Friendship Worth Risking

Chapter One

Morgan rubbed his hand along the bottom of the steering wheel. They had just solved their case. Jenny, the 12 year old girl who had been abducted, was found, scared and bruised, but alive and had been returned to her grateful parents. The bastard who had taken her hadn't had the time or privacy to do anything more than threaten her with his knife before Morgan kicked down the door and put two bullets in his chest.

Reid was sitting in the passenger seat of the black SUV. His eyes seemed lost in the vast dark expanse covered in thick blankets of snow. The stars twinkled warmly against the dark winter sky, blocked out along the horizon by mountains in the distance.
Reid shivered against the cold, his wool coat and many layers doing their best to warm his small frame.

The thermometer on the display read 9 degrees outside. Morgan wordlessly reached over and turned the heater on the maximum setting. His friend didn't even notice the movement, but sighed a small breath when the air became warmer.

Morgan was ready to be back at the motel. It was admittedly a bit weird to share a room with Reid, especially since they only had one-bed rooms available, but it was a place he could lay down and try to get some sleep. He never slept well during a case. Neither does Reid, he had learned through the tossing and turning and the nightmares that the genius pretends don't happen.

Only a half-hour to go before they can both rest.

A sputtering and shaking shocks both men. "What was that?" asks Reid. Before Morgan can answer, the car does it again and the engine dies. Morgan uses the SUV's momentum to pull off to the side of the two-lane highway.

"Damn!" Morgan tries, in vain, to start the car, but the engine makes no attempt at a sound. "Damn!" Morgan repeats, hitting the steering wheel in frustration. He grabs his phone from his belt and flips it open. No signal. "Damn!" He snaps the phone shut and tosses it on the dashboard.

Morgan looks over and sees Reid looking at his own phone. "No signal on mine, either." He sighs, slipping his phone in his pocket and wrapping his arms around himself, obviously missing the heater's warm flow of air already. "How long before you think they notice we didn't make it back?"

Morgan sighs. "An hour, at least. Then another hour to find us. If they start looking. Might be a long night."

Without the headlights, the road disappears into the dark a few yards ahead. The stars and the sliver of the waxing crescent moon do little to illuminate the snowy landscape. Reid begins to feel antsy in the dark and the cold. His knee bounces off the seat into his palm mindlessly.

"Pretty boy, you are gonna drive me insane." Morgan's voice is calm but slightly exasperated.

"Sorry," Reid sounds like his dog was just kicked, but his bouncing stops. "I don't like the dark and quiet," he quickly adds.

"Well, let's play a game or something."

"Like what?" The young doctor's honey-speckled brown eyes light up in the darkness.

"Truth or Dare!" Morgan has some burning questions for the boy wonder.

"Sure. You answer first; Truth or Dare?"

"Truth."

"What are you afraid of most?"

Morgan looks at Reid in disbelief for a second before his features soften as he understands. Everyone knows Reid's fears. The dark, the quiet, being taken by psychopaths to a remote cemetery to be drugged and tortured. "Helplessness. Truth or Dare?"

"Truth."

"How old were you for your first nerdy kiss?" Morgan cracks a smile at his friend.

"Twenty-five." The darkness does nothing to conceal the blush overtaking Reid's cheeks.