“Where’s your daddy, sweetheart?” Harry asked, keeping his tone calm while his free hand reached for the jeans tossed over the chair.
Lydia made a broken little sound, the kind children make when they are trying to talk through tears. “He kicked Mommy’s tummy real hard. Then he got his truck and drove away fast. Mommy’s bleeding. Papa, there’s blood on the kitchen floor.”
The phone groaned in Harry’s grip.
Twenty-eight years on oil rigs had taught him how to lock his anger away when danger struck. On a rig, a man lost control and people died. Rage could wait. Fear could wait. You checked the lines, shut off the pressure, counted heads, and kept emotion far from your hands until everyone was safe.
But this was not a busted valve or a collapsed platform.
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