Over the following weeks, he would gather footage, toxicology results, legal documents, and other evidence that would matter enormously to police and the courts.
But that evidence was never what convinced Marcus.
Lily had convinced him in the front hallway in less than a minute.
And kneeling there, he understood that one of the most important things a parent could ever do was also one of the easiest things to miss: stop during an ordinary busy morning, listen to a frightened child, and believe her.
He had been fifteen minutes and one small glance away from failing to do that.
For the rest of his life, Marcus would think about how easily that morning could have gone another way.
Because he had very nearly not listened.
He wanted that understood whenever he told the story, because he did not think of himself as a hero.
He was not a hero.
