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“He's a fraternity member too.”

“I understand.” She reached for the blue notebook and opened it to a tabbed page. “This is tab twelve,” she said, handing the open notebook to me. “Recognize the picture?”

Acid shot through my stomach lining! It was an 8x10 color photo of me sitting on a chair with my head thrown back with my mouth wide open while some braless girl I didn't recognize, who looked about fourteen wearing a pink tank top with upward pointing nipples, held the neck of a bottle of Cuervo Gold about half a foot over my open mouth pouring tequila directly down my throat.

“Yeah,” I muttered.

“So you were at the party, right?”

“Now I remember. Yeah. I was there just at the beginning. Just for a little while. I got sick from the tequila and threw up and went upstairs to bed.”

“What time was that?”

“Early. About nine or ten.”

“You go back to the party at all that night?”

“No.”

“You're certain?”

“Absolutely.”

She snickered. “Turn to tab twenty-five, please.”

I flipped to the right page and shuttered. It was a copy of the citation and NOTICE TO APPEAR in court for the joints that fell out of my wallet.

“You get cited for marijuana that night?”

“Yeah.”

“Look at the top of the citation, where it says date and time.” She paused. “Notice the time of the cite was 12:40 A.M.?”

“Yeah.” I didn't like the way this was going. I slumped further down on the uncomfortable chair hoping to disappear into the uncut grass beneath it.

“So you did come back to the party sometime after the tequila incident, didn't you.”

“Guess so.”

“This is a rape investigation. You could go to prison if you're convicted. And you'll be a registered sex offender too. You understand?”

“Yeah.”

“But if the girl consented, it's not forcible rape. You understand that?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you rape anybody at the party that night?”

“Absolutely not.”

“You ever rape anybody ever, anywhere?”

“No.”

“Look at tab two.”

I flipped back to the second tab and whose ugly fucking face greeted me? Frizzhead's! Relief flooded my body.

“Is this who I supposedly raped?”

“It's not forcible rape if she consented.”

“I wouldn't fuck her with your dildo.”

Dirty Harriet flinched; a sudden flash of pink covered her face. She paused for a few seconds before asking the next question. “Heather picked out your photo from the kitchen wall.”

I had enough of this shit! “She's in my Sociology class! She and some others all worked together on our midterm project! She knows me! She didn't have to look at any goddamn photo to ID me! She knows me!”

The cop looked at me blandly without speaking.

“Aren't you taking notes?” I demanded. “I'm telling you this girl's full of shit if she says I raped her!”

“You know her though, right?”

“Yeah. I just told you, she's in my Sociology class.”

A slight snarl formed on the cop's lips. “Hear you like to shave a girl's private area and then have anal intercourse with them.”

“That's a lie.”

“You get Heather drunk enough so she'd pass out that night?”

“No.”

“And shave that area?”

“No.”

“Then have regular and/or anal intercourse with her?”

“Absolutely not.”

“What do you think of her?”

“Ugly lying little twat.”

“You always talk like this?”

“Yeah. When answering bullshit rape charges.”

“Any reason she'd falsely accuse you?”

Lyman, that fucker! “Yeah.” I had no choice; I told her all about the will.

With her lips snarled, in a sing-song sarcastic voice like she was outlining the plot of a daytime soap opera, she sneered, “So your cousin Lyman had his girlfriend Nina tell her friend Heather to falsely accuse you of raping Heather so you'd be kicked out of the fraternity and Lyman would get the five million dollars from your grandfather's will?” Then she burst out laughing. “Is that what you're telling me?”

“That's the absolute fucking truth.”

“Speaking of fucking,” she said, continuing her sarcasm, “weren't you a member in high school, and even years after that, of the Number-Fuckers Club? With six as your code number?”

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

She looked down at the notebook that was still on my lap. “Please turn to tab fifteen.”

When I got to the right number I stared at the front view of my 4Runner.

“That your truck?”

“Yeah.”

“Read me your front license plate number.”

“NBRFKR6.”

“DMV records show that from past traffic tickets, you've had that same plate on three different trucks, haven't you?”

“So what?”

She smiled. “Stands for a club called NUMBER FUCKERS, doesn't it? And your code number is six,” she quickly added before I could deny the first question.

She must've kept the San Francisco cops plenty busy
checking me out since the club still exists at the school, all these years later.

“It wasn't a club. Just a bunch of guys in high school and afterward hanging around together: drinking, partying, fooling around a little.”

Her eyes tightened. “Wasn't the purpose of the club to fuck more girls each month than any of the other guys in the club?”

“No,” I lied.

“Wasn't each conquest numbered and whoever had the most conquests each month would get a hundred dollars from each of the other members?”

I faked a smile. “That's what we told everybody. But it was all bullshit.”

“You're from San Francisco, aren't you?”

“Yeah. So what?”

“Ever known as Mr. Rollover to the San Francisco Police Department?”

That fucking bitch really did her homework. “No.”

She took the blue notebook from me and opened it. Then she started reading from the page. “Arrested for possession of over an ounce of marijuana in 1996, right?”

“Wasn't convicted though,” I answered stubbornly.

“Ratted out the supplier and your case was dismissed. Right?”

“So?”

“Then in 1998, arrested for possession of stolen property. Right?”

“I didn't know the stereo equipment was stolen.”

“But you told the police who you bought it from and your case was dismissed and the seller got arrested. Right?”

“So?”

“Then last year you were arrested for hit and run, right?”

“Yeah, but that case got dismissed too.”

“But first you called the police, reporting your car stolen. When the police didn't believe you, you claimed that you loaned the car to somebody you knew who counterfeited concert tickets. When the police didn't believe the guy you named was the driver,
you offered to set up the concert ticket guy on a counterfeiting rap. When that didn't work, you got prosecuted and the case got set for trial. Lucky for you, on the trial date, the guy on the bike that you hit was an illegal alien and disappeared somewhere. Probably threatened with being deported. That's how the case got dismissed. No witnesses. And your lawyer was your father.”

I shrugged my shoulders casually, trying not to react to the truth of everything she said.

“You rolled over on three cases against somebody else and you claim you're not called Mr. Rollover by the police?”

“Some detective probably gave me that name, I guess, but it's more bullshit.”

“Like you not being at the Christmas party. Except the photo puts you there. Then getting sick and staying in bed all night. Except the marijuana cite puts you here at 12:40 A.M. Then denying that you had sexual intercourse with Heather, claiming she identified you to help your cousin get the inheritance. Then being a member of the Number-Fuckers club and trying to tell me it's like the Red Cross or American Legion.”

“I'm innocent,” I protested nervously.

“Like your drunk driving case?” the thorough bitch asked.

“I pleaded guilty to that because the Public Defender made me. He was too scared and lazy to have a trial.” Then my voice got hard. “I don't care what anybody says, I didn't rape that cunt.”

She stood up with a sour look. “Wait upstairs until you're called.”

I was still seated. “What if I leave instead?”

“Your choice.”

Her greenish eyes stared down into my eye sockets like laser beams.

“Last time I ask you this,” she said. “Even with Heather's consent, did you have sexual intercourse with her?”

I stood up. “Abso-fucking-lutely not!”

“That's all,” she said coolly. “Please send me Mr. Holmes.”

_____

I stood in the doorway of the living room and pointed to Holmes. “You're next.” Then I looked at Batman and Vysell, pointing with my chin toward the hallway. “Outside,” I whispered. They followed me until we were on the front lawn. “The cunt that supposedly got raped was Frizzhead.”

“Whew,” Batman said, exhaling loudly. “Thank God. Who'd rape her?”

“Not me,” I answered.

“Me either,” Vyell added.”

“What'd you tell the cop?” Batman asked.

“I denied everything, no matter what she asked. And I'm telling both of you, do the same thing. She can't prove shit without some evidence. She's just fishing around, hoping some idiot will confess.”

Vysell punched me lightly on the right shoulder before balling his fists and pointing each thumb upward. “You're the man.”

_____

It was nearly six o'clock before Dirty Harriet and Castle walked into the pledge dorm where me and the other guys were lying on the beds like death-row convicts waiting for the guards to drag us to the chair.

Dickless Tracy didn't keep any of us guessing for long. She pointed to me, Froggy, Castle, Holmes and Watson. “You five stay here. Everybody else is cleared.”

Lyman's mouth was open and his eyes bugged out. He pointed to Watson. “Did you say he's a suspect?”

“Who're you, his lawyer?” she demanded.

“No. I'm his pledge brother and good friend. I was with him all night. I know he never raped anybody the night of the Christmas Party.”

The cop sighed, twisting her face in exasperation and looked around at us. “The people I told could leave can go now. Unless you're volunteering to keep being a suspect.”

Seconds later only the five of us were there with the cop.

“A week from today, Thursday afternoon, January 9th, at two o'clock in the afternoon, there's going to be a line-up, at the Pacific Division Station on Culver Boulevard. Corner of Centinela near Venice.”

“Like with
The Usual Suspects
?” Watson asked.

“Right.”

The cop reached into the pocket of her jacket and pulled out a white sheet of paper folded into four squares. She handed it to Watson who was sitting up on the bed closest to her. “Date, time, address, and room number for the line-up are listed. Better for everybody if you're all there.”

“Do we need lawyers?” Holmes asked in a thin, scared voice.

“You can bring one if you want. But it's a waste of money. Because no matter what, nobody's going to get arrested that day. This is an ongoing investigation. We're trying to clear as many people as soon as possible.”

“There's other suspects besides us?” I asked.

She nodded. “Yes. Like I said, this is an ongoing investigation.”

“You got nothing on me,” I challenged.

She smiled a little. “Don't be so sure, Mr. Rollover.” Then she turned around and walked out of the room.

“Who's Mr. Rollover?” Lyman asked.

“I got no idea,” I answered.

Watson was standing in the doorway. “She's gone,” he mumbled a few seconds later. “Now what do we do?”

Vysell and Batman and Lyman walked in together, all looking as jittery as the rest of us.

I looked at the three of them. “What did you guys say or not say that got you off the hook?”

Batman shrugged his shoulders. “Denied everything. Like you said. That I never touched the ugly bitch.”

“What about you?” I asked Vysell.

“Same thing. That I never touched her.”

“Me too,” Lyman answered.

“Then why are we here?” Watson asked Castle.

“I don't know. I denied everything too. And it was the truth.”

“You admit anything?” Holmes asked Watson.

“No. I denied that I ever fucked her without her consent. I just told the cop that this girl had the hottest pussy on campus. That she'd come over almost every night and sometimes even during the day and fuck us both. I kept repeating it: that everything was with her consent.”

“You tell her anything else?”

“Cop wanted to know if I fucked her at the Christmas party.”

“What'd you say?”

“That I didn't. I fucked her later that night at our apartment.”

“Use a rubber?” I asked.

“Of course.”

“What'd you tell her?” Watson asked Holmes.

“I denied everything.” He swallowed hard. “Going to get a lawyer?” he asked weakly.

“She said we didn't need one,” Watson answered.

“Even if we did,” Froggy muttered, “how can I tell my parents? They'll pull me out of school. And I got no money for a lawyer.”

“Same with me,” Watson answered.

“Me, too,” Holmes muttered. “Let's see what happens at the line-up.” He looked at me. “You getting a lawyer?”

“Hell no. Why should I? I didn't do anything.”