“I had to get her back!” Lydia screamed, panic overtaking her completely. “You don’t help! You just go to work and drink beer in the shed! If she leaves, who is going to do the work, Marcus?

Who?”

Marcus looked at the officers. He looked at the radio. He looked at the tablet in Helena’s hand. He was a selfish, cowardly man, but he wasn’t stupid, and I watched him do the math.

Child abandonment. Forgery. Abuse. The state was going to tear his life apart, and someone was going to prison.

The self-preservation instinct flared up, blinding and absolute.

“I didn’t know,” Marcus said, his voice dropping, his hands rising in surrender.