Bottom-Feeder

Title:  Bottom-Feeder 

Genre:  New Adult Adult Dark Contemporary

Word Count:  82,000

Bottom Feeder is a New Adult Contemporary told in first person point of view between seventeen-year-old, Maddy Carrington, and nineteen-year-old, Jackson Monroe. 

Prologue

Maddy

My time is limited, so I will make this quick.  My name is Madelyn Faith Carrington, but you can call me Maddy.   I am seventeen years old.  My skills include running in flip-flops and eating my weight in fried okra; sometimes together, but not always in that order.  

I lie sometimes.  Don't look at me like that.  Please.  It's only to protect the ones I love from the ones who hate me.  Because of the scars on my wrists, people think I tried to end my life.  Between us, and only us:  I did not put those scars there.

My best friend, Dixon, means the world and everything in it to me.  He's the only person I trust, and even he doesn't know everything.  Tybee Island is my home, but not for much longer.  Daddy is forcing guiding me with the best of intentions to attend school in New York.  My mama died when I was eleven.  And Daddy?  Well, he might have killed her. 

I would like to tell you about my life before the same happens to me.

Jackson

My name is Jackson Benton-Monroe.  I am an Explosive Ordinance Disposal soldier in the United States Army.  

They want me to talk about why I am so angry.  They say I should tell you about the guilt of coming out of war without so much as a scratch, while others went home without body parts, or in a box with a United States flag draped across the top.  

But let me tell you something, I do not want to tell anyone about my twelve months in the mountains of Afghanistan.  So, no, I am not going to talk about anger or guilt.  Besides, if I told you an untied bootlace saved my life you will probably call me a coward for not dying.  I don’t blame you.

I will say this once:  a war is not only fought by countries of soldiers across oceans and deserts and mountains.  No.  After combat, the battles at home begin.  Our mind, our family, our trust is never the same.  I thought the worst was over as soon as my size twelve boots hit American soil.  

I was wrong.  

I learned about a different kind of battle; a backdoor assault where one person will take hits so others don't have to suffer.  Some of us wish we could be that honorable, but instead we will bunker down and cower away from anything that might hurt. 

I will tell you my story on the single term that this will all be said with strict confidentiality.  There are others whose lives depend on your guarantee, so please consider carefully.

Bottom-Feeder Copyright © 2013 by Maria G. Cope

All rights reserved.  No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, distributed, stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, without express permission of the author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes.

This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, or any events or occurrences, is purely coincidental.  The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.