I was in and out of the shower fast.
Five minutes, max.
Something I’d been doing since the birth of our first child.
Showers and poops were luxuries that I couldn’t afford to take my time on, so that meant that I had mastered the fine art of doing both fast.
After getting dressed in something that would stay on long enough to get my hair dry, I began.
I heard the scream, but since I knew that both my husband and his parents were out there, I wasn’t too concerned.
I looked at my eyes and noticed how tired I looked today, but I didn’t care.
I’d had one hell of a weekend.
We’d gone fishing at the river Saturday with Loki. Then, we’d gone to a donut-eating competition between the Benton Fire Department and the Benton Police Department. FYI—BPD won. Not sure if that was because our youngest son, Bryce, who was four, had kept sneaking donuts to his sister, who was under the table, when everyone wasn’t looking or what. But the boys pretended they didn’t notice it happening. And the police department won.
Our day had ended with a trip to the local park as we tried to teach Bryce how to ride his bike.
I’d, of course, taken my skateboard.
I hadn’t mastered it over the years, but I was fairly good at it now. I could stand on it without falling, and sometimes I could even turn it into the direction that I wanted.
“Mommmmmmmyyyyyyyyy!”
Bryce’s yell chilled me to the bone.
When I turned, it was to find him staring at me with fat tears rolling down his cheeks.
“Mommy!” he cried. “I didn’t mean to! I didn’t mean to!”
I shut the hairdryer off almost as if on auto-pilot, and that was when I could hear Justice bellowing my name.
I’d heard him call my name like that twice in my life.
Once, when I was in danger when Marcus Gomez had his gun trained on me, and right now.
The first time, that bellow had been terrifying because of how much terror Justice had inputted into the scream. Now, this was almost worse. Because one of my babies was the reason for his yelling.
I dropped the hairdryer like it was a piece of trash and hauled ass past my son.
He was crying as I passed him, repeating over and over that, “He didn’t mean to.”
Ignoring Bryce’s terror and worry, I made it out to the kitchen and came to a dead stop.
That was because my daughter was sitting on the counter, crying her eyes out. Channing was holding her still with her hands on Jane’s hips. Loki had his big hands clenched around my daughter’s upper thigh and her ankle, holding her leg out straight. And on the other side of her leg was Justice, holding bloody paper towels to her leg with a look of sheer panic on his face.
“What happened?” I cried out.
I tried to ignore the blood, but it was impossible.
There was just so much of it.
It was all over…everything.
Even the three people who were holding Jane.
Justice looked over at me grimly and shifted his big body, then moved the paper towel so that I could see what was underneath.
And I nearly fainted.
Straight up hit the floor.
My head went lightheaded and my skin turned cold and clammy all within half a second of seeing the wound.
Because the wound was bad.
Not just bad, but bad, bad.
The cut itself was about four inches long right under her right knee, spanning from about shin to the middle of her calf. And it looked like it’d just burst open, like a can of biscuits. I could see fat, muscle, and what might’ve been bone.
And a whole lot of fucking blood.
“Bryce cut her open with a fuckin’ spear,” he said, sounding pissed.
He was also using his cop voice and wearing his cop face.
The one that was the impenetrable mask.
But his eyes? He couldn’t hide those eyes from me, and I could tell that he most certainly wasn’t in control like he was trying to appear likely for our daughter’s sake.
I swallowed bile and said, “What do you need?”
“My medical bag out of the truck,” he said. “Now.”
It was the clipped ‘now’ that had me hauling ass outside of the house and heading in the direction of our SUV.
I ignored the little bloody footprints as well as Jane’s discarded doll—that also had bloody handprints on it—and crossed the yard to the SUV that we parked beside the house.
Yanking the door open, I had the medical bag out and in my hand in the next second, hauling ass back across the yard.
When I arrived in the kitchen, Justice still had the wound uncovered.
“Should we call 911?” I asked.
Had I already asked?
Jane started to cry harder.
Bryce whimpered pitifully from somewhere on the other side of Loki.
I looked at my husband who shook his head.
“It all looks superficial,” he said.