“We didn’t plan anything in advance, but I saw her in the field with her sister. She gave me a look. I knew what she meant. She was telling me to hang around, so we could get together.”

“A look?” Ray asked.

“Yeah, a look.”

“Okay, go on.”

“I heard her coming, so I surprised her. Came up behind her. She freaked out for a minute, because she didn’t know who it was. That was when she scratched me.” He touched his face.

“She scratched you by accident?”

“Exactly.”

“Then what?”

“Then we started making out. I mean, when she realized it was me, she was really sorry. She said she had heard someone in the woods earlier, and she was scared. Then we started kissing, and we lay down in the grass, and, well, you know.”

“No, I don’t know,” Ray said.

“We were going to have sex.”

“Right there in the softball field.”

“Sure.”

“And did you?”

Peter shook his head. “No. We were rolling around in the grass, and we were starting to get our clothes off, and that’s when it happened.”

“What happened?”

“This guy attacked us.”

“What guy?”

“I don’t know who he was. Some big black guy.”

“What did this guy do?”

“He hit me with my baseball bat.”

“How did he get your bat?”

“I left it in the field. He must have picked it up. He hit me in the back. The doc says I’ve got some broken ribs. Then he yanked me off Laura. I mean, he picked me up like I was a rag doll. This guy was strong. Laura screamed, and I saw her run for the woods, trying to get away. He started after her. He still had the bat in his hand. I got up and took a swing at him, and he punched me in the head with his fist. Knocked me out cold, flat on my back. That’s all I remember.”

Ray looked at him. “What happened when you woke up? How long were you out?”

“I don’t know. Fifteen minutes maybe.”

“Where was Laura? Where was this black guy?”

“They were both gone.”

“Didn’t you look for her?”

Peter shuffled his feet. “No.”

“This girl is your lover, and some guy chased her into the woods, and you woke up and just left?”

“I panicked. I was scared to death.”

Randall Stanhope interrupted. “I’m sorry, Detective. Obviously, my son should have made efforts to see if his girlfriend was safe. I’m very disappointed in his behavior.”

Peter’s eyes flashed with anger. “Hey, what could I do? If I’d gone after him, I’d be dead now, too. Is that what you want?”

“Shut up, Peter,” his father told him.

“Let’s get back to this man who assaulted you,” Ray said. “What else do you remember about him?”

Peter shrugged. “He was big. Like a bear. I think he had dreadlocks.”

“Have you ever seen him before?”

“No.”

Ray nodded. “Jon saw a black man matching this description in the woods that night, too.”