Enduring Pride - Teaser #1
Howdy! Thanks for checking things out. Today I thought I’d give you a taste of my recent book, Enduring Pride… a teaser, if you will. I plan to do this regularly, so check back often. Or, you can always go straight to Amazon and just buy it. Either way, I really appreciate your interest.
Enjoy!
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The late season cold front had pushed through town an hour earlier, dropping the mercury into the mid-30’s and leaving in its wake rain-soaked ground and a frigid wind that rattled the windowpanes of Dorm 11. Inside the half-century-old brick structure, at the north end of the fourth-floor hallway, a single, low wattage bulb did little to illuminate the tightly bunched group of eight faceless individuals standing in silence outside Room 418.
Shrouded in deep shadows, the group’s leader tentatively turned the knob and then slowly pushed opened the heavy, institutional grade metal door, the howling wind outside masking the creaks and groans of the aged hinges. They scurried into the room like a pack of feral animals; the last one in quietly pulling the door shut behind him, shuttering the dim hallway light before it could gain a foothold into the room’s darkness and waken the sole occupant, obliviously asleep in the bottom bunk.
The intruders, featureless in the early morning darkness, quickly, quietly surrounded the bunk, their attention solely and intently focused on the lone occupant, Ray Allen; his steady, undisturbed snoring proof that the covert operation remained undetected.
Their mission intelligence was so far, so good. Allen was alone; his roommate, Pat Green, had gone home for the weekend, and not expected back until late Sunday night.
Raymond Joseph Allen – Commanding Officer of D-Company, Infantry Battalion, Texas A&M Corps of Cadets – remained completely unaware, and for a brief moment, the eight team members silently, almost reverently, watched him sleep as each completed a mental check list of their individual mission responsibilities, just as they had trained. Each was steadfastly committed, irrevocably dedicated to the outcome, even though the uncertainty of success created a collective, palpable anxiety that was clearly present in them all.