Page 85 of Sunsets & Slow Dances

They all shook their heads that they hadn’t seen her.

It took another few minutes to make it to the caves; when I rounded the corner of the sand dunes where they were hidden, I heard her before I saw her.

“Stop. Don’t.” Her words were muffled, but I could make them out.

The first thing I saw when I came around the corner was a hoodie. I grabbed it and pulled. The kid it was attached to flew down to the ground and landed on his ass. Chloe was backed up against the cave wall. Even though the only light was coming from the moon, I could see that her eyes were red. Her cheeks were stained. She’d clearly been crying.

“Go wait in the truck,” I told Chloe as I picked Hoodie up by the front collar of his shirt.

Two guys with beer bottles in their hands and not a lot of sense in their heads, who looked about sixteen, appeared from inside the cave as Chloe walked around the corner.

“Hey, calm down!”

“Relax! She’s fine!”

I didn’t say a word to Tweedle Dumb or Tweedle Dumber. I didn’t have to. One look in their direction, and they both lifted up their hands and took two steps back. I put the hoodie up against the same wall he’d had Chloe up against.

“I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do anything,” he kept repeating over and over.

I put him in a front forearm choke, keeping his legs dangling up off the ground so only his toes were barely touching. I was cutting off his oxygen just enough to scare him but not enough for him to pass out. I reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. I opened it up and saw his license.

“Brian O’Dell. Oh look, it’s your birthday next week. You’re going to be eighteen. Do you know how old that girl is, Brian?Huh? Do you? She’s thirteen!” I tossed the wallet on the ground and saw that there were alcohol bottles scattered all over the floor, not to mention his breath reeked of beer. “She’s also my sister. Did you give my sister alcohol, Brian?”

His eyes widened. “No?—”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Y…yes, sir.”

“That’s contributing to the delinquency of a minor, O’Dell. I knew an O’Dell in high school. Jake O’Dell. Are you related to Jake O’Dell?”

“It’s his dad,” Tweedle Dumb piped up from the cave.

“Jake O’Dell is your dad, huh? I know Jake. I haven’t seen him since I’ve been back in town, but it might be time for a little catch-up.”

“No, plea—” he started to beg.

“Or maybe I’ll just stop by the police station first and have Chief Dawson call your dad to come down, and we canallhave a chat about why his son is eighteen and does not know what consent is. Because, Brian, when I came around the corner, my sister was saying, stop and don’t. Wasn’t she?”

“I didn’t mean to?—”

“Wasn’t she?” I increased the pressure of my forearm against his neck and collarbone, making it nearly impossible for him to speak.

“Y…y…yes.”

“But you must not know what those words meant because you weren’t stopping. And see,consentis very important. If you don’t have it, youwillend up in prison.” I got closer to his face. “I willpersonallymake sure you go to prison so you can be with people just like you who don’t know what that word means. So, everything you just made my sister feel—small, defenseless, scared—there will be men lining up to make you feel that way. They won’t care if you’re crying, shaking, saying don’t, or askingthem to stop. So, the next time you’re with a girl who’s crying and she’s saying the words stop and don’t, just think about you, in prison, being that girl and all the things that will be happening to you. And please use your imagination because that’s all they have in there. Am I clear?”

His chin moved up and down as much as it could with his limited mobility, thanks to my forearm.

“I want to hear you say the word.”

“Y…y…Yes,” he croaked, barely able to speak because I was blocking his windpipe.

“Good.” I looked over at the two assholes in the cave. “What about you, Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dumber, did you catch that, or do I need to repeat myself? Because watching a crime happen is just as bad as participating.”

“No.” Tweedle Dumber shook his head then nodded. “I mean, yes.”

“Yeah.” Tweedle Dumb nodded.

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