“You’re cold.” Gail nuzzled her ear, and kissed her just under the corner of her jaw. “It’s only four, come back to bed.”

“I don’t want to keep you up.” Holly yawned, “Just because I can’t sleep doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.”

“Come on.” Gail released her left hand and gave Holly’s right one an insistent tug.

Holly groaned, but compliantly allowed Gail to lead her back to bed by the hand. They had just dozed off, or so it seemed, when Gail’s alarm went off. Ugh! Six a.m. had come too soon!

Gail knew the rest of today was going to be a bitch too! Members of the Fifteenth Division had been chosen to spearhead a taskforce on making sure the city’s homeless population had an indoor refuge from the cold, and cleaning up some of the vacant buildings that were quickly becoming dangerous tent cities and crack houses. Today they would be clearing an abandoned factory of its growing population of junkies, runaways, and drunks who sought shelter from Toronto’s winter there. Frank had explained that the Mayor and the Chief were concerned about the growing body count of homeless people who had succumbed to this harsh climate. The mother and child who had frozen to death in the back seat of the car, where they had apparently been living for some time, had, of course, brought this, on. It had made the news. Two days later, so had this campaign with her own mother front and center talking on TV about how much the Toronto Police Force cared about the welfare of the city’s homeless. Wow! Gail thought, and it wasn’t even Christmas time. Turning it off and playing another round of HALO was all she could do to keep herself from gagging. She was sure that Elaine had something to do with the choice of officers involved, and prayed this wouldn’t end in an other attempt at a mother, daughter photo op.

Nothing had prepared her for having to ride with Nick today though. He had started to say something when she got into the car, but she had stopped him with a look, and hissed, “Let’s just get this over with.” Through gritted teeth.

The abandoned factory was vast and dark. It smelled like stale urine, burning garbage, and something far more sinister and chemical. The acrid smoke pouring from several recently extinguished metal barrels did not help the situation either. Although they were not necessarily there to make arrests, Luke had warned them to be careful, to consider everyone living there a threat, until proven otherwise. There were five squad cars, four ambulances, two fire trucks, and one van from forensics. Gail prayed that Holly was safely back at the lab. She felt the familiar rush of adrenalin, mixed with fear and excitement as they entered the building, flashlights on. There had been a small stampede as a number of ragged looking people had made a run for it. She and Traci had stopped a young mother, no older than fifteen or so, pushing her toddler in a shopping cart. She had attempted to run Gail over and had hit her right hip with the front of the cart in her attempt to escape. Ow! That would leave a bruise. Traci had drawn her weapon, and the girl had stopped. They had confiscated a small amount of marijuana, a baggie of cocaine, and were waiting for social services to remove her, and her dirty little spawn from their custody when they heard Nick yell. Gail pulled out her weapon and ran in his direction.