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“Tell her or I will.”

    David clenched his fi sts at his side. “Shelley was gang-raped when she was nineteen. She got pregnant and told Dick the baby was his.” He turned to watch my reaction.

    Th
    e soda burned in my stomach like battery acid, rising halfway up my throat before I swallowed it back down.

    “Jesus. Samantha told you this?”

    “She freaked out and called me at school right after the session ended. I drove all night to get here.” He sank deeper into the chair, deeper into himself. “She was a fucking mess.”

    I started to ask another question but David interrupted.

    “Do you want to know the worst thing?”

    I shrunk back, not believing there could be anything worse.

    David’s bitter voice peeled the air like old paint. “Dick Friel, her father for her whole fucking life, told her he didn’t give a shit about her since she wasn’t his kid. Wasn’t his kid,” he repeated. “What kind of man does that?”

    I thought of my own father and how ruthlessly, almost gleefully, he’d abandoned his own child. Yeah, I knew exactly what kind of man Dick Friel was. But this wasn’t 41
    about me, although the parallels were eerily similar.

    “David?” I prompted at another bout of his silence.

    He’d dug his elbows into his knees, handsome head cradled in his youthful, unlined hands. I couldn’t see his face. God, I hoped he wasn’t bawling. Men always complain when women cry, but it was a cakewalk compared to a sobbing boy on the cusp of manhood. “Yeah?”

    “Can you tell me the rest?” He overlooked my tight smile, intent on memorizing the boldly colored, Native American artwork of Richard Dubois over my right shoulder. Hours, days, months passed. At least he wasn’t pacing, but I didn’t think he’d appreciate me snapping my fi ngers and yelling “Focus.” Instead, I waited, which I rarely do well.

    “It’s kind of a blur,” he said fi nally. “When I got into town, I picked her up and took her to my mom’s.”

    “Your mom was there?”

    “No. She was in Denver.”

    “What about your dad?”

    “My parents divorced when I was two. Anyway, that afternoon, I took Sam out to the rehab center and while she talked to Shelley, I found the counselor.”
    “Why?”

    With his back snapped straight, the carefree college stud disappeared. “I told that woman after what she pulled she’d better counsel Sam, too, for free, or else I’d get my father to slap her stupid ass with a lawsuit so fast it’d make 42
    her head spin.”

    Okay, so I didn’t care for the extreme focus he turned on at will.

    Th
    at mini-tirade put a new spin on Mr. David LaChance. I took another swig of soda, wetting my cotton mouth. “Did this counselor agree?”

    David leaned closer, his eyes bright like small, shiny tacks, his mouth a smirk that curled my innards. “Without question she agreed. You may not like my father, Ms.
    Collins, but his name does invoke fear in most people around here.”

    More disgust than fear, I wanted to point out, but kept my mouth shut. David resembled his father far more than I’d initially believed. “Samantha wanted the counseling?”
    “At
    fi rst she wanted to forget the whole thing and go home. She stuck it out for a few days. I think she was dealing with it, but her mom didn’t want her there.” His harsh bark of laughter fi t this new persona. “No big surprise.
    Nobody wanted Sam anywhere. About two weeks later, she and Dick had a big fi ght and he kicked her out.”

    “Where’d she go?”

    “Some dive up on East North Street.”

    Th
    at surprised me too. Th
    e north side of Rapid City
    has a bad reputation, deservedly so. I’ve read the police and Social Services reports: stabbings, sexual assaults and child abuse run rampant. Th
    e population is largely poor
    and Native American; a few college kids and elderly people 43
    on fi xed incomes remain among the gangs and transients.
    Couple that demographic with the excessive number of