Then I heard the sickening smack of metal hitting flesh.
“I’ll shoot your sister, bitch!” Gavin’s voice.
I looked back over my shoulder, frantic. Gavin had the gun pointed at Courtney. Dani was on the floor, holding the side of her face.
Brian had me out the door. I fought hard, pushing back with all my strength, but his arm was wrapped tight around my body. Was he going to kill me? Crazed with fear, I didn’t care. I didn’t want to find out what he was going to do. I remembered the sounds from Dani and Courtney as they tried to clean themselves, their moans at night when they tried to sleep, their crying in the dark.
Brian hauled me down a short hallway, then through an open door. He had the rifle tucked under his other armpit, his hand gripping the lantern, which was swinging and casting strange shadows. I looked around, searching for an escape, something to save me. We were in a warehouse, looked like the roof was a few feet higher than our room, with exposed rafters and aluminum sheeting. Clear plastic poly covered the triangle at the top of the walls at both ends of the building. Wooden crates were stacked all over in haphazard towers, a conveyor belt came out of the side of the building. The air smelled of rotting fruit. A rat scurried away from us. Brian startled, then muttered, “Fucking thing.”
He took me to a room that broke off from the main one. An old cash register sat on a wooden counter, empty shelves lining the wall. A mattress lay in the center, a faded blue blanket tossed over it. I could see spots of reddish brown.
My sisters’ blood.
“Please, please don’t,” I begged.
“Shut up and get on the mattress.”
I sat down.
He set the lantern in the corner, stroked the gun barrel as he stared at me. Would it be better to fight or just go along? Talking, that’s what Dani would do, she’d try to talk to him.
“Please, I’m just a kid—you heard my sisters. We just want to go home. We won’t tell anyone. I thought you were a nice guy.”
Brian rocked back on his feet, giving me a calculating look. “You think I’m not smart enough to figure out that you’re playing me?”
It wasn’t working. I thought desperately, remembered the way the girls had looked at him down by the river, how angry he’d been.
“If you let me go, I could be your girlfriend.”
“You don’t think I can get a girlfriend?” He stiffened, his face flushed.
“I think you’d be a good boyfriend.”
“Yeah?” He smiled. He rested the rifle against the wall, still within his reach but just outside of mine, then sat on the mattress. He put his arm around my shoulders, pulling me toward him. “Then act like my girlfriend.”
“That’s not how it works. You treat me like a real girlfriend, then we do that—like how it’s supposed to be.” I brushed his arm away.
His face was angry now. “You want to be my girlfriend, then fucking act like one.” He stood, stared down at me. “Take off your clothes.”
“Please … I’m a virgin.”
He smiled. “That’s why I wanted you.” The smile disappeared. He lowered his head, looked directly into my eyes. “Take your fucking clothes off.”
My fingers shaking, I took off the dress, sat there in my underwear.
“Take it all off,” he said.
I pulled the rest off, trying to make myself small on the mattress. I wondered how much it was going to hurt. He was taking off his own clothes now. I squeezed my eyes shut, heard his belt buckle hit the floor.
“Get on your back,” he said.
I lay down, my arm still across my chest and my other hand over my crotch. My body had started shaking violently.
He climbed on top of me, his hands rough as they mauled my breasts, pinching. Tears dripped down the sides of my face. I cried out.
“I thought you wanted to be my girlfriend,” he said.
I shook my head back and forth. “No, please.”
He pushed my legs apart with his knees.
“You’re going to like this,” he said.
*
He had to help me walk back to the main room. I was dizzy, the pain between my legs agonizing. I tried to close my eyes to the memory of what had just happened, but I couldn’t stop seeing him grunting, the glazed look in his eyes.
He brought me back to Dani—Courtney and Gavin were gone.
Dani’s eyes roamed my face, her expression anxious. I wanted to cry, but I held my face still, didn’t want her to see how scared I was, how much it hurt. Brian pushed me down beside her.
“Little sister was telling me how she wants to be my girlfriend.” Dani’s face didn’t change but her gaze flicked to me again, just for a second.
He knelt close to me, grabbed my face, and shoved his tongue in my mouth, grinding my lip against my teeth.
“Don’t worry, baby. I’ll let you be my girlfriend.”