Silent Creed by Alex Kava Page A

But they get back and then decided to eat their guns or swallow a shitload of pills. One guy managed to hang himself.”
    Creed watched Jason over the rim of his coffee mug. He didn’t need to ask. He figured the kid had thought about it himself. Hannah had met Jason at Segway House, a place that took in returning soldiers who didn’t have anywhere else to go or couldn’t afford to return to their previous lives for one reason or another. He didn’t know Jason’s circumstances. He never asked. Figured he didn’t need to know. They hired him to do a job. Offered him a chance to learn how to train dogs. Even provided a double-wide trailer on their property for his housing. If the kid was looking for therapy he should have stayed at Segway House or, at the very least, talked to Hannah and not him.
    Instead of telling Jason this, Creed told him, “My dad committed suicide.”
    Jason stared at him. It wasn’t exactly what the kid had expected of this conversation, but he didn’t seem thrown by it at all. Finally he nodded and said, “Because of your sister?”
    This time Creed was surprised.
    “How do you know about my sister? Did Hannah tell you?”
    Jason shook his head. “She didn’t need to tell me. All you have to do is Google your name.”
    Creed’s sister, Brodie, had disappeared when she was eleven and Creed was fourteen. His dad was driving them back home, a daylong road trip from their grandmother’s house. His mom had stayed to take care of his grandmother, who had been sick. They stopped at a busy rest area because Brodie needed to use the restroom. Creed’s last image of his sister was of her skipping in the rain, the puddles lit up with orange and red neon from the reflections of eighteen-wheelers’ running lights and the dozens of brake lights.
    “How’d he do it?”
    Appeared the kid had very little manners.
    Creed glanced down and saw that both Grace and Bolo had lain down at his feet. Grace, however, was watching him. Of all his dogs, she seemed the most sensitive to his moods. She looked anxious. He dropped his right hand and she nudged it.
    Finally Jason realized his mistake. “Sorry. Just seems like if people talked about it more they might not actually do it.”
    “Are you thinking about doing it?”
    Another rescue crew came into the cafeteria, adding noise and distraction, but Jason kept his eyes on Creed’s and Creed could see the answer.
    “You accepted a puppy from me,” Creed told him. He leaned down and scratched Grace behind the ears. “I understood you’d be around to take care of him.”
    “A dog?” Jason half snorted, half chuckled, like he didn’t think Creed was serious.
    “There’s been a time or two that these dogs were the only reason I stuck around.”
    Jason got quiet and eyed him suspiciously, as if still waiting for a punch line.
    “You don’t owe Hannah a thing, and you certainly don’t owe me, but you have an obligation to Scout. Yeah, a dog.” He sat up and leaned his elbows on the table, hands wrapped around his mug again. “You take a dog in, you earn his trust, his unconditional love. If you think there’s a chance that you might not be sticking around, then you need to give him back to me.”
    “Seriously?”
    Creed held his eyes, saw that what he was presenting was actually a decision for Jason to make, despite his attempt to make light of it now.
    “Yeah, I’m serious. Most of my dogs have already been abandoned in some way. You need to remember when I found that puppy he was stuffed into a burlap bag with his siblings, ready to be tossed into the river. If you’re planning on offing yourself and abandoning that dog again, you might as well give him back now.”
    Jason’s eyes flitted away, suddenly interested in the rescue members shedding gear and clanking trays and silverware. He looked at Creed again and there was still too much curiosity when he asked, “Did you see your dad do it?”
    Creed wondered if the kid had heard a word he’d