Ground Zero by Rain Stickland Page A

my sight, I felt it was my responsibility to watch him.”
    “You didn’t have to tell me all this,” Mackenzie began. “So why are you?”
    “Because I want your daughter to know, assuming she’s the one who managed to kill him, that she may have saved my life, too, and maybe countless other women. He would have started with rape, if he hadn’t already. He certainly tried it with me. Then it would have progressed. Most likely to torture and murder. His last two therapists agreed with me, but unless he actually did something to a human being, there was little that could be done. He was an adult by that point, and we could no longer have him institutionalized without going through the court system.”
    Mackenzie needed a few minutes to absorb what she was hearing, so she took her time and drank some of the coffee. She almost moaned at the taste.
    “How do you people make coffee this good? I don’t get it. I’ve got a really nice machine. I’ve read the directions on the coffeemaker, and on the coffee containers themselves, countless times. I still cannot make a decent cup of coffee.” Her words relieved a bit of the tension.
    “That’s my wife for ya,” Neil stated laconically. “Always focusing on the real issues.”
    “Hey, coffee is going to be a luxury in this part of the world very, very soon. It’s definitely an issue. Especially when I keep ruining it.”
    “Salt,” Geraldine responded with a smile. “I always put in a bit of salt. Though I do try to brew it right, too. It makes a difference.”
    “When did you guys get married, Mac? Sorry, I mean Neil,” Brian said with a short laugh, when both of them hesitated after opening their mouths to respond at the same time.
    “About eight months ago. It was right after I talked to you that last time, and just before the power died in this area. It was already down in most of the cities by then. We got the licence from the town hall in Parry Sound on the Monday morning, and then we were hitched that afternoon. A friend of ours was able to do the ceremony, because she was a JP.”
    “I didn’t realize when you were talking to me about her that you two were involved, but it makes sense now. Truth be told, I wasn’t worried much about why you were telling me. I was too busy thinking about wanting to kick Gerry’s ass. He might have been named after my wife, but he sure as hell didn’t take any other part of himself from her.” With that they were back on topic.
    “I want you to know something,” Mac began haltingly, knowing there was no going back now that she was about to confirm their suspicions. “My daughter has been miserable since that day. Until she went out to check on the sensor alert yesterday, she hadn’t picked up her bow. We had to move it for her when we put up the main building, because she wouldn’t even look at it. This hasn’t been easy for her to live with.”
    “Taking a life shouldn’t be an easy thing, no matter whose life it is,” Brian responded. “I volunteered for the CAF when Bush Sr. started that brouhaha in Kuwait, and Canada joined in the fight. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was already winding down by the time I got through boot camp. I was only over there for a month, but it took me a few years to get past what I had to do in that time, and the things I’d seen. No matter who you kill, it damages you.
    “Neither of us knew that Geraldine was pregnant when I shipped out. We were very lucky that I was back home in time to be there for her through most of it, but I often wondered if maybe I’d brought home some of that evil and passed it on to my child. Since nobody knows how that works, I suppose it’s as good an explanation as we’ll ever get. I had recovered enough that we were talking about maybe having another baby, when we started noticing that Gerry was a little different.
    “At first we put off having more children so we could concentrate on figuring out what was wrong with him. When we