On this outing, one of the fish produced a knife and inflicted several slashing wounds across John’s arms and torso. Ben had been moving in to rescue his son, when John secured the wrist of his assailant with one hand and drove the thumb of his other into the man’s eye. As if scooping out the inside of a pumpkin, John thrust his thumb as deep into the socket as he could. Ben grabbed his son and fled. Certain the knife-wielding man was dead or dying, Ben feared taking John to the hospital. So his father drove him home, and the cat clawed its way out of the bag.

Ben and Margaret cleansed his wounds as best they could. Luckily, the blade hadn’t penetrated deep enough to puncture anything vital, and Ben possessed a well-equipped combat medical kit that included local anesthetics as well as antibiotics. Though the injuries were not immediately life-threatening, they were going to leave lifelong scars, especially since Ben himself crudely sewed up his son. Ben was forced to explain why their fishing trips rarely resulted in bringing home any catch. After accepting a bottle of antibiotics and further instructions on how to care for her son, Margaret kicked Ben out of the house.

John’s sister, Marilyn, had been sequestered to her room while his mother fretted over Johnny for three days and nights. The fear her son would be sent to prison prevented Margaret from taking him to the hospital. A week later, when John was recovering with no signs of infection, she allowed Ben back in the house, but relegated him to the basement. Things were never again the same between his father and mother.

Alone with his son, Ben asked, “How do you feel?”

“Dad, the thing I feel worst about is I don’t really feel much at all.”

“It was my fault, son, and mine alone. You did what you had to do to survive. You’re a good boy, Johnny, and you always will be.”

The incident would never be mentioned again. His mother and father were cordial, but Ben’s sleeping quarters remained in the basement, and he was no longer allowed to leave the house alone with his son. Four months later, Ben left for a deployment and never returned. John hadn’t seen or heard from his father since. As the months passed, John began to resent his mother; he secretly blamed her for his father’s leaving.

One night he heard his mother sobbing in her bedroom and went to her side. She’d lost a great deal of weight over the previous month, and her eyes had become dull and sunken. Thorpe put his hand on his mom’s shoulder, which prompted her to speak.

“I loved your father. You know that don’t you?”

“Loved?” Johnny asked, fear creeping into his voice.

“I loved him. I still do.”

“Then tell him to come back. Tell him that you love him.”

John’s mother shook her head and bit her bottom lip. “Oh, baby, your father didn’t leave us. He knew I was still mad. But he wouldn’t leave us, baby! Your daddy’s a lot of things but he’s no quitter. He wouldn’t quit us, and he sure as heck wouldn’t quit you or your sister.”

“Then why hasn’t he come back, Mom?”

“Johnny, you knew he did dangerous work, you knew something might...happen.”

“What happened, Mom?”

“I don’t know. God’s honest truth, baby! I swear I don’t know exactly what your father does. He wanted to protect us from all that. But he’s never gone this long without contacting me.”

“Is he dead, Mom?”

“I don’t know, but something’s wrong. Your father…I’m worried. And he left with me being mad at him. That’s never happened before and now…this. I could have taken it any other time…but…and now my son hates me too.”

John broke down. His sister heard the commotion and joined them. The three stayed up talking and crying till dawn. John no longer blamed his mother and realized her torment. Along with the agony of not knowing Ben’s fate, John’s mother suffered the regret of sending her husband off with a cold shoulder. A few weeks later, she received a phone call before informing her children their father had been killed in a training accident. She would never recover from her guilt.

Margaret Thorpe died two years later after being diagnosed with bone cancer. She’d been given six months but didn’t make it half that long. John believed she simply lost the will to live. During her funeral, he realized how much his mother had sacrificed; there was scarcely a soul in attendance, a testament to the devotion his mother had bestowed upon her family. She’d sacrificed her entire life for her husband and children.

Then, only thirteen months ago, his new family had been destroyed. The horrific images from that night poisoned his thoughts—Ella in his arms, her pale complexion, hair smoothed back on her head, cold to the touch. Dead. Thorpe pushed away the memory of his slain daughter. He couldn’t go through that again—not now. No wonder he was more than a little screwed up. Who wouldn’t be? But he worried about who he was becoming.

He identified himself as a Christian, but how could he justify his actions? The people he hunted were killers and preyed on the weak, but did their sins give him the right to be judge, jury and executioner? Thorpe hoped on Judgment Day he wouldn’t be standing in line with the same people he’d helped remove from this world. He hoped there were exceptions to the “Thou Shall not Kill” rule. Deep down, he suspected he was only justifying his actions.

Thorpe took the last drink of his last beer, patted his dogs on the head, and walked back inside his home. After brushing his teeth, Thorpe looked in the mirror as he slowly traced one of the scars on his chest with an index finger.

With moistened eyes, he spoke unconvincingly to his reflection, “You’re a good boy, Johnny, and you always will be.”

Tuesday

February 6

Late morning

THE NEXT MORNING, WHILE THORPE gathered fallen tree limbs near the front of his property, Al and Trixie tore off in a full sprint and disappeared into the thick woods. The dogs didn’t bark, and after a few minutes trotted back to where Thorpe worked. Several seconds later, the familiar form of Deborah Jennings came bouncing down the road. The woman was trouble with a capital D—the “D” in reference to her surgically enhanced breasts, which were on full display. Thorpe had stumbled into a one-hour relationship with Deborah just after he’d moved into the neighborhood. It was an encounter he’d instantly regretted and tried hard not to repeat. They’d met on an occasion much like the one repeating itself today.

Then, he’d only been in his new house for a short time. He didn’t know a thing about his neighbors, and with the large acreage, he figured the situation wasn’t likely to change. Thorpe had been clearing fallen branches from his newly purchased property on a day exceeding a hundred degrees. In a time when both fit and unfit men shrink-wrapped themselves in formfitting T-shirts, he went to great lengths to mask his muscular form.

“Don’t ever show the enemy your hand, son. Make him think your strengths are your weaknesses, and your weaknesses are your strengths,” his father used to preach. Mostly, he kept his body covered in an effort to conceal his collection of scars, some of which acquired the night his opponent produced a knife, but there had been other altercations as well. When people saw his old wounds, they wanted to know the stories behind them. If the inquiries came from strangers, Thorpe spewed a line of crap they couldn’t dispute. However, his fellow cops possessed the resources to sniff out a fabricated story—and Thorpe couldn’t exactly be truthful when relating how he’d sustained his mementos. If only he’d heeded all of his father’s advice, such as, “Don’t shit in your own sandbox,” then Thorpe might not have found himself in his current predicament with this woman.