Free No, Daddy, Don't! by Irene Pence

lived in the same hilly, tree-shaded neighborhood as Michelle LaBorde, but she had no idea what the woman who lived two blocks from her had been going through.
    Clad in khaki shorts and a pink T-shirt, Bonnie was enjoying a chat with her next-door neighbor as both women watched their toddlers play in the hot afternoon sun.
    A bus rumbled down the street in front of them and slid to a stop. A pretty woman stepped off whom Bonnie recognized, but didn’t know by name. As always, the woman was dressed with bandbox precision. Her smart red suit was accented with black and she carried an expensive-looking briefcase. Diamond studs sparkled in her earlobes.
    With a subtle hint of recognition, the stylish woman smiled at the two women and said, “Hi.”
    They said, “Hello,” and stared admiringly as she began to cross the street. Bonnie glanced at her watch. “Five-thirty,” she said. “Time to start dinner.”
    Both women began heading home with their children. Just as Bonnie reached her front door, she heard a scream. She turned and saw that the woman in red had crossed the street and was several feet from the entrance to the teachers’ parking lot at the White Rock Elementary School, directly across from Bonnie’s house.
    A flurry of movement caught Bonnie’s attention next. A man was beating the woman, who appeared to be fighting for her life. She was raising her hands and using her expensive briefcase to fend off his blows. He wore only tight white tennis shorts and no shirt. Bonnie thought she heard him call the woman a bitch, and she wondered what had the woman done to make that jogger so mad ?
    Then the man, a muscular six feet or taller and probably weighing 200 pounds, pulled back his fist and slammed it into the woman’s face. The blow connected with her left eye. Now he was gearing up for another shot. Bonnie could see the muscles bulge in his bare back. The woman’s pathetic cries continued. The attack had happened so suddenly. The man was like a striking cobra—giving no advance warning of the venom that was coming. His punches came faster and faster, and his fists drove deeper into the woman’s face, now white with fear.
    Bonnie called to her neighbor to take her son. She let go of his hand and took off running, leaping across the green yard. In seconds she was in the street, her pink sandals slapping the pavement.
    “Stop that!” Bonnie screamed, but the man continued to hit and yell at the terrified, defenseless woman. He hit her other eye; then his next blow slammed her nose until it lay flat against her left cheek. The snap of cartilage popping through skin nauseated Bonnie. Blood oozed from the woman’s crooked nose and flooded past her lips, staining her teeth red.
    While Bonnie stood inches away, pleading to the man to stop, he blasted the woman with one final strike, this time hitting her jaw and knocking her unconscious. She dropped to the blistering sidewalk like a rag doll.
    Bonnie was panting, and numbed by shock. She fought to stay calm as she knelt by the woman. Then she turned to her neighbor, who was watching from just inside her front door.
    “Call 911!” Bonnie shouted.
    The attacker must have heard her, but he appeared unconcerned at the thought of police coming for him. As the woman lay unconscious, the man slowly picked up a bike that Bonnie hadn’t noticed before. She wondered, had he been hiding somewhere, stalking this woman, waiting for her bus to arrive? He sat down on the bicycle seat and casually began to pedal away as if he were out for a leisurely ride.
    Bonnie had been so traumatized by the brutality of the assault that she had given no thought to her own safety. Her blood chilled when the man stopped and turned back toward her. He glanced down at the broken, bleeding woman, then gave Bonnie a proud, smirky, confident, arrogant smile, as if he were enjoying the woman’s pain. Then he pedaled on.
    A few seconds later, a young man on a motorbike slowed down when he saw