Dances with Monsters

by D. C. Ruins

"Sit there," he said, his voice gentle and low, but offering no room for discussion. She immediately dropped onto the couch and watched as he crept deftly toward the back of her apartment, where her bedroom and bathroom were. After a few long moments, he returned to the living room.

  "No one's in there," he said. "But Drew…I didn't see Rocky anywhere."

  Drew shot to her feet. "Oh, my God. He probably got out—if the door was open he probably just ran out. He does that all the time if I don't watch him." As she rapidly talked she moved back to the door. "We have to find him –"

  "Hang on," he interrupted, grabbing her arm. "Not to downplay your cat missing, but Drew—we just came home to your fuckin' door hanging open. This is a secure building, so that means somehow somebody got in here, and broke into your apartment. Let's focus on that." He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. "I'm callin' the cops."

  "And I'm going to look for my cat," Drew replied firmly. She fixed him with a stare that let him know she wasn't kidding around. Finally, he nodded and sighed.

  "I'll wait for them," he said. He glanced at the door frame and saw that the wood was splintered around the lock and ran his hand over it. "Go look for Rocky but don't take too long, all right? Ten minutes tops."

  Drew nodded and without another look at him she turned on her heel and flew downstairs. She burst through the door, her heart pounding. Rocky meant everything to her; she'd adopted him from a shelter shortly after he'd been born and had raised him from a kitten. She'd never owned a pet before him, but had an extremely soft spot for animals, so she had become quite attached to him in a short amount of time, and he seemingly to her. She had done a lot of research on cats after adopting him, wanting to be as in tune with him as possible to understand how he communicated with her and what he needed. She knew that cats were extremely independent creatures and domesticated cats tended to view their humans as just that—"their" humans. She took it as a personal compliment when Rocky would come to her when she called, run to greet her at the door when she came home, and generally insist on cuddling with and being close to her at all available times. She would joke that Rocky was the man in her life, but she felt almost as though he were her own child.

  It was for all of these reasons that her eyes burned with unshed tears as soon as she was outside. She knew that he was naturally a very curious animal, and had often tried to slip outside before. He wanted to sniff all the scents, nibble at the grass, chase mice and other vermin in the darkness that he could see in. He was lean and muscular, and very fast and agile. She'd witnessed him leap from the floor to the top of her refrigerator casually on many different occasions. She wondered if he could be up a tree somewhere; she knew it was cliché, but most clichés were grounded in truth.

  "Rocky," she hissed harshly into the night, straining to hear rustling noises of grass that might herald his movements. His noiseless, tiny padded paws wouldn't make a sound out here. "Rock! C'mon, kitty."

  She stood in place, her ears pricked for any sound. She wasn't sure how long she stood like that, but after an extended silence, she tried again.

  "Rocky," she called a little louder. "Rock-kitty. Come here!" She tried all of the nicknames she had for him that he responded to, her voice higher in pitch and tone because he liked her voice that way, and stood still, listening hard again. She moved around the sidewalk that led to side of the building, calling out softly for him as she went.

  She had just rounded the corner of the building when she heard a tiny, piteous little mewl.

  "Rocky?" she called, and heard the sound again. She rushed toward it, blind in the darkness, calling his name and listening for his cries. Between the way the cries sounded and the fact that he hadn't run to her, Drew felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She pulled her cell phone out to activate the flashlight application to see better in the darkness.

  "Rocky," she called softly again, and swung the flashlight to her left when she heard another small, pained noise. She saw his long, lithe body stretched out in the grass about five or six feet away and hurried over, throwing herself on her knees as she examined him, feeling relief, confusion, and horror at the same time.

  One of his front legs was bent at an odd angle, and there was matted blood in his soft gray fur. She stroked a hand along his body gently, fighting back tears at the way he weakly winced under her hand. Had he broken his leg somehow? Had someone done this to him? She was utterly confused and it made her heart sick to see her beloved pet in so much pain.

  "It's okay, baby," she said softly. "I got you now. You're okay." She set her phone down and prepared to lean forward to scoop him up when she heard a low chuckle in the darkness. She froze. She knew it wasn't Heath. Her body tensed as she whirled her head in the direction of the noise. She saw a dark figure approaching her slowly, but she couldn't make out his face.

  "Hi, Drew," a low voice said. Her breath and pulse picked up speed as she recognized it. Carter.

  "What the hell do you want?" she demanded harshly. "Did you hurt my cat?"

  "Aw, I just broke his little leg, is all," Carter said coolly. "Maybe some other things. Just wanted to leave you and your boyfriend a little message. But then I decided that wasn't enough. So here I am. You look good."

  "You cruel, disgusting piece of shit!" Drew hissed angrily. She rose to her feet, feeling adrenaline sweeping through her. That this man had admitted to hurting her pet for the sport of it infuriated her, pushing any fear she previously felt to the back of her mind. She wished briefly she had a gun, then realized it was a good thing she didn't. She was so angry right now she believed she would have shot him out of that anger.

  Carter took advantage of her hesitation, and before she knew quite what was happening, he reached out and grabbed her, slamming her face-first into the brick wall of the side of the apartment building before forcing her face to the side, tilting her jaw out toward him and covering her mouth with a hand. He gripped her face hard and pressed his palm painfully against her lips while her neck throbbed from the odd angle and her forehead scraped along the sharp brick. She felt the insides of her cheeks thrusting painfully around her teeth as her jaw tightened and tensed. She felt panic rising, horrible, dismantling panic that threatened to freeze her up and make her go limp.

  "See, Heath fucked up when he fired me," Carter was whispering into her ear. "He fucked up in a huge way. But then—he fucked me over again. I don't know how he does the things he does, but that motherfucker got me banned from MMA—forever. Do you know what means, Drew? Do you? That means I can never manage any fighters because I can't enter them into tournaments. Who wants to be managed by someone who can't even do anything for their career?"

  He chuckled again, the sound horrible in her ears, and she realized she could smell a strong, pungent, sharp odor of alcohol around him. He had pressed her to the wall below a wall sconce, and in the dim light, she could see as she looked over her shoulder when he leaned into her face that his pupils were dilated almost to the size of his entire iris, and that his eyes were bloodshot, hazy, and insane. She assumed he was both drunk and high on something, all at the same time.

  "So then this fucker takes my business from me. My business—the one I built from the ground up. Because he got me banned, and I won't be able to pay any of my bills. For a day I lost two-thirds of my clientele when they found out I fired him. Then they all came back when he stole my business. Do you know how much money that comes to?" His hand was still gripping her face hard and pressing the side of her forehead into the brick hard, and it hurt so much, but Drew refused to cry out. She only shook and stared back into his eyes.

  "What hasn't he taken from me?" Carter went on rhetorically. He tightened his grip somehow, and Drew tasted copper on her tongue again as the tender insides of her cheeks scraped tightly against her teeth. He pushed on her, and she felt a wet trickle slide down her temple as her skin gave as it raked over the brick wall. She moaned involuntarily, squeezing her eyes shut at the pain. Carter was using the elbow of t
he hand gripping her mouth to pin one of her arms to the wall. His other hand pinned her free arm to the wall down by her side. His body was pressed against hers, and his legs somehow maneuvered against hers to wedge in between them and around them. Drew didn't know quite how he was holding her; all she knew was that she couldn't move. Any slight tension on her part resulted in pain from the force he was exacting on her.

  "The only way I see it," Carter went on, his voice dropping to a sharp hiss, "is for your fucking mick boyfriend to understand what he's done is to take everything from him." He leaned his forehead against the back of Drew's neck and then nipped at her flesh there. She cringed, trying to lean away, only to feel a fresh burst of pain throughout her body. "I do believe that's where you come in, pretty girl. I think you're everything to him. So I'm gonna take you."

  She began to pant at his words, feeling throbs of pain with every flex of her lungs. It hurt so much to even draw breath, since he was pressed against her so tightly, but it was involuntary as her body fell into full panic mode. She felt she couldn't catch her breath; she was terrified of what was going to happen next.

  "The way I see it, things started going to shit with me and Heath as soon as he started fucking you," Carter growled in her ear. He rolled his hips against her rear end and she moaned again in disgust. "So if I fuck you, then things will go to shit for him. It's the only way. Don't you see, Drew-Drew? You're going to help me fuck your boyfriend." He giggled maniacally in her ear. "In more ways than one. So let's get down to business, shall we?" His hand dropped down to her waist, then lower, fumbling at the button on her jeans.

  Drew's eyes glazed over as her body froze up. Her thoughts receded, almost as though her brain were signaling to her body to give up the fight, to let things happen. Vague, distorted images of her previous attack hazed in and out of her mind, her own screams echoing through her brain intermittently. Perhaps it was best to not fight this time; it would hurt less, she reasoned dully. Carter didn't have a knife, not that she could tell. If she would only just lie still, it would be over with, all over with, before she knew it. Just give up, a voice in her brain whispered. You can't fight it. Just let it happen.

  Then she thought about her poor, innocent cat lying in the grass a few feet away, hurt because this bully had some mad revenge to exact, and welcomed the sudden warm rush of hot, delicious anger as it flooded through her veins like it was on an IV drip in her arm. A sudden memory flashed through her brain, seemingly forever ago—one dark night, late, at the gym when Heath had been trying to show her some self-defense moves for the class he wanted to hold. It hadn't worked when he'd been the assailant—she'd panicked. But what about when she had been the assailant? She recalled his heavy leg swinging around behind hers, his arms maneuvering fast, and before she'd known it, she'd been on her ass.

  Despite having never repeated the move since that night, it seemed to all come back to her in a rush.

  She jerked hard, blindly, feeling pain shooting through her, but got her left leg free. She used her hips and butt to thrust back hard on Carter, putting him slightly off balance, before she swung her left leg in a giant step backward, positioning it right behind the back of his right thigh. Her arms were still trapped, but she thrust her hip hard again, throwing him even more off balance. As a result, he let go of one of her arms as it flailed in the air, trying to regain his balance, and she slammed her elbow back into the center of his face as hard as she could, feeling the flesh and bone give way with an incredibly satisfying crunch. She felt wetness on her elbow and realized it was from the blood that began to spurt from his nose.

  He bellowed in pain, his hands going to his face as he stumbled back blindly, and Drew used the opportunity to ram her knee into his groin as hard as she could, making him choke out a moan and a gag before doubling over, his hands now moving into his crotch as he gasped for breath. She threw an uppercut into his face before using her other fist to slam down on the back of his neck, laying him out flat on his stomach. She kicked him hard in the ribs for good measure before turning fast on the ball of her foot toward where her cat was still lying. She scooped him up as gently as she could, cringing at the tiny mewls of pain he whimpered out, and cradled him as she hurried around the corner of the building, just as the front door flew open and Heath stepped out, his eyes searching from side to side. He immediately caught sight of her and ran down the sidewalk. He noticed the blood on her face and arm, and Rocky, and his eyes went wide.

  "What the fuck –"

  "Carter," she interrupted breathlessly. "He did this to Rocky, he attacked me. Or tried to. Where are the cops?"

  "Where is he?" Heath asked her calmly, ignoring her question. A sudden cold, violent anger settled over his face like a mask and Drew's insides twisted as she shrank under his gaze. Heath could be absolutely terrifying when he wanted to. "Where did he go?"

  "He's around the corner, on the side of the building," Drew said, regretting it as soon as the words were out of her mouth. Heath took a giant step in that direction and she used one hand to fumble at his shirt, pulling. "Heath –"

  He growled and jerked free of her grasp, running off, so Drew had no choice but to follow him. He stopped short at the sight of the man lying face-down on the ground. Carter was still breathing, but he wasn't moving. He looked at Drew over his shoulder, the anger replaced by an expression of absolute amazement.

  "You laid him out like this?" he asked.

  Drew nodded in irritation. "Who else?" she snapped.

  Surprisingly, a reluctant grin tugged up one corner of Heath's mouth. It was more of a grimace, but he shook his head.

  At the sound of their voices, Carter stirred vaguely and groaned. The anger fell back over Heath's face, creasing his brow deeply, and he stormed over to where the man lay prone on the ground and dropped a foot on his back, digging in with the heavy heel of his athletic shoe.

  "You outta your fuckin' mind?" Heath hissed down at his former manager. "You came after Drew? You got a death wish?" He leaned down, pressing his weight on his foot in the middle of Carter's back and the man cried out weakly in pain. His face was a bloody mess from Drew's elbow.

  The sound seemed to only spur on Heath's rage. He knelt down, one foot still in Carter's back, and reached out and gripped the side of the man's face and pressed it hard into the pavement. Carter let out another strangled cry.

  "You've gotta be fuckin' shitting me," Heath went on in a furious undertone. "I could break your spine right now—you know that, right?" He dug in harder.

  Drew hurried forward and grabbed his shoulder. "Heath, stop." Her voice was commanding, not a plea, and at the strength in it Heath actually glanced up at her. "I fought him off. I put him down. Don't do this. Don't stoop to his level. Don't get in trouble over him." Her hand tugged insistently at his shirt. "Stand up, right now."

  Heath glared down at Carter again for several seconds, not releasing even a little pressure on either his back or face. Finally, he let go and rose to his feet. He stepped back from the man and continued to glare over at him. Drew noticed his fists were clenched by his sides and shaking slightly. She reached up to touch his face, instantly drawing his attention.

  "Calm down," she said softly. "Just calm down. For me, okay?" She pressed her palm against his cheek insistently. She felt his jaw tighten under her hand before releasing and he gave her a terse nod.

  The sound of vehicles at the back of the building caught her attention. She glanced over Heath's shoulder and saw the police, two squad cars, had arrived. She glanced back down at Carter, then at Heath.

  "Are you calm?" she said. "The cops are here."

  "Go meet them," he said. "Bring them over here. I'll stay and make sure he doesn't get up or try to run."

  Drew nodded at him, meeting his gaze intently. He seemed to understand her silent question and nodded slightly.

  "I'm good," he said. "Go on."

  Drew exhaled a tense breath, feeling relief flooding her body again, and rushed off to meet the cops,
still holding onto Rocky tightly.

  ***

  It hadn't taken long for Drew's family to catch wind of the fact that something wasn't right. Once the cops had gotten her and Heath's statements, and Drew informed the police that she did want to press charges on Carter, they informed her that she had to come down to the station to give a formal statement about everything that had transpired and take photographs of her wounds to submit as evidence to the prosecuting attorney.

  There goes pizza, she thought grumpily.

  She had reluctantly given Rocky to her sisters who informed her they would take him to the twenty-four hour veterinary hospital that was at least a fifteen minute drive away. Heath had agreed to drive them there, then would head back to the police station to pick up Drew.

  Her parents had been horrified despite Drew assuring them repeatedly that she was okay. Her mother clapped a hand over her mouth as she got into one of the police cars to go to give her statement.

  "It's okay, Mom," Drew said reassuringly.

  "She's in no trouble, ma'am," one of the officers added. "This is standard procedure."

  They took her to the station and she gave her statement and answered questions, then allowed the officers to take pictures of the wounds to her forehead and the inside of her mouth, as well as the bruising on her body from where Carter had gripped and pressed against her. She'd been nervous about the photographs, but a very nice female officer took her to a private room to get the photos on her body. She was then told that a prosecuting attorney would be contacting her within a day or so to get the charges formally filed. Drew sighed, knowing she would have to return to a courtroom again at some point, but Carter Steele deserved to be in jail for the problems he'd caused everyone.

  Heath was waiting for her when she came outside and he took her immediately to the veterinary hospital that Rocky was at, where her sisters still were. The vets on staff assured her that despite his broken front leg and two cracked ribs, he would make a full recovery with plenty of TLC. They planned to keep him overnight to make sure that he remained stable. Drew hadn't wanted to leave, but Heath gently pointed out there was nothing she could do for him that wasn't already being done. He promised to bring her back bright and early to pick him up in the morning.