The child's sandals hit the stone floor of the entryway before the door had fully swung shut.
"Father — 'dad' — where is mother?"
The man barely looked at him.
He was already at the doorframe, one hand on the wood, scanning the dark lane outside with the expression of a man who has misplaced something expensive.
"I don't know," he said. "She should have been home by now."
He reached back without looking and pushed the child gently through the inner door.
"Come inside. Go."
The boy disappeared into the back room.
The man stood in the doorway alone.
His jaw worked.
His hand tightened on the wood.
'Where did that bitch go.'
Not a question in his head — a statement, delivered with the flat irritation of a man who had organized his evening around a specific outcome and found it denied.
He grabbed the back of his own neck.
Squeezed.
"Wanted to fuck her tonight," he muttered, low, to no one. "Shit."
