Taking the Town Read online

  Taking the Town

  By

  Ford Murphy

  Unbound

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, locations and dialogues in this book are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental. Any actual locations mentioned in this book are used fictitiously.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

  All rights are retained by the author. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. The unauthorized reproduction, sharing, or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to five years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Copyright 2016 by Ford Murphy

  www. duncurra. com

  Cover Design: Selectografix

  Background image: Vincent Rafferty

  ISBN-10:1-942623-36-4

  ISBN-13:978-1-942623-36-6

  Produced in the USA

  Dedication

  For My Family. Thank You.

  Acknowledgements

  Thanks to all those who helped make this book a reality. Without your support, insight, constructive criticism and guidance, it would have never have been possible. You know who you are and I will always be very grateful.

  Thanks also to Susan and all at Duncurra for taking a chance with an unknown, first time author. Your expert guidance has been amazing and kept me from messing up a good story on numerous occasions!

  Thanks also to Vincent for the cover picture. You did good, sir!

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Prologue

  August, 1971

  Cork City

  Ten year old Finn Lane set out by himself to walk home.

  It was a four mile journey.

  He wasn’t supposed to be alone and he knew he’d get into trouble for it.

  He didn’t care. He wanted to be alone.

  He had traveled by bus with his soccer team to the north side of the city to play a game that would go a long way to determining who would become local champions for the year. Their opponents were an extremely tough team who had used a combination of skill and intimidation to remain unbeaten as of yet this season. They also had the advantage of near fanatical parental support lined up along the sidelines and shouting abuse at opposing players, often scaring them out of their wits.

  Such tactics had worked particularly well in this game. So much so that Finn had become very angry with several of his team mates during the game because they were shirking tackles and not competing aggressively for the ball. Finn had thrown himself into every tackle with abandon and fought fiercely every time the ball came his way. They had been beaten by five goals to zero—their worst defeat of the season.

  Finn was disgusted. He’d refused to ride the bus home with the team because he knew he would never be able to restrain himself. The walk would cool him off he thought. He wasn’t entirely sure how to get home but he figured he knew enough to get him somewhere he recognized. He also knew he would be journeying alone through some pretty rough neighborhoods and he’d have to keep his wits about him the whole time.

  He was still mentally running through the game as he walked home dejectedly, until he turned a corner and stopped short. Four boys, who had to be at least thirteen or fourteen, appeared to be picking on a girl who was maybe nine, at the most. They had surrounded her and were pushing her and pulling at her clothes. Even against those odds, Finn could see that she was not going down easily and was fighting back with all her might.

  Finn ran towards them. “Leave her alone, you creeps! It’s not right to pick on a little girl like that. What kind of boys are you?”

  One of the teenagers looked at him. “Mind your own fecking business eejit.” He turned back to the girl.

  Finn shouted at them once more. “Stop it, I said. Leave her alone or you’ll be sorry.”

  This had no effect either, so he switched tactics and shouted at the little girl. “Why don’t you run away? They’ll let you go.”

  When this latest entreaty invoked no response Finn decided if this little girl, who was completely outnumbered, was willing to fight back then he sure as hell could help her. He went flying in kicking and screaming like crazy. He started hitting at the boys and kept hitting.

  “You want this you little shite? You got it.” The older boys turned on him.

  With their attention on him he shouted again at the little girl. “Run! Now—as fast as you can. Go home and call your dad and tell him I need help.”

  “No,” she screeched back at him. “I’m not leaving. I can help.”

  “No you can’t, girlie.” One of the boys pushed her away.

  And she couldn’t.

  If the teens had been surprised by the ferocity and intensity of Finn’s initial attack, it didn’t last long. They ended up kicking the living shit out of him. They didn’t stop until he was a bloody, bruised heap on the pavement. Then with one last kick, seemingly satisfied with the damage they had done, they walked away laughing and jostling each other, no longer interested in tormenting the little girl.

  She rushed to him, tears pouring down her face. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah,” he replied bravely, trying to hold back the tears that were welling up in his eyes. “Where do you live? I’ll walk home with you to make sure they don’t come back.”

  The little girl looked at him rather skeptically as if she was wondering how he thought he could protect her when he could barely stand up but she said, “Just around the corner.”

  Finn struggled to his feet. “Okay. Let’s go.”

  It really was just around the corner. “There it is.” She pointed.

  He waited until she had the door open, then set off running.

  “Hey wait,” she shouted after
him. “My parents will want to thank you.”

  He had already rounded the corner before she finished the sentence.

  When Finn eventually arrived home, his parents’ anger at his not traveling on the bus with his team quickly changed to concern when he told them what happened and they saw how badly bruised he was and how much pain he was in.

  His mother inspected his face. “What were you thinking?” She lifted his shirt to check for broken ribs. “Why did you have to get involved?”

  Finn looked at her for a moment, tears welling in his eyes. “How proud of me would you have been if I had stood and watched and let it happen? Would you have wanted me to walk away without helping?”

  “Yes, I mean, no,” his mother clucked. “I know you did the right thing but look at your poor face. My, my. You’re such a brave little boy.”

  His father who had remained silent until now finally spoke up. “Well son, if you’re going to stack the odds against yourself like that, we’re going to have to get you some training in the art of fighting.”

  ~ * ~

  About two weeks later, the girl’s parents found out where he lived and came to visit, bringing their daughter along.

  Her father shook Finn’s hand, appearing very somber. “Young man, I can’t thank you enough.”

  Her mother hugged him. “You were so very brave. I can’t even think about what would have happened if you hadn’t intervened. She could have been…she could have been…” She seemed on the edge of tears. “Well, thank you.”

  The girl herself remained oddly silent during their visit. But as they were about to leave, she leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you for saving me. Even though I didn’t think I needed help at the time.”

  Finn blushed mightily and mumbled, “You’re welcome.” As she turned to leave he added, “I’d do it again you know.”

  And he knew he would. He also knew that if he couldn’t stop something bad happening to her in the future, he’d make sure whoever did it paid dearly.

  So, once his bruises cleared up, his father took him to a newly opened club where he was to learn how to fight.

  The sport of mixed martial arts had been new to Ireland when Finn had started but he’d been hooked from the very first class. He loved the aggressive nature of the sport, the need for speed, reflexes, athletic ability, and above all, the requirement to keep a cool head and not panic in challenging situations. Fearlessness and a strong stomach for fighting were also huge advantages, both of which Finn had in abundance.

  ~ * ~

  May, 1979

  Eight Years Later

  At eighteen there were no remnants of the scrawny kid Finn had once been. At six foot four he was two hundred and ten pounds of pure muscle and had developed into a genuine fighting machine. He was in Dublin for the All-Ireland Mixed Martial Arts Championship which was to be held over four days.

  The sport had become very popular in Ireland and competition was expected to be intense for the top prizes. Finn was scheduled to compete in the heavyweight bracket and he knew he would be fighting against competitors in their late twenties and early thirties. He wasn’t the least intimidated. He had trained hard for the past four months and his coaches believed he was ready.

  But more importantly, Finn believed he was ready.

  For several years his coaches had not only remarked on his abundance of ability and skill, they said he had heart and something else—something less definable. When he entered a ring, they said the look in his eyes became so intense it had an immediate effect on many of his opponents.

  “One look from you makes many of your opponents want to be anywhere else in the world but standing opposite you in such a confined space.”

  His coaches expected him to do well. They thought that he might even go all the way, despite the high quality of the competition he was expected to face from older and far more experienced fighters.

  As the competition progressed over four days, his coaches were proven right.

  Finn had bulldozed his way through the earlier rounds, taking out his opponents with relative ease and without expending too much effort. He had surprised one of the tournament favorites in the semi-final with a blistering display of aggression and technique. Halfway through the second round his opponent had tapped out. Clearly the man knew if he didn’t he was surely going to be knocked out.

  A buzz had built up in the stadium about the teenage fighter from Cork who had easily taken apart the cream of the Irish MMA scene. By the time the final was held on the afternoon of the fourth day, the stadium was crammed with people eager to catch a glimpse.

  “Completely jointed,” his friend, David Kirk, had told Finn’s parents when he phoned them about thirty minutes before the fight. “Not an empty seat in the house. Your boy is becoming a star. I’ll get him to call you when the fight’s over.”

  They didn’t have to wait long for that call.

  Finn knocked his opponent within fifteen seconds with a stunning kick that landed square on his jaw, lifting him off his feet before he fell prone on the canvas. There was stunned silence initially, as if nobody had ever seen anything like it. Then the whole stadium erupted in cheers.

  His opponent was still out several minutes later when the referee held Finn’s arm in the air and presented him with his belt. With that, Finn was crowned the first All-Ireland heavyweight MMA champion.

  David rushed into the ring and hugged him fiercely. “Not bad for a gobshite from the ‘Hane’,” he shouted in glee, referring to the slang name for the parish where he and Finn had grown up.

  His coaches smiled and exchanged high fives. Their protégé had announced his arrival on the big stage in the loudest possible manner.

  Finn was to retain that crown for the next four years before bowing out of that competition undefeated to give others a chance at the title. Besides he was to set his sights higher on achieving international glory which most observers believed he had the ability to achieve.

  Chapter One

  Monday, June 23, 1986

  Week One: Day One

  Roan Pharmaceuticals, Lissadown, Ireland

  Finn had recently completed a Ph.D. in his hometown of Cork and was eager and ready to make his mark on the world. He accepted the job at Roan Pharmaceuticals and relocated to Lissadown, a town of about twenty thousand located in the heart of the Irish midlands. Roan had been an unusual choice for him and he was not without misgivings. However, when he weighed everything thing up, he was convinced this was place to be…at least for now. He had a job to do.

  He shared an office with Laura Jennings who held a Ph.D. in chemistry and had worked at Roan for several years. She was a friendly girl who was all of five feet tall with short brown hair and a pixie face. Finn had warmed to her immediately.

  She looked up from her work and checked at her watch. “Wow, twelve thirty-four. Let’s go to lunch. I’ll introduce you to a few people. The food’s not great but it’s cheap and plentiful.”

  Finn shrugged. “Ok. Let’s do it.”

  They left the small, somewhat dingy office in the low slung, redbrick building and walked out into the bright sunshine. Glancing down at her, Finn smiled to himself. They made for an interesting sight. The elfin Laura looked like a little kid next to Finn’s broad shouldered, six foot four frame. Most people thought twice about getting on his wrong side and that suited Finn.

  The canteen was located around the corner to the right of their building. It provided sustenance to the one hundred and fifty or so employees who were scattered across six small buildings. A much needed seventh building was under construction. Roan was doing very well and was widely recognized as a rising star in the pharmaceutical industry. It was also one of the very few indigenous Irish pharmaceuticals that conducted research on site, which was one of the reasons Finn wanted to come here.

  They were all ugly buildings, some of them without windows and each with the same boring, red brick facade. The company was located on the outskirts of t
own surrounded on three sides by fields where cattle grazed. However, the cows were exponentially more pleasant neighbors than the pig factory on the fourth side. In truth it was not an inspiring location for this growing company but the land was cheap and the local officials had provided a lot of financial incentives to attract Roan to Lissadown.

  Finn and Laura walked down steps into the canteen to be greeted by the hustle and bustle of the lunch time crowd and joined the line to purchase food. Finn looked at the food piled high in metal warming dishes. Laura was right, he thought. No one will ever accuse this establishment of serving haute cuisine.

  As he waited in line, he surveyed the crowded room. Tables were jam packed with employees and he didn’t miss the blatant stares of his new colleagues who appeared to study him intently. Unfazed, Finn shrugged it off. This was something he had become very used to. Men tended to look at him with a combination of envy and fear. On the other hand Finn knew women found him attractive. He worked hard to stay in peak condition but it was more than that. He’d had more than one woman tell him he gave off a “bad boy” vibe and they found that hint of danger to be very intriguing.

  He continued to idly scan the room until his eyes came to rest on the person he sought. She sat at a table alone. There, for a brief moment, he looked directly into the green eyes he remembered so well, that were at once beautiful and sad. As lovely as her eyes were, he couldn’t fail to notice how beautiful the rest of her was also. It seemed curious that she was dining all alone when pretty much every other table was full. He wondered if she was holding the table for her usual crew or if she was just early. As he held her gaze, the barest hint of red developed on her cheeks before she turned her eyes away.

  Once they had picked their food up, he followed Laura to a table occupied by four women. Laura introduced him to each of them and he spent the next few minutes politely answering all of their questions about his background, his qualifications and why the hell he had come to Lissadown in the first place. Then the conversation moved on to “shop talk”. Roan had recently obtained approval for one of its drugs and now it was all hands on deck to manufacture launch quantities. The production floor and quality control labs were operating twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. It was an exciting time for the company.