No Man Left Behind: A Veteran Inspired Charity Anthology by Elizabeth Knox (black authors fiction TXT) 📕

the door to my small home and Bear, my German shepherd, ran to the door and sniffed Sadie as I gently lowered her to the bed. The door closed behind us and my small room was even smaller as we all checked on her, assessing her injuries.

Skid turned to his little brother and lowered to his level as Mick wet a washrag in the sink and started cleaning the blood from her face. “Jacob, what happened to Sadie? Is this her blood on you?”

Jacob’s small voice cut through the room, “No.”

The little boy burst into tears, pulling Skid into him, and wrapping his arms around his big brother. I made eye contact with her uncle, who in turn looked to our President, Smokey, for what to do.

“Let’s take Jacob outside and see what happened to him. Gunner, you sit with Sadie in case she wakes up. Doc’s on the way to check them both out,” Smokey decreed and Mick, Jacob—who was being carried by Skid—and Smokey left me and Bear alone with Sadie.

I checked her pulse and found her heart rate to be erratic. She shook, and I covered her with a blanket. Bear, my faithful companion, crawled gently into bed with her and placed his head over her lap as I finished cleaning the blood. She had a minor cut on her head with a knot forming, but otherwise, she appeared to be unhurt.

Bear whined, and I reached over, rubbing his head. When I first prospected with the Hounds, I was still having nightmares. Waking up in a cold sweat and always on edge, I was struggling to move past the pain and impending doom that being in Iraq instilled in me. One afternoon a few weeks after I moved into the tiny house behind the clubhouse, Bullet knocked on my door and in a state of panic, I pulled him inside and shoved a gun into his temple.

He talked me down and I thought for sure I was about to be killed. Instead, he and I got on our bikes and rode for two days. No words, no explanations. Just the open road and the wind rushing past my face to help me finally calm down. When we arrived at our destination, it was another chapter of the Death Hounds.

Not knowing what to expect, it surprised me when he introduced me to a brother who bred dogs for service animals. When we walked around to the kennels, I saw Bear and the moment I approached his cage; I knew he would be what saved me. They trained him to know when my anxiety was growing too much and when my PTSD flared beyond what I could control; he was the only thing that could bring my focus back to now.

A few days later, Bear was delivered to me in Portstill and it’s not often someone sees me without him. I wanted to give him the night off with the party raging outside and to see him laying against Sadie, his neck across her lap, and his eyes scanning the room, I realized my buddy was sensing something deeper than an unconscious girl.

Hearing loud voices from outside my door, I reached over and scratched behind his ears. “Keep an eye on her. I’ll be right back.”

He sighed and his ears perked up as I gently stood from the edge of the bed and moved to the door. Glancing back at Sadie, I realized how beautiful she was and something deep inside me shifted. I fought the urge to adjust my dick as I stepped outside and quietly pulled the door closed.

Bear would protect Sadie until the Death Hounds could figure out what happened.

Then all hell was going to rain down on whoever hurt her and Jacob.

Chapter Five

Sadie

My footsteps were quick as I juggled the three bags of groceries, trying to not drop them as I moved faster down the broken sidewalk. I never wanted to be out past dark, but my teacher kept me after school, trying to engage me in the idea of college. I took extra classes, hoping to graduate early and be able to earn some money for my family, so I was the only fifteen-year-old senior in my high school’s history.

School came easily to me, but with a strung-out mother, there was no hope for college. I couldn’t leave my brother, Dalton, or my newborn brother, Jacob, alone with our mom, so I tried to brush off the desire to be something more. I wouldn’t leave them, and if it meant putting off my future for them, I would.

Living in the Flats, I saw the worst that society offered and never wanted that future for myself or my brothers. Drugs, prostitution, and random murders were common and more than a few of my classmates earned their money from the streets. The sky was growing dark with each step I took and every noise I heard had me shifting my eyes around, looking for potential problems.

Marco ran the Flats, always knowing who was doing what and using that to his advantage. His grip on the small section of town was extreme, and I never wanted to cross him. I could see the edge of my yard in the far distance and I shifted the bags in my hands, pushing myself faster toward home.

A man stepped out onto a front porch across the street from me, lighting a cigarette and blowing the smoke into the air. I could feel his eyes roaming over me as I moved past him, and shivers broke out across my body. The smell of weed wafted out the door and music from inside spilled onto the streets.

“Hey, baby,” he said, and I glanced at him to find two more men standing on the porch with him.

I briefly closed my eyes and continued forward, ignoring him, hoping to get home in one piece. It wasn’t safe on the streets after dark, but I had to pick up Jacob’s formula