He thought about calling Tressa. He wanted the support of their bonding together as they protected their son. But didn’t want it to look like he was tipping her off. From what he’d read, they’d be visiting her, too.
Unless, of course, she’d been the one to file the complaint.
As much as he wanted to, he still wasn’t completely ruling out that option.
With the child monitor he kept with him whenever he was out of earshot of his son’s room, Jem popped the top on a beer and, opening the back patio door, sat outside by the stone fireplace he’d built next to the outdoor counter and grill. The sink and miniature refrigerator were flanked by a waterfall feature that lit up at night to show off the goldfish that Levi had picked out. Jem barely noticed any of it.
They hadn’t shown Lacey Hamilton the goldfish.
Still, he’d had a feeling that she’d softened a bit before she left. That she’d maybe even started to believe him.
He would not hurt his son. And would also not stand idly by if someone else did.
* * *
LACEY HAD ALREADY worked on nine other cases by the time Jeremiah Bridges showed up with Levi just before ten the next morning. He’d said he’d take his son with him on his morning rounds, which started at seven, and then bring him in to see her before dropping him at preschool for the afternoon.
Levi had his own hard hat, he’d proudly boasted.
“He’s never around a construction site while there’s dangerous work going on,” his father had quickly asserted. He’d started to explain the safety procedures he’d enacted before ever bringing the little boy to a work site.
At which time Levi had interrupted with “I can’t leave the trailer unless all the machines is off.”
“There’s a job secretary in the office trailer at all times,” his father had added.
If Lacey had had her tablet out, she’d have typed something about those striking blue eyes—both pairs—looking at her so solemnly.
She’d wanted to trust them.
She still felt that way as she led the duo back to her office, Levi’s strides as long as his little legs could make them, attempting to synchronize with his father’s.
“You want to see my playroom?” she asked the little boy just before they reached her office.
With a glance at his father, who nodded, Levi said, “Sure!” She held out her hand. He took it.
“You can wait in my office,” she told his father, pointing toward the door. All case files, including his, were locked in her file drawer. Her computer was off and couldn’t be accessed without her password, anyway. But there were magazines for him to read.
“We won’t be long.” Why she felt the need to reassure him, she didn’t know. Her concern was Levi. And the possibility that someone was abusing him.
At the moment, nothing else could matter to her.
* * *
JEM PLAYED A trivia game on his phone while he waited. It was either that or think about his insides eating him up. He probably should have had some breakfast. Levi had offered to share the scrambled eggs and toast he’d had waiting for him when he’d shown up in the kitchen, sleepy-eyed and hair tussled, early that morning.
Jem was a fix-it kind of guy.
Kind of hard to fix what you didn’t know was broken.
He had six trivia games going—all with guys on his crews. He generally won, but now answered six questions wrong in a row. When he missed one about the pitcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers, he closed the game. Having been on the farm team when the pitcher in question had been pitching, having had beers with him and some of the other guys during a road trip, he knew the guy’s name.
But he just wasn’t in the game, so no point in wasting turns.
Hands in his pockets, he walked around the small office. It was as neat as a pin. No personal pictures on the desk.
But he took note of a message scrawled on a little sheet stuck to the side of the computer monitor. She needed a hero and so she became one.
Something about that note eased his tension and made him feel kind of sorry for the social worker who’d interrupted his life so abruptly.