Rating: ★★★★☆ Tags: Mystery Detective, General, Fiction

AMY ELLIOTT DUNNE
THE NIGHT OF THE RETURN
I
still have Desi’s semen inside me from the last time he
raped me, so the medical examination goes fine. My rope-
wreathed wrists, my damaged vagina, my bruises – the
body I present them is textbook. An older male doctor with
humid breath and thick fingers performs the pelvic exam –
scraping and wheezing in time – while Detective Rhonda
Boney holds my hand. It is like being clutched by a cold bird
claw. Not comforting at all. Once she breaks into a grin
when she thinks I’m not looking. She is absolutely thrilled
that Nick isn’t a bad guy after all. Yes, the women of
America are collectively sighing.
Police have been dispatched to Desi’s home, where
they’ll find him naked and drained, a stunned look on his
face, a few strands of my hair in his clutches, the bed
soaked in blood. The knife I used on him, and on my bonds,
will be nearby on the floor where I dropped it, dazed, and
walked barefoot, carrying nothing out of the house but his
keys – to the car, to the gate – and climbed, still slick with
his blood, into his vintage Jaguar and returned like some
long-lost faithful pet, straight back home to my husband. I’d
been reduced to an animal state; I didn’t think of anything
but getting back to Nick.
The old doctor tells me the good news; no permanent

---

damage and no need for a D&C – I miscarried too early.
Boney keeps clutching my hand and murmuring, 
My God,
what you’ve been through do you think you feel up to
answering a few questions?
That fast, from condolences to
brass tacks. I find ugly women are usually overly deferential
or incredibly rude.
You are Amazing Amy, and you’ve survived a brutal
kidnapping involving repeated assaults. You’ve killed your
captor, and you’ve made it back to a husband you’ve
discovered was cheating. You:
a) Put yourself first and demand some time alone to collect
yourself.
b) Hold it together just a little longer so you can help the
police.
c) Decide which interview to give first – you might as well
get something out of the ordeal, like a book deal.
Answer: B. Amazing Amy always puts others first.
I’m allowed to clean myself up in a private room in the
hospital, and I change into a set of clothes Nick put together
for me from the house – jeans with creases from being
folded too long, a pretty blouse that smells of dust. Boney
and I drive from the hospital to the police station in near
silence. I ask weakly after my parents.
‘They’re waiting for you at the station,’ Boney says.
‘They wept when I told them. With joy. Absolute joy and
relief. We’ll let them get some good hugs in with you before
we do our questions, don’t worry.’
The cameras are already at the station. The parking lot

---

has that hopeful, overlit look of a sports stadium. There is
no underground parking, so we have to pull right up front as
the madding crowd closes in: I see wet lips and spittle as
everyone screams questions, the pops of flashbulbs and
camera lights. The crowd pushes and pulls en masse,
jerking a few inches to the right, then the left as everyone
tries to reach me.
‘I can’t do this,’ I say to Boney. A man’s meaty palm
smacks against the car window as a photographer tries to
keep his balance. I grab her cold hand. ‘It’s too much.’
She pats me and says, 
wait
. The station doors open,
and every officer in the building files down the stairs and
forms a line on either side of me, holding the press back,
creating an honor guard for me, and Rhonda and I run in
holding hands like reverse newlyweds, rushing straight up
to my parents who are waiting just inside the doorway, and
everyone gets the photos of us clutching each other with my
mom whispering