No Pistol Tastes the Same
by Jacob Paul Patchen
GENRE: Suspense (Military/PTSD)
BLURB:
JP’s pistol tastes like bourbon.
Sergeant JP Grimm didn’t pull the trigger. Now his Marine brothers are dead. All victims of a child in a suicide vest…a child that resembled Sgt. Grimm’s very own. But how are you supposed to take a child’s life? How can you kill someone that looks just like your own son?
Those same hazel eyes he saw in his scope continue to haunt him long after he left the desert death lands as he tries to reconnect with his son, Adin. JP battles another war at home against PTSD and the worthless, dejected thoughts that he is the reason his friends are dead. His wife, Lisa, struggles to let her stubborn husband work it out on his own terms. She does all she can to give him space, support, and strength—but her love can only go so far.
As the world shows signs of impending doom from a weakening magnetic field and flaring sun, JP, too, shows signs of his own impending doom. After pushing everyone away, JP must face his nightmares to restore his relationship with his son, save his marriage, and save himself before the modern world burns out in a fiery, electromagnetic disaster.
Excerpt:
Is that someone crawling? A dog?
From around the rear bumper, he snapped his rifle to his shoulder and pierced the shade with his scope. It wasn’t a man, nor a dog. It was a child. A boy emerged from the darkness. A singed and fret little boy in a bulky, black Thor T-shirt with a red hammer in the center, like a target on his little chest. Thor. His son’s favorite superhero. A child no older than Adin, himself.
What the hell’s he doing?
JP hesitated, his finger on the trigger. Is he a threat? Sgt. Grimm knew what he should do as the boy moved closer to Joey. But he couldn’t. With thunder and lightning cracking in the city around him, with war striking at all of his senses, all he could focus on was that little boy’s face, so twisted and determined, yet so helpless and afraid. Hazel eyes, like Adin’s. Arms outstretched, cautious steps, like treading barefoot on gravel for a goodbye hug, the boy moved from the dark static of a concealed footpath directly toward Joey and his bounty.
Is that the guy’s son? What’s he doing? Trying to reach his father?
And for a moment, through the blurry haze, JP didn’t see an Iraqi boy in the chaos of a littered battlefield. No, JP didn’t see Iraq at all. JP saw his own son begging for him not to leave, his own son’s petrified face when his father told him it was time for him to go away.
Adin? Jesus, he looks just like Adin. JP thought as he lowered his rifle just a tilt and squinted through the smoke and fire flashing against the walls.
Wait. There’s something under his shirt? Is he injured, or is that a vest?
In that frozen moment, when Joey rose from his knee and stepped out from behind the concrete base of that lamppost, his baffled eyes found JP gazing into the darkness. But JP wasn’t staring at Joey; he was stuck on the fire eyes of that frightened, frail boy. He was mesmerized, enthralled, seized by the child that resembled his son. And all he could do in those pausing seconds was stare stupidly as the boy took another step closer. Closer. One shaking step. Two. Three.
Joey and his men were in the open, exposed. Fresh sparks of gunfire rattled down the alley and his men returned fire, pulling Sgt. Grimm from his slumber. He snapped out of it with a jerk and felt the weight of the rifle in his hands and the grit under his knee as he leaned around the back bumper of the sedan.
“Allahu Akbar!” The boy yelled.
Now focused, he pulled his rifle into his shoulder and sighted in on the boy. Clutched in his tiny hand was a small black remote. Shit! The chaos muted as they locked eyes from across the street. A golden-brown shade. Dark and light. Hazel eyes. Adin’s eyes. So afraid. So helpless. So desperate. So deadly.
JP’s finger pressed against his trigger. But it was too late. A blinding bolt of lightning and a ringing roar of thunder exploded from the child’s chest.
And the firestorm swept away the men that Sgt. Grimm promised to protect.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Jacob Paul Patchen is an award-winning author and poet of inciting fiction and provocative poetry.
Jacob earns his inspiration through experience and believes every book has a purpose. He writes powerful, emotional, and thrilling stories about mental health, war, social stigmas, and other taboo subjects in order to bring awareness, change, and hope to those who need it.
Raised in Southeast Ohio, he’s a sucker for fast workouts, long laughter, and power naps. Snacks are his love language, and he thinks he’s a Pisces. Check him out and join his newsletter at Jacobpaulpatchen.com.
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Print US only
International winners will receive a digital copy of the book.
1 comments:
I like the excerpt and look forward to reading more.
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