER 20: (The Week of May 12, 1996)

CHAPTER 21: (Graduation week)

CHAPTER 22: (May 31st 1996)

CHAPTER 23: (June 1, 1996)

CHAPTER 24: (June 1, 1996)

CHAPTER 25: (Aftermath)

POST SCRIPT: Charlie Goodwin:

CHAPTER 1: (March 18, 1996)

Nathan Finley woke up with a gasp.

His breath was choppy. Sweat ran down his forehead. His body shook with pain from a memory of a terrible night eight years ago.

Initially, his conscious mind recalled almost nothing about the accident itself. He’d woken up in a hospital with head trauma and memory loss, and only his brother, Matthew, his friend, Charlie and a police report to fill in the lost span of time. Now a disjointed portion of his subconscious had begun working overtime tormenting him with its recreation of the most painful moments of his life.

College. Senior year:

He left later than he normally would have because of a study group for an upcoming exam. The road was dark and poorly lit. Normally, it wasn’t a bad drive. Ithaca was only about fifty minutes from Endwell, but the dark road was slick with drizzling rain and he knew he didn’t need to make the trip. He could have done his laundry at school. Yes, it required effort he didn’t particularly want to give, and he knew if he was home, his mom would do it for him and she’d feed him too.

Those were the foolish thoughts he could still remember. But the details locked in his mind were breaking loose.

A tractor-trailer truck was coming up behind him too fast.

Way too fast.

He’d just passed Besemer Hill Road, and 79 was narrow there, heading toward the bend. He kept glancing in the rear view mirror but the truck kept coming. There was nowhere to go to get out of its path. Then came that awful instant of time when he knew for certain the truck was going to hit him. He laid on the horn, hoping to get the driver’s attention.

The truck swerved at the last possible moment, bumping him just enough that he lost control and began to spin, as the cab of the truck veered into the oncoming lane. Brakes squealed and slipped, as the trailer began to slide on the slick road. It jack-knifed around and struck him again. He could hear the thumping of the truck wheels as they skipped sideways on the wet pavement. He could hear the sickening crunch of metal on metal as the trailer hit his car. His mind vividly reenacted the spinning and he could suddenly see the headlights as the cab of the truck spun toward him. He could feel the tremendous force of his head smashing the side window as the car and cab of the truck collided for the second time. It happened so fast. He was out of sorts. He seemed to be weightless for an instant until the crushing impact of the car landing jolted every part of his body. He was only vaguely aware of being upside down in a ditch.

His head hit glass. The sound was loud in his ears. There was blood; so much that everything seemed red. The car got very hot, very fast. Somehow, he did what he’d had to do, dislocating his left shoulder to free himself from the burning wreckage of the car. He lay there in pain in a wet ditch on a dark road.

And he cried.

The nightmares were horrific. His subconscious couldn’t seem to escape the memory and it had begun replaying the scene more and more frequently; each time delving deeper, like his mind was searching for some missing piece of the time.

The clock said 5:02 am.

A long anguished sigh escaped his body as he reluctantly got out of bed and made his way to the bathroom. You look like hell this morning, he told his reflection as he splashed cold water on his face. It was eight years ago. Why are you doing this now? he asked, wishing, for the hundredth time, he could just forget, or have those moments of semi-conscious memory permanently removed. Nate looked back at his bed and wished he wasn’t alone, but he immediately regretted that thought because it just made him think of Kay.

And thinking about Kay was frustrating.

He didn’t have to be alone. He knew that. But Kay was all he wanted. He could feel her. He could sense her. He could look into her eyes and know exactly what she was thinking. But she wasn’t thinking about him; at least she wasn’t thinking about him the way he thought about her. He was just her plan B. He was the one she poured her heart out to. But he couldn’t find a way to get from being the shoulder she cried on to being arms that held her or heart that was her home.

There were too many painful things going on in his head and it wasn’t even dawn yet. He started the hot water, but even a shower couldn’t wash away the weariness. He knew he should probably go talk to Charlie or Matthew. They always helped him get his perspective back. The whole frantic recreation of this lost memory just seemed so strange. He’d never dreamt of that night for the first four years after the accident. He knew what was recorded in the police report but he never thought about it. He lived through it and that was all that mattered, until he moved into the city nearly four years ago. Maybe he had some latent fear of the city that triggered him. So many things happened in his life all at once when he moved here. Yes, it was a great job opportunity, but the commitment was enormous, the workload was stressful and he met Kay, so the frustration, desire and need were constant.

Still, there was no defining moment; there was no injury or trauma to explain why the nightmares started. The dead part of his mind suddenly awoke frenzied. Each time it became clearer now, to where he could see the rain in the headlights as he looked back at the truck, and he could feel the pain as he wrecked his shoulder to squeeze out of the car.

His shoulder ached as he pulled his shirt on. He knew the pain was only in his head. The shoulder wound had healed long ago; there wasn’t even a mark. The only physical reminder of that night was a scar on his left temple that ran down to his cheekbone, where his head hit the window and broke the glass. Looking at the scar made it ache; his mind would not let him forget the pain.

But the dreams wouldn’t have been half as bad if he didn’t have to feel the pain every time.

Nate pulled on jeans. It was a Monday and he just couldn’t be bothered with anything nicer, he was too tired. The March mornings were still cold in New York City so he pulled his favorite sweater over his shirt, left the tails hanging out the bottom and folded his cuffs over. He dried his thick brown hair just a little and ran his fingers through it, like he usually did. He looked at the scar for a moment and remembered what the twenty-three stitches had looked like there, flipped his hair back over that spot and willed himself to stop thinking about it

Then he went to the kitchen, poured a cup of coffee and prepared for another long day at work.

The Daily News.

Sure it wasn’t the New York Times, but it wasn’t the Inquirer either. It was a good solid paper. Just the news as it happened, and in New York, news happened all the time.

The building was already swarming with people when Nate arrived. He went into his office and shut the door, hoping for a few minutes of peace. But he was immediately bombarded with calls flashing on his line and two reporters outside his door knocking.

It was going to be a very long day.

* * *

Gerard Williams poured the coffee into a tall mug. He could see the steam rising off of the black brew, but he knew that wasn’t good enough. The coffee pot could only make it so hot, and that was never hot enough. He put it into the microwave for two full minutes until he could see the angry roiling boil. He took it out carefully, with a conscious effort not to scald his hand. He added precisely two teaspoons of sugar. A grain more or less and the Master would know. Then he placed the cup precisely one hand span from the Master’s left hand.

The Master of the house liked things precisely the way he liked them.

The Master, that was what his employer, Dominic Thanos, was and that was how Gerard always thought of him. The term was more than respect; it might have been something like an internal warning that he needed to remember his place with this man. And though Gerard may have looked more like a bodyguard than a butler or a valet, he meticulously remembered his place when it came to Dominic Thanos.

The Master didn’t take his eyes from his newspaper; he just lifted the cup and drank.

Gerard winced. He could barely touch that cup, he knew that coffee was boiling hot, but it never seemed to be too hot for this man. Occasionally he would complain that the coffee wasn’t hot enough, but it was never too hot.

Gerard had worked in the house of Dominic Thanos for three years. But he still knew almost nothing about the man. The very first thing he remembered thinking, besides hoping the man would hire him, was that there was something very strange about his eyes. They didn’t seem to have a color. That’s not to say they were the noticeably colorless eyes of an albino, but rather that the color seemed to ebb and flow with his thoughts or feelings. They were different every time Gerard looked at him. It may have been a trick of the lighting, but as they settled in to their conversation, the color they settled upon was rather reassuring, and his mind almost instantly forgot the uncomfortable strangeness. The second thing he noticed was the sword and shield that hung behind his desk.

They are quite fabulous aren’t they? Dominic Thanos said as his eyes followed Gerard’s.

Yes, they are. Are you a collector? Is that your business?

No. These are something of a family heirloom. They are priceless. I shall never be parted from them, they shall go with me beyond the grave. he said smiling, taking the sword from the wall and testing the weight of it in his hand. His mysterious eyes blazed a color like sunshine as he stepped away and swung the weapon as thought it had been made for him. Then he laid it across his palms and held it out to Gerard.

Gerard took it cautiously. It was old, finely made and elaborately engraved. The hilt was well-oiled leather and it was damned heavy but the man had handled it as though it was an extension of his arm. And Thanos’ eyes flashed something that might have been what victory looked like if victory was visible expression.

He hired Gerard there on the spot.

Over the past three years he’d seen those strange eyes show more of his Master than Gerard wished to know. He’d seen those eyes burn with anger. He’d seen the man’s pride and the look that was as close as he ever came to happiness or pleasure show in the colors of those eyes. Gerard had seen lust and envy, but most fearsome was the wicked hatred that flamed a color that could not be put into words. Gerard feared that color and he feared this man. So he did his job; he did the tasks the Master requested of him and he kept to himself.

Thanos traveled for his work, which he rarely spoke of, and aside from bringing home a woman every now and again, it was always just he and Gerard in the house. He never considered addressing him as anything other than Sir, and Thanos never hinted that it would be acceptable to do so. The man’s age was hard to pinpoint, though if he had to assume, Gerard would estimate somewhere between thirty-five and forty-five. Where he was from and whether he had any family to speak of remained a mystery.

Gerard was afraid to see the man angry, so he never asked questions that weren’t related to the business of the day. He’d thought of leaving this job, but the pay was good and he needed the money. It was always difficult for someone with a questionable past to find decent employment, and Gerard still had child support to pay. Desperation was a terrible thing. But this job was as secure as Gerard was going to get given that past. Dominic Thanos took him in even knowing his failings. All the man asked in return was that the coffee was precisely made and that his personal dealings and commitments remain private.

Gerard, the Master started quietly, breaking the other’s silent reverie. I’ll need a car for Saturday evening. I’ll be attending a fund raising event in the city. Make the usual arrangements please.

Yes Sir.

The Master flipped his newspaper over and pointed at the photo of a heavy dark haired man with an easy smile and his jewel-encrusted wife. Have you heard anything about this Lachman family? Big political donors it seems.

Yes Sir. He’s old family money from bankers, well invested in technology and in the Middle East. Three children, two are currently Ivy League though the younger was accepted for the contribution, not the grade point. They are primarily Democrats; he was one of a handful that personally funded the Governor’s race last year. He’s been known to throw money at various Republicans who back certain banking legislations and tax agendas. He makes large donations to the arts on behalf of his wife, a former dancer. He also funds certain medical institutions and their temple.

Jews?

Yes Sir. Gerard finished.

He smiled. There was nothing in that smile that gave even the slightest impression of happiness or joy.

Gerard shivered.

* * *

Dominic finished his coffee and went upstairs to his rooms.

Jews. And bankers at that, he muttered. How wonderfully stereotypical, he told his reflection. He leaned over the bathroom sink, splashed water on his face and winced. He didn’t like the cold. He hated the fact that he could feel the cold. It was torment upon eternal torment. Joy and warmth were beyond his reach, but he felt the wretched cold. He looked at himself in the mirror. Physically, he didn’t age. That’s not to say he couldn’t appear older or younger as it suited him. He could be any physical being he chose and while his form was acceptable, even pleasing to the women, on days like this one threatened to be, it galled him that he had to remain embodied in human flesh.

Dominic lay down on his bed and turned on his television. He knew he should go to his office and make some calls, do his homework on Lachman, but he was feeling lethargic. He flipped through the cable news channels, even the sensationalism bored him this morning and he closed his eyes.

That was always a mistake.

He had a name then: Sammael.

But the others didn’t call him by that name.

It had been so long since the name had been spoken. He couldn’t remember what it sounded like spoken in the tongue of the Angels. He and Evangeline were the last beings created from the Divine Glory of Heaven. The Father dug deep, he gave them beauty such as no other knew. Evangeline was the image of perfection, the most magnificent work of celestial artistry ever fashioned. She was love and peace and charity, all the goodness The Father had he poured into her.

But Sammael was different.

The gifts he was imbued with were none that Heaven should possess. And The Father knew what he’d created, but he refused to fix his mistake.

At first, Sammael didn’t realize he was made differently. The Father treated him like all the others, and Sammael’s beauty was such that the others accepted him as one of them, but his essence was different. He tried hard to be one of them; he wanted very badly to feel the joys and the Glory. He was the other half of the most beautiful of all souls, and he wanted her. His desire and his need for her was tremendous, but he could not love. He could not feel the most sacred gift The Father had given all the others. Sammael didn’t understand the thing he lacked, nor did he understand what he was given. He asked the others questions, so many questions. But they couldn’t answer. They did not have the feelings or vices that he did.

He could not feel satisfied.

He could not be at peace.

He could not blindly obey like the others.

And that was his downfall.

Though there were multitudes of Angels in the heavens, The Father never made another after Sammael. He turned his focus to the dirt. He hand crafted imperfection in the form of flawed beings from clay and mud and he ignored the pleas and tears of the last son of his Glory. He ignored the questions and even the insolence. He ignored the belittling of the other perfect ones for their blind faith and unquestioning devotion.

His name was Sammael. But they didn’t call him that for long. No. They called him Iblis.

Damaged.

Then, The Father created Adam.

Sammael burned with jealousy that his Father would love this ugly creature more than he loved him.

The Father wanted the man of dirt treated as one of the Angels. He told them to bow down to this child of his. And they did because they were never given the will to disobey.

Sammael refused.

Iblis the others whispered. They said it with sympathy. They said it because they could only speak truths. But they said it quietly; away from his ear, because his rage was nothing that belonged in that place. They whispered that he was corrupted, that the Glory of Heaven was not meant for the likes of him. They whispered that his beauty was a dangerous thing because it masked what his essence was made of. And they were right. He was damaged, his spirit was corrupted, but that was what The Father made him. He didn’t want to feel the things he felt, but he could not be less than what he was and The Father refused to fix him.

So when the man of dirt stood before him, Sammael’s pride was hurt. He refused to bend his knee. He said: I am better than this thing that you parade before me. I am made from your own Glory and you would have me bow to him. It is an affront. It is an outrage upon your own being to debase those who are made from the light of Heaven and have them bow their heads to that.

"He is my son as much as you are Sammael." The Father said gently.

"No! He is not! He is made of nothing, he has no place here."

"The Glory and the power will be his. His Paradise will be shared by all of you. Every one of you will be born of the earth, to live as a mortal, and wear the flesh of man. I ask you to accept him, to embrace his life. I ask you to bow your head in respect."

"I will not! Sammael shouted as hot tears welled in his eyes. That place is no Paradise. I ask you to make me whole like the others and you refuse. Instead you abase me before this thing you call Son. Then you decree that the children of Heaven will be born of the flesh to walk the mortal world? I will not accept him. I will never be born of the dirt." He held his head high. He spoke arrogantly, impudently, but those tears fell as he spoke. And The Father turned away from him.

Evangeline could not bear his pain. My Love, she said tenderly, why do you do this? Why do you question him so? He made you. He loves you. Can you not just do as he asks? she pleaded.

"I cannot, Evangeline."

"Why?" she gasped.

"I am not made properly. I cannot follow blindly like the rest. I cannot be less than what he’s made me. He put these weaknesses in me. I feel pride and anger, I feel want, and he will not take those things back. He leaves me to suffer these torments. Where do you see his love in that?"

"It is not my place to question his reasons, Sammael, but if you continue, he will cast you out. He will banish you from here, from me," she whispered.

The love in her voice tore at his heart. He wished beyond all else he could feel that love and express that feeling to her. He looked away because he could not bear the look in her crystalline eyes. The Father will do what he alone chooses. If he loves his son of mud more than the child of his glory then he will cast me aside.

"Please, I cannot bear to lose you. Can you not just do this for me?" she clutched his hand to her and her tears burned.

But Sammael said, I cannot. Not even for you.

Dominic woke up remembering that moment, whispering to himself. His eyes were deep brown with longing and regret.

"I stroked her cheek and I walked away.

The Father breathed life into his new beloved one.

The others sang his praise.

I heard the song for a moment.

And then I was alone.

Cold."

He screamed out his agony and his frustration alone in the safety of his home. He’d been part of this world since the dawn of creation, but he didn’t really exist. He didn’t belong among the Angels because his essence was different from theirs, but he was not a man either. He was smoke and mirrors. He was the embodiment of vengeance. He hated The Father and wanted with all of his being to return to him at once. That desire, the longing to go home burned above all else.

And that loss drove him to find greater ways to avenge himself.

But today, he needed a distraction; his mind was too crowded with anger and loss.

He could use a woman. He hadn’t taken the time for pleasure in some time. He could feel that lust, that craving, and his physical self wanted the release. He would have satisfaction, he told himself as he took his phone from his nightstand and began the business of his day.

* * *

The sound that emanated from the rooms upstairs was like the agony of a thousand souls being rent and destroyed. Gerard’s blood was like ice in his veins. He had no idea how close to the truth his speculation might be. He’d heard that sound twice before, and each time it made him cower and pray. He wondered what sort of torture Thanos did upon himself that unleashed such fearsome agony. Surely there must be some physical damage from such overwhelming anguish. But he never saw any signs of it. Gerard had thought that the physical suffering it took to get clean and sober was the worst possible torment imaginable. But this sound was hell itself. He hoped never to know what the cause of that sound could be.

The Master, as always, emerged as though nothing unusual had transpired. And life continued. Gerard knew he would never be brave enough to ask what the sound was or if the man was all right.

* * *

Kay Olsen looked up and down the platform and sighed. Loudly.

The weather was colder and gloomier than necessary this close to spring, and it didn’t make for a cheerful morning. The New Jersey Transit stop in Seacaucus was one of the better stops along the Northeast Corridor, but that didn’t make it pleasant. A cold wind whistled along the tracks, whipping her long, dark hair into her face and causing it to stick to her mascara and her carefully tinted lips. The train rumbled and clattered to a jerky stop. Hardly anyone exited making it particularly crowded even for a Monday.

The station was close to her apartment, so close she could hear the awful racket of it all night long. And while that was convenient, it irked her that at twenty-seven, she still had to commute into the city on the miserable train. Not that she wanted to make the drive into the city; that was far from the case. But it had been nearly four years and she still hadn’t made a breakthrough that allowed her to live the city life, no, she was still struggling along in a lousy apartment in Jersey. A degree in Journalism, sparkling references from both papers she worked on in college, an internship with The Chicago Tribune and all she ever got was the fluff pieces: social news, fund-raising events, the Governor’s Holiday Ball, the yearly lighting of the Christmas Tree in Rockefeller Center, the Mayor’s birthday extravaganza; nothing that was actually newsworthy.

Kay studied her fellow passengers as they occupied themselves reading briefs and answering email. She smoothed her skirt and slid her laptop from its bag. She knew she should spend the commute engaged in something that might better her chances of getting an actual story. She could test the waters and look for another job. Instead, she did what she always did, she zeroed in on one passenger, singling out some poor soul who looked weary, frantic or out of place in some way and wrote a fictitious article about what his or her tragic day was going to be like. It passed the time. One day, she told herself, all those bits and piece of fictional life would be compiled into a best selling book and she’d revel in the acclaim. Of course, that would mean taking all of those stories and making them into a coherent tale with some sort of storyline and plot. She’d ridden this train a lot, so there were potentially reams of fictitious days in the fictitious lives of these quasi-strangers. But she had no idea how would it be possible to weave them into any sort of narrative. She wasn’t even writing any longer just staring into space looking vexed until the speaker above her head finally blurted out: Next stop New York Penn…. Thinking about it made her head throb, but it did pass the time and lend itself to some degree of hope.

Fortunately, the trip from Seacaucus to Penn Station was relatively short. Penn was a dingy, crowded depot, and the population tended to be short tempered and pushy. The walk uptown was miserable when the weather was gloomy and the morning as a whole was bringing her down. Kay lamented the triviality of her job as she walked. Sure there were probably thousands of women who’d love to take her place, but it was a rut and she was stuck in it. She wrote for the Lifestyle section of the paper. A typical week included a Hot Trends column on Wednesdays, Fashion Finds column on Thursdays and the Weekend Scene on Fridays. She’d started her Hot Trends article, but the ‘trend’ this week was sheer animal prints, which she loathed, so trying to find a way to make then seem fun and sexy was draining her. And it bugged her that there was not a single perk to being the fashion writer. After all, the movie critic saw free movies. The restaurant critic dined on free meals, typically good ones in high dollar restaurants. The Fashion writer didn’t get jack. She could hardly score cab fare. It was such a lame excuse for a journalism career. Thinking about her job was bringing her down even more than the gloomy weather.

The office was already bustling when she made her way into the building. The elevator was so tightly packed with bodies she thought she might be smothered or suffocate. The effort it took dislodge herself at her floor was worse than the stairwell at Grand Central during a Friday rush hour.

What is going on here, she asked no one in particular as she shoved her way forward through the door.

A Police Officer was shot and killed about six-thirty this morning. The new is breaking all over the city, an intern told her as he followed in her wake through the sea of bodies."

That’s terrible, she muttered.

Yeah, unless you’re Ben. Then you can sit pretty, suck your lowly interns dry and milk this probably for a good portion of the summer. More if the peons can dredge up any sort of dirt.

Love your job, do you? Kay laughed a little.

The job is great, the boss is… Shit, you won’t tell him, will you?

He’s an ass, but he knows he’s an ass which makes it a little easier to work for him.

If you say so, he said snidely. I was trying to get Mr. Finley’s internship.

Well, I certainly don’t blame you there. Working under the top dog is always a better prospect and Nate’s about a thousand times more personable. Kay answered with a smile.

Yeah, but he only takes one and I guess you have to take what you can get, he said resolutely as he got shoved off her line. He disappeared as the crowd closed around him almost as easily as if he’d never been there at all.

Kay continued on until she reached her destination, her home away from home, her small gray cubicle tightly wedged between two other identical cubicles and one large photocopier. There was a post-it note stuck to Kay’s computer screen. She didn’t look at it right away. She slid her laptop onto the dock and in moments the two monitors came to life with the happy Windows jingle and a burst of color. She logged in, tucked her computer bag under her desk and adjusted her skirt.

Ben wants you in his office ASAP! The neon green post-it shouted.

And she knew he had the cop story.

Sweet! she whispered excitedly. This could be the big day, she thought hopefully. That shooting had the potential to be something big, at least around here. If the intern was right, her name could be on a lead story for quite some time. And she was willing to take a chance, delve deep into the story where the big writers were cautious about their names. They didn’t want to take anything that might be a dead end.

Kay had nothing to lose.

She mentally checked her appearance. She was really glad she’d taken the time to dress well, especially given the ugly weather and the horrible commute. But she looked professional and ready to tackle whatever aspect of the story Ben was ready to give her. Kay took a deep breath and composed herself. She didn’t want to seem too eager or worse desperate. Though she was desperate. Desperate for a break through and the luxury of leaving Seacaucus.

Ben’s door was open but she knocked anyway.

Kay! Good, come in. Close the door.

Busy morning, she said cheerfully.

Yes, a complete nightmare, he smiled brightly. I’ve got an assignment for you.

What is it? Kay asked happily.

Fundraiser. A big one…

Kay stood shocked. No! Ben! No! Come on, you’ve got this great story…

Kay, you thought I was…

Yes. That’s what I thought. Seriously, Ben, with everything that’s going on out there and an urgent note on my desk, what the hell did you expect me to think?

Ben shook his head. It’s not your area, Kay.

Damn it, Ben, I don’t have an area. I’m a journalist. I want to report the news, not this trash. Kay said tossing the file back onto Ben’s desk. I’ll do anything, Ben, I’ll talk to the widow or the partner. I’ll take the witness statements…

It’s already assigned. It’s too big for you, you don’t have the chops for this.

And I’m never going to get them if you don’t give me a chance.

Ben raised one eyebrow at her and frowned. He picked up the file. This one’s important, and on the cusp of what just happened today, all the big money will want to talk to the press and show their support. It’s Saturday night, do you want it or not?

What she wanted to do with his damned file would surely have gotten her fired. But she snatched it out of his hand and spun on her heels. I want Kevin with me, she said blandly and she walked out.

The intern was right, she thought. Ben was definitely an ass, and quite a few other things that she probably shouldn’t say aloud right outside his door. It was moments like this she wished she could cuss in another language, something harsh like German or maybe Vietnamese. Kay wasn’t watching where she was going, which was a bad idea given how crowded the office was. She was too consumed in her abject loathing of