Devil You Know(5)

Now, I don’t have kids, and believe me, I’ve counted my blessings for not having to shield such innocence from a man like him. But if I did have them, I imagine the pain a mother feels when her child is in danger is akin to what I feel at that moment.

My heart stops, and time comes to a painful halt for a fleeting second before everything seems to pass at triple-speed. My feet hammer down the hallway to find Dylan slouched into the laundry doorway, having obviously lost his balance given his still alcohol-induced bearing on gravity. Rocco cowers at the back door, teeth bared, his eyes saying the worst.

He knows what will happen if Dylan gets to him first.

As do I.

I take a single step over my dearest husband, and come tantalizingly close to securing freedom for the only thing in the world I care about enough to save. Heaven knows that isn’t me.

Restriction on my ankle halts my progress, and I crash to the floor with my head beside Rocco. In that split-second, we share a moment. I look into those brown eyes, and I see me reflected back. I see what a pathetic mess I have become, and I vow I will be the last soul Dylan destroys. So what if Rocco is ‘only a dog’? He’s my dog, my life, and my sanity.

He deserves freedom. Freedom that I can’t give myself. Freedom I’ve long ago given up all hope of.

My entire weight goes into the kick that I deal Dylan, and for a few precious seconds, he lets go of me. I take the rare shift in power as it comes, jump to my feet and make that bitch mine. The moment may have been infinitesimal but I relish every nanosecond I’ve won, and I open the door for Rocco.

His furry butt charges outside before he pauses, and looks back at me. I swear if that dog could speak, he would be giving me the ‘I’ll never forget you’ speech. I commit the sight of him to a special part of my memories I keep to myself, free of Dylan, and shut the door.

“Get out of my fucking way!”

Stars swirl in a fantastic light show as my head hits the washing machine. I roll to all fours, and brace myself as the back door lands against my hip. The asshole is after him. I can’t let it happen.

All thoughts of life after Dylan vanish, and I bolt out that door like I should have done so many years ago. All this, the suffering, the abuse, can be attributed back to me in the end, because if I had been strong enough—if I had tried—then I wouldn’t still be here. I wouldn’t have got Rocco to keep me company while my husband was out sleeping around, and I wouldn’t now be trying to save my soul mate in this pathetic moment of absolute desolation.

Dylan thunders around the backyard, searching behind every bush, under every tree, determined to find him.

“Run, Rocco!”

My outburst catches the attention of the hunter and he whirls on me, closing the space between us in ginormous, rage-fuelled strides. His hand lifts, I widen my stance, and we dance the only way we know how—palm to cheek.

“That fucking mongrel won’t bite me and get away with it.” He spins on his heel, and stalks to the last place I want him to go—the garden shed. Rocco’s hiding place.

Do I run to stop him? Or would that foil any chance my baby has of escaping? Pots fly aside, followed by the lawnmower as it careens out the narrow door.

“There you are.”

Those three words. I’ll forever hear them in my dreams.

My scream pierces the night, but what for, I don’t know. Dylan won’t stop, and I know by now that none of our neighbors will intervene.

At least, I thought I knew.

Dylan’s hands clamp around Rocco’s throat, and he holds my life out before him as he wanders so damn casually over to me—my dog kicking, and clawing for breath. Crazy is a children’s tea party compared to the look in Dylan’s eyes.

I fall to my knees, and grieve for the loss I know will come. Like a train wreck, I can’t peel my eyes away from. I watch as he draws the last signs of life from my companion—from my one true love.

Tears flow so fast they blur my peripheral. A large, dark shadow moves at unnatural speed from my left, and draws my attention from the horror that unfolds before me. I literally fall flat on my ass from shock.

A man has leapt our six-foot fence.

Dylan is so fixated on his demise of Rocco that he doesn’t see the hit coming. My wails have long since stopped, but the tears still flow at the sight of Dylan’s head snapping to the side, and Rocco falling to the ground. Only now, they’re tears of happiness.

My dog will live.

Rocco drags himself towards the shelter of our garden. I scramble to where he lies, gasping, and pull his furry head into my lap while the stranger from next door lays blow after blow into Dylan’s face. The man straddles him, easily half his size again. If I don’t do something to stop it, I’ll have a different death on my hands to explain. And quite frankly, I have no idea how I’ll do that. If the police didn’t believe my husband was abusing me, then they sure as shit won’t take me seriously when I describe a random hulk of a man leaping our fence to save my dog.