She felt a hand tighten around her throat and then a man’s face pressed up close to hers, his expression ugly.
Frankie forced herself to stay still and think. She had no idea where Roxy and Mia were, but their new favorite place was the park and she was guessing they’d gone for a walk. Which meant they could be back at any moment.
Using a move she’d practiced hundreds of times, she knocked the man’s hands away from her throat and brought her knee up hard.
He gave a grunt of pain and made a grab for her, but she hooked her leg under his and brought him crashing to the floor.
“You crazy bitch.” He howled in agony as his head smacked into the floor and his shoulders landed on the broken glass.
Frankie hit the floor with him and felt pain shoot through her knee.
“Yeah, that’s me. Pleased to meet you.” She yanked his arm behind his back and twisted it hard, thinking they could probably hear his yells up in Harlem.
She hoped someone would hear.
And then she heard a sound at the window and saw Claws, standing in her usual place.
“No!” Frankie glanced at the glass scattered across the floor. “No! Claws! Don’t jump.”
But Claws ignored her and jumped.
Matt finished the proposal he’d been working on, removed his earphones and stood up. Mozart helped him concentrate and blocked out the noise from the street.
Claws appeared and rubbed herself against his leg.
He looked down and saw spots of blood on the floor. “What the—” He dropped into a crouch and caught her gently. “What have you done?” Lifting her carefully, he examined her paws and winced.
“You trod on glass?” He stood up, intending to investigate on the way to the vet, when he heard Roxy scream his name.
Cursing fluently, he locked the cat in the safety of his apartment and sprinted to the ground floor.
Frankie’s door was open and the lock was hanging off.
Matt strode into the apartment and saw Frankie kneeling on the floor next to the twisted body of a man who was letting out a stream of curses interspersed with grunts of pain.
There was blood on the floor, but whether it was from the cat, the man or Frankie, he wasn’t sure.
His stomach lurched.
“Oh, Matt—” Roxy was clutching Mia, pressing her daughter’s head into her shoulder. “I went to the park and when I came back the door was open and—
“Take Mia up to my apartment, Rox.”
“But—”
“Just do it.” He handed her his keys. “I’ve got this.”
Frankie looked at him. “You’ve got this? I hate to bust your knight-in-shining-armor aspirations, but from where I’m sitting it feels as if I’m the one who’s got this.” She adjusted her hold on the man and he gave another howl of pain.
Matt felt a rush of relief that she seemed to be alright, closely followed by admiration. “So you don’t need any help there?”
“Thanks, but I’m good.”
“I’ll call 911.”
“Way ahead of you.”
He scanned the broken glass, the trail of blood and the bruise on her head. He wondered how he had missed hearing the commotion, and then remembered he’d been listening to music. “You already phoned this in? How?”