A Fistful of Rain Read Free Page A

he wouldn’t do this here, not in the back of his truck parked two doors down from my own home, that there had to be something else he was after. Something more than his power and my humiliation.
    He wouldn’t do this here.
    Even so, my fingers copied my jaw the whole way, numb and clumsy as I fought my boots, my belt, my buttons and zippers. I struggled out of my clothes, and I thought he would leave me my underwear, but he wanted that, too. The hardtop trapped the cold, seemed to increase it, and it made me shiver.
    When I was naked, he reached in and took my clothes.
    “Lie down and don’t move,” he said, and then he slammed the gate on the truck.
    I heard the driver’s door open and close, felt the vibration run through my skin. The engine started, the smell of exhaust in the trapped space. We lurched into motion.
    I closed my eyes, and wished I was home.
    It was dark and still raining when the truck stopped and the engine died. I heard the driver’s door open again, heard the footsteps splashing around to the back of the vehicle, then the key scraping the lock. The gate came down.
    “Get dressed and get out,” the man said, and threw my clothes at me.
    Surprise didn’t stop me. I dressed, fast, not bothering to tie my boots, just getting covered and then sliding along the bed. I dropped off the gate, onto the street, looking around, and as soon as I was out, the engine started again. I could see the man behind the wheel as he pulled away, and he wasn’t looking back.
    It seemed like all of me was shaking, and for a moment, I was sure I would fall, that my legs wouldn’t hold me. I felt the rain on my face, and I searched the darkness, trying to find some sense of where I was.
    I was right where I’d started.

CHAPTER 3
    My front door was unlocked, and I blew through it, slammed it shut behind me, throwing the locks and switching on the hall light. The alarm panel on the wall said that the system was in reset, and I stabbed at it, desperate to get it to arm, but it refused to change its message. My guitar case and duffel were both in the front hall, and my keys were on the table beside the door. I didn’t understand, and I didn’t try.
    The phone in the kitchen gave me a dial tone, and I called 911, and tried to be coherent. I said things like “gun,” and “naked,” and “truck.” The dispatcher told me someone was on the way, and told me to stay on the line, and I thought that was fine and dandy, because the phone was cordless, and that meant I could get a bottle of Jack Daniel’s from the pantry and put some of the drink into me.
    That helped, but not much.
    The white cop’s name was Dunn and the Asian cop’s name was Watanabe, and they were the ones I spoke to, because they were the first to arrive, coming in two different cars and reaching my door within thirty seconds of each other. They were by no means the last, and within ten minutes of the call, I had seven officers of the Portland Police Department swarming in and around my house, moving throughout the neighborhood.
    Dunn sat me in the kitchen and asked me to tell him exactly what had happened, and I did, I told him all of it, as best as I could, as coherently as I could. When they’d arrived, both he and Watanabe had worn looks of earnest concern, even excitement.
    When I was finished, the looks were gone.
    “Were you hurt?”
    “No, not . . . not really. Scared out of my mind, but not . . . you know, not hurt.”
    “He didn’t assault you?” Watanabe asked.
    “No. He made me give him my clothes, but that was all.”
    “If we took you to the hospital, would you consent to a doctor running a rape kit?”
    “No, what? Why? He didn’t rape me, he didn’t touch me. He never touched me after he put me in his truck.”
    “He put you in his truck, he made you strip, he drove you around, and he took you back here?”
    “Yes, that’s what I’m saying, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”
    Dunn asked, “Can you describe the