Look out Batman, there’s a new crime-fighting duo in town.
“Where the fuck did you come from, lady?” The new man scowls at me, the gun barrel trained on my torso.
He walks slowly but steadily towards me, shortening the distance between us to less than two metres in just a few seconds. Any chance I had to run is now a distant memory.
“I was just in the neighbourhood,” I say, the inane words pouring forth without the benefit of engaging my brain beforehand. My hand trembles and I clamp it viciously hard around the short side of the brick, forcing it into stillness from sheer will. “Thought I’d drop by.”
His gaze saunters down my body, taking in my dishevelled hair, my crumpled dress, the fading shine on my best patent-leather shoes, then takes a leisurely stroll back up, coming to rest on my heaving chest.
One lick of his lips and my body crawls with revulsion. The man’s hair is stringy, so greasy it looks wet, and his tiny dark eyes absorb all the light. His yellowing teeth have more holes than a golf course, the remaining soldiers standing to drunken attention, sagging towards each other to close the gaps.
This is what a murderer should look like. Not the golden retriever of a man standing too far away to be any immediate help.
“You have a thing for breaking windows, eh?”
I raise the brick, trying to position it so it looks like a threatening weapon instead of something I just forgot I was holding. His face wrinkles in amusement, scorn plastered in every dead skin cell of his face.
“Forgot my keys.”
“Drop the brick. Come over here.”
Obedience to men larger than me is so ingrained I almost follow his instructions. Then my fingers claw back the brick just before it falls. I instruct my raised leg to step back rather than forward.
I jut my chin in defiance. If I’m going to die out here, my turn to be reclaimed by the sprawling flora, better to rile him so he makes it quick. “How about you drop the gun, get in your car, and fuck off?”
“Ooh. The little lady’s got teeth.”
He steps nearer, halving the distance between us in one go. The muscles in his arm soften so the tip of the gun lowers nearer to the ground.
“Thought you dumped her dead body in the forest,” he calls back to Malakai. His eyes scan me from head to toe again, lingering in places that make me ill. “She looks pretty healthy to me.”
His free hand grabs my shoulder and I clip it with the brick, knocking hard against his knuckles, the awkward angle making the blow weak.
“Fucking bitch,” he screams, hitting out with the butt of the gun. A blow meant for my head that deflects to my shoulder when I swivel out of the way last moment.
I swing the brick again, this time catching him on the cheekbone, making him stumble, then fall to one knee. My eyes scan for help but Kai remains by the door, a million miles away.
In a flash, I grasp he’s hesitating because of the gun. This mad man is just as much a threat to him as he is to me.
My fear sets deeper even as my protective streak kicks in.
As I try another blow, he grabs my calf, tugging so I’m thrown off balance, slamming onto my back. All the breath catapults from my lungs, the brick tumbling from my numb fingers, falling out of reach.
The gun. What happened to the gun?
I kick out with my feet, catching a glancing blow on his shoulder. The hit is so lame, he just keeps coming. Hands wrap around my knees.
Both hands.
I turn my head, seeing the weapon lying in a scrappy tangle of weeds. Too far for my short arms.
I twist my body, trying to throw him off, hooking my elbows underneath me and using them to drag myself backward. He follows, moving far enough away that the gun is now out of his reach, too.
My hands scrabble on the ground behind me, beside me, searching desperately for something to threaten, to hurt. To stop his relentless crawl nearer.
I toss a few bits of loose gravel at him, the only defence I can find.
Far too little. Far too late.
