CHAPTER 1
“C’mon…you can do it! Push!” Morgan said, excitement rolling off of her encouraging words. “C’mon, mama!”
“Oh my gosh, this is too much! I can’t…” Megan, so nervous, and exhausted, couldn’t finish her thought.
Holding Meg’s hand, Colton became her rock, giving her strength when she thought she had none. “Breathe, baby, you can
do this! Hang in there, almost done!”
“Alright, this is it guys! Here comes another contraction,” Morgan warned, getting ready to receive the little bundle about to be delivered, “here come’s baby!”
“Colton! Oh my God, here comes the baby! Oh my…”
Morgan looked Meg in the eye, “Breathe, Meg, breathe! I need you to focus, honey, you got this!”
“She fainted! She fainted again, do something, Morgie!” Staying calm was becoming increasingly difficult for Colton; he was becoming desperate, ready for this part to be over.
“It’s okay. It never lasts long…” Although rare, Morgan had seen this before, and wasn’t alarmed. “She’s just excited.”
Colton chuckled, “and she’s back! Phew, it didn’t last as long this time!”
“Here it comes! I see the baby!” Excitement rolled off Morgan as she had the privilege of seeing the baby first, standing at the delivery end of the event. This part never got old. “Look at that face!”
“Colton!” Megan shouted, tears streaking her cheeks in an endless stream. “Look at our baby!”
The joy on Morgan’s face was short lived, quickly turning to a focused stare. “Hold on, here come’s number two!”
Megan and Colton looked to one another, Meg reeling in fear, Colton shocked. “Two?!” they questioned in unison.
“Yep! Twins.” Surprised by the couple’s response to more than one baby, Morgan prepared them for what could come, “we may get a third, even a fourth! There’s no telling how many are in there!
Hyperventilating, and fanning herself with her hand, Meg tried to keep it together, summing up what Morgan had just said and coming to terms with it. “More than two…”
“Honey, there can be as many as a dozen in there! Didn’t you guys google this or anything?!” Now Morgan was the surprised one, concerned for her friend’s lack of preparedness.
Meg looked to Colton, waterworks fully engaged. “A dozen? How will I take care of twelve babies?! Is this really happening? I change my mind, I can’t… I can’t do this!”
“A little late for that, here comes…” Morgan said.
With his hands holding her face, Colton looked in her eyes, and comforted Megan. “Baby, we’ll do it together, it’ll all work out. I promise.”
Just what she needed to hear, Meg smiled and nodded, ready to take on whatever challenge they were presented with.
“I really thought you guys did your research before committing to this… Oh, here it comes! You have another little girl!”
Colton wiped his forehead. “Wow, more females! The boys and I are almost outnumbered here!”
Toweling off the newest member of their family, Morgan swaddled both babies together and handed them to Meg to see for the first time. “I think that’s it! Just two this time!”
“I can’t believe they’re here, after all these weeks! Look at them!” Megan beamed with pride, as her heart filled with a sense of joy she had yet to experience before.
“You’ve been through your first birth, you’re a pro now, darlin’” Colton prided.
“No… Priscilla here did all the work – I’m just her really bad frantic coach!” Megan admitted, not taking an ounce of credit. “Can you believe it, babe? We have three pigs, now!”
When Morgan Jameson wasn’t protecting the peace as a Police Officer in the small mountain town of McKenzie Ridge, she was playing the role of town livestock Birth Doula. Having grown up on a ranch, and now owning it, afforded her that talent. Today was all about pigs, special pigs.
Priscilla the fainting pig was the latest addition to Colton and Megan’s menagerie of special needs animals. When Priscilla got too big to fit in her previous owner’s pocket, she landed on Colton and Megan’s door step with a note attached to the collar around her neck that said, she faints and eats a lot – we think she’s pregnant.
Sure enough, she was, and Megan hadn’t let Priscilla out of her sight since.
McKenzie Ridge rested in the Pacific Cascade Mountains of Oregon. It was a small town but had its own variety of hustle and bustle as a popular tourist destination. Morgan had lived in McKenzie Ridge her entire life, and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else – ever. If not for her century long family roots, then because of the people.
Her friends were dear to her, more like family. She sat back, wiping her hands on a nearby towel, over flowing with joy as she watched Colton and Megan introduce their newest additions to the rest of their perfectly imperfect furry family. The rest of the gang – the walking upright human kind – began to file into the small barn they all had helped Colton build to house their growing brood of lovable beasts.
In this group of friends, it didn’t matter who you were, where you were from, they loved you and loved you hard. It didn’t matter if it was Dawson and Sam’s kids meeting a milestone or pigs being born – they were there for each other through everything. Including chasing down bad guys, like they had the previous fall when Meg came to town and brought the past she was running from with her.
“My pig, my Meg?” questioned Lydia’s son, Meg’s toddler nephew, Jax, who was opening and closing his hands as he reached for a baby pig.
“Oh no you don’t,” Lydia intercepted, sweeping the tot off his feet, “you can come visit your Meg
, and her
pigs all you want, but that
will never be your
pig, son.”
Colton ruffled Jax’s hair, “Don’t worry about it bud, we’ll work on her. Maybe start with a fish.” Colton finished with a wink, earning a dirty faced smile from the cookie eating toddler.
“Just what this town needs,” Jessie interrupted, tossing in a dramatic eye roll aimed at Blake, “more pigs.”
“Darlin’, I’m not sure how to take that. Is that a cop jab, or pegged at my manhood
?” Blake chimed, in response to Jessie with a mischievous grin and waggling eyebrow.
“Trust me, you’ll know when I’m interested in your…manhood
, darlin’,” she rebutted in a breathy tone, running a finger down his chest, stopping at his belt buckle. “But, I wouldn’t wait around for that
.”
Jessie left the barn, middle finger in the air, “Cover their eyes,” she said, referring to the kids present. “If I can’t say the words in front of them, gestures are happening.”
Anticipating a vulgar verbal attack, Sam and Lydia had placed their hands over the kid’s ears, and quickly moved them to their eyes, shielding them from what was simply known as being Jessie
. The more crude, the better, if you asked Jessie. To her, a sweet loving hug and the middle finger meant the same exact thing and insults were compliments.
“Seriously Blake, when are you two going to get past the hate part of your love hate
relationship?” Morgan asked her partner.
The group snicker earned her a go to hell look from Blake, to which she winked – he clearly wasn’t fooling anyone when it came to his feelings for Jessie.
The air shifted and light mood grew heavy when Duncan Haines, the foreman from Morgan’s ranch, Pinecrest, briskly landed in the large barn doorway.
“Morgan, we gotta go!” he said with his cell phone to his ear. “There’s a problem at Pinecrest…it’s a body, Morgie.”
The silence was deafening as the wave of shock from his words quaked through the space. They each looked from person to person until clarity set in and each jumped into action as they always did. This group of family-like friends each made up the town’s various sectors of law and order, spanning from Law Enforcement, to Fire, Emergency Medical, and even Emergency Room Personnel. They were there for each other and they were there to fulfill their civic duty.
Blake Cooper pulled his ringing cellphone from his hip, certain the call was regarding the very thing that brought a chill over the room they all stood in. “Cooper, what do you got?” he said, answering a call from dispatch. A long pause ensued, before he nodded his head as if the person on the other end of the phone could see. “Got it, thanks.”
“Just got called out to your place, Morgan. Rescue is needed, Dawson and Carigan – that’s you. It’s your property, and a possible crime scene, Morgan, you’re not working this one. That means I’m going to need some extra hands, we’re spread thin today. Colton? Everly?” Blake resorting to his friends, some on and some off duty, wasn’t questioned or second guessed. This is what they did, helped each other.
“Dawson, you drive?” Carigan O’Reilly chimed, breaking the silence.
“You got it, partner – let’s go,” Dawson replied, assuming they would be called out as the on duty EMT team anyway. Sure enough, both his and Carigan’s phones began to chirp.
“I’ll ride with you,” Colton said, nodding to Blake, before kissing Megan’s forehead as he handed her the baby pig he had been holding. “Jessie’s already gone, but I’m here to help any way I can.”
Duncan, or Dunny as they called him, nodded, appreciating the quick response, and said, “He has a pulse – he’s alive.”
A sigh of relief escaped Morgan. At least this stranger, a man it seemed, was alive.
Everly Shaw, ER and Life Flight Nurse for McKenzie Ridge and its surrounding area, quickly intercepted. “Don’t move him! I’ll call Doc Charles on my way, he’s working ER tonight. I’ll have him meet us there, he lives close by.” She was already on the phone, summonsing help before she finished her thought and made her way to the door.
Dunny rode with Evie, so he could relay information from the scene to Evie and she could assess and instruct throughout the ten-minute drive up the ridge, to the ranch where their victim lay. The scene could best be described as organized chaos, everyone having a role and knowing what they could contribute.
With everyone out the door, as quickly as they’d come, headed to her
property, Morgan looked to a wide-eyed Megan who was staring blankly at her new little additions, not sure what to think with everyone leaving so quickly.
Sam stepped up and said, “Go, Morgie. The babies and Priscilla are fine. I’ll stay and help Meg and Lydia. Call me if you need me, though. I can be there in no time.”
Without hesitation, Morgan gave Meg a quick hug, and headed out the door with Blake after saying a few final encouraging words, “Priscilla knows what to do, honey, you just watch and enjoy! Congrats.”
And they were gone.