Pawliday Love

Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

T he sound of gunfire was his lullaby. Every time he closed his eyes, he came back to the moment that changed his life. It was on a constant loop and he had no idea how to make it fucking stop.

He felt trapped. His mind held him hostage, making him suffer the loss of Danny over and over again. He was a prisoner to a past he couldn’t escape. The weight of that day sat heavy on his shoulders. He should have protected Danny. He should have talked him out of joining, but a sense of pride had filled Derek’s chest when Danny told him he wanted to join the marines. They were as close as brothers could be without blood bonding them.

Everything happened so fast. One minute, Danny was looking at Derek with life in his eyes and the next, blood poured down his face.

Derek screamed, his voice seeming louder than the war going on around him. He didn’t give a fuck that he’d blown his shitty cover. He needed to get to Danny and fast. He could still save him.

He moved––or tried to. His body had been in too much pain to get him anywhere past the burning Humvee. He coughed into his hand, seeing the blood coating it. He was going to die out here and it served him right––

The sound of loud barking and the smell of bad breath pulled him from his sleep. He opened one eye to see the same brown eyes he saw last night in his face and the pup’s paws were on his chest.

I really did get a dog last night?

The dog barked again and Derek groaned, moving his hand to pet the pup. “Alright, alright. Shit, I’m up. We gotta get you doggy mints or something.” The dog let out a huff and Derek chuckled again. “You goin’ to get off me, so I can get up?” The dog moved to lay down next to him.

Derek looked over at the dog wondering how it knew he was in the midst of another nightmare and to wake him up before his mind trapped him further. He’d seen so many retirees have service animals. He’d been shown the reports on how beneficial it was to have one for the things he’d seen in his life. He believed it was true on paper but he wasn’t much of an animal person. He liked them, just never had one growing up, and as an adult he didn’t have the time or bandwidth to be responsible for one.

He still didn’t, but he knew the second the puppy came up to him last night he was keeping it. Pitbulls got a bad rap and he wasn’t about to surrender this sweet face over to a shelter, because he knew the only life this puppy would have would be locked in a cage.

His mind had him trapped in one, and knew that was no way to live.

“We need a name for you,” he murmured, and reached out to scratch behind the pup’s ears. He found out after a bath, his little four-legged guest was a female. “How about Bailey?”

The puppy made some huffing sound that sounded eerily close to ‘absolutely not’ and pulled away from his hand with a bark. “Okay Bailey’s out, got it,” he chuckled.

He continued to look at her hoping a name would come to him that she would approve of. The puppy nudged his hand for more pets and it hit him. The name had been whispered in the air around him, making him wonder if the dog actually said it out loud.

“How about Kai?” He swallowed, struggling to get past Danny’s middle name.

The dog barked and wagged her tail. She jumped toward him, licking his face. “Alright, alright. Kai it is.” The sadness he felt speaking Danny’s middle name was instantly replaced with a feeling of joy that had been a result of seeing the happy puppy. “Come on, girl. Let me walk you before you pee in my bed.” Kai barked before jumping off his bed.

Derek shook his head, wondering what asshole dumped her. As soon as she walked into his apartment, she made herself right at home like she’d been an inside dog all her short life.

He braced himself, knowing this was going to be hard. Between the punishing run, the sitting in his misery, and the long trek back in the pouring rain, his left side hurt as badly as it did when he was first injured. He knew he should take this day to rest and recoup, but he needed to make sure Kai got outside and he needed to grab her dog food. He also needed to get her checked out, which meant a visit to see Sasha.

He closed his eyes as memories flooded his mind with one of the last times he’d seen her. He’d been drunk off his ass. It was the anniversary of Danny’s death. He should have been comforting Sasha but he’d been out getting piss drunk, and burying his cock in the nearest woman eager to fulfill her patriotic duty by pleasing a retired serviceman.

He drove home––his third mistake of that night. He was baffled he had anyone still watching over him with all the fucked up shit he’d done, but he figured after his fourth mistake of that night, getting into a fight with Sasha that ended with him putting his hands on her, had made his guardians disappear.

The sound of barking had him picking his head up. Kai was in his face again. “You’re an impatient little thing, aren’t you?” He pulled the blanket off of him and as slowly swung his legs off the side of the bed. As soon as his feet hit the cold floor he groaned, unable to keep it in.

Fuck , everything hurt.

He placed his left hand on the nightstand next to his bed, using it for leverage to heft his body up. His right hand was placed beside his hip, and he held his breath as he pushed off the nightstand and bed to stand. He cursed, feeling every ache in his body. He really needed to take better care of himself. If he kept up at the punishing pace he was going at, he wasn’t going to see forty.

And when did that finally become a bad thing?

Derek paused a moment as the thought trickled into his mind. There had been too many times when he closed his eyes at night he prayed they wouldn’t open again. He begged for oblivion––begged for the pain to stop but had never been able to make it stop on his own. He remembered the nights he stared at his gun, felt the weight of the cold metal pressed against his palm. He even remembered the way it tasted when he had the barrel in his mouth.

No matter how many times he sat in his bathroom with the water running, thinking it would somehow drown out the noise of him blowing his brains out, he could never pull the damn trigger. As desperate as he was to escape his pain, something inside of him made him keep going.

Once Derek was steady on his feet he grabbed a pair of gray sweatpants and a burgundy shirt that had been on top of a pile of clothes. He did a quick smell test, not sure if they were clean or dirty. When all he could smell was fabric softener, he threw them on. He looked around his room at the mess it had become. He knew he let himself go, but the piles of clothes, and food wrappers that littered the floor made him cringe. He used to be such a neat freak and that had been blown to shit along with the rest of his life.

He heard Kai’s paws on his wood floor and knew she was coming in to check on him. He chuckled, grabbing a pair of socks and cut her off in the hallway. “I know, I know. I’m an old man, you gotta be patient with me. I don’t move as fast as you.”

Kai barked and he could have sworn it sounded like ‘duh.’ “Be nice or you’re not sleeping in my bed tonight.” He shook his head, wondering when he became one of those people who talked to their animals like they were humans. He had no clue if she understood anything he actually said, but that somehow didn’t stop him from talking to her like she was more his roommate than pet.

Derek leaned up against one of his walls to put on his socks and sneakers. He grabbed his keys and wallet off the counter and grabbed a hoodie to fight off the December chill in the air. Kai sat patiently by the door, her tail wagging a mile a minute. As soon as he unlocked the door she barked twice. “I know, I know. We got a busy day ahead of us. Once you’re done with the bathroom business, we have to get you food and off to the vet.” He slowly bent down, needing to pet Kai. “You get to meet Sasha. She’s a good vet, so you don’t have to be afraid, okay?”

And an even better woman.

It was going to be awkward as hell seeing her after all this time, but Sasha was the best vet in this town and he wouldn’t trust anyone other than her with Kai.