There are monsters
He watches. Like a crocodile, waiting, almost wholly submerged by a riverbank. He waits, watching as girl after girl stops at the bar, buys a drink or two, talks to Carl or Doug, disappears back into the throng. He watches, as a pack of young college kids enter the bar, loud and boisterous as a troupe of monkeys. He waits, until one of them, having knocked back a couple of shots, staggers away from the herd.
The next time he goes to the bar, he slips a packet of powdered crystals into her wine glass. It's slow acting, less noticeable. Pharmaceuticals are a lot more sophisticated than they used to be and he knows a guy in China who'll export them in bulk.
The girl's loud, babbling, blonde, bubbly. The girl's very young.
He waits, feeling for the right moment, like a hunter waiting for the wind to drop, his bowstring taught, his eyes trained on the far distance. He watches, calculating how long it will take to get her up out of the bar and into his car, wondering if he can get her back to the hotel before she passes out completely.
The girl stumbles and falls on are ass. Only a few of her friends are sober enough to notice, and those that do, point and laugh riotously. She laughs, riotously.
Time to move. He straightens his tie.
But just as he's about to get to his feet, another man, another predator, sweeps in and takes her arm, helping her to her feet. The stranger smiles his nice-guy smile and buys the girl another drink.
Thwarted. Damn. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. But he settles back and he waits. And he watches. Because not every hunt goes the way it's supposed to.
From his table he watches his rival paw the girl, watches him get close, touch her, get her used to being touched - a knee, a shoulder, a lock of hair, brushed away from her face with careful fingers. Watching makes him angry, makes him focussed, leaves a cold stone deep in his guts.
Mine, he thinks. Should have been mine.
But then, a miracle. The girl stumbles and clutches her head, and his rival asks if she's okay, if she should go home. His rival lacks the killer instinct. His rival vacillates. And he's just about to escort the girl out of the bar when another dark-haired woman approaches this lesser-predator, and she grabs his tie, and she yanks him away from the bar.
The pair engage in a heated conversation, loudly enough to be heard by anyone who cares to listen. He doesn't care to listen. He's already at the bar, already talking to the girl, already buying her another shot. He's smooth and sleek and deadly as a shark. He pounces.
It takes less than three minutes for him to get her from the bar, up the steps and into the street level above.
*--*--*
"I swear, Robin, it was harmless. I was just-"
"Who is she, Barney?"
"She's just some chick. Some girl. She's really drunk. She fell over and I tried to see if she was okay-"
"Just some chick? Your face was practically buried in the whore's cleavage!"
"Robin, I was just talking to her. You can't stop me just talking to- I totally- Someone should see if she's okay. Oh! Seriously, dude, where's she gone?"
"Barney!"
"Damn it, Robin! This is serious. She's gone, she was just talking to a guy and she's gone. She's-"
"I get it. She's gone. What's so important about- Oh! Oh my god, is this like-?"
"Yeah. Dude, there's no time, just get Marshall."
"Barney, oh my god! Hey, Marshall? Marshall!"
*--*--*
It's a skill born of long practice. Smooth words to explain that his girlfriend's had a few too many drinks. Or his sister - that elicits more sympathy, sometimes even help getting her into the car. Confidence, look like you know what you're doing.
Lying on the back seat, her skirt (that's really little more than a belt) scrunched up around her waist, she already looks like a sex-crime victim. His dick is long and hard in his pants. He looks around the deserted streets, wondering if he can just do it here.
The thought of having her here, of violating her here, in the street, in his car, it turns him on. The windows are tinted. He's sure he can get away with it.
And if he leaves it much longer, she'll be insensible. She won't even try to resist. She won't feel it when he gets out his bag of tricks. She'll bleed, but he won't see the fear in her eyes.
It's just not the same.
So he begins to crawl into the back seat, on top of her, he tears at her blouse, exposing creamy, unblemished skin. He lowers his face towards one breast, his lips curling back over his teeth.
Just a bite.
And then-
There's pain. He's pulled back violently, out of the car, hands wrapped around his waist. He feels a crunch, an explosion of pain on the side of his face as a fist connects and he falls to a heap on to the dirty sidewalk.
There's a second burst of pain, followed by tiny pinpricks from the vicinity of his ribs. Voices.
"Barney, Jesus Christ! He's down!"
"Dude, I know that."
"Barney, he's down!"
Someone mumbles something like "It's unfair, Marshall got to hit him," and he looks up, using the one eye that's not rapidly swelling shut, and sees as a pair of long, smooth legs are pulled out of his car.
There's a distant siren and he presses his face against the cold concrete and manages a groan through his broken ribs.
After five months of preying on the bar scene, the notorious Manhattan Rapist is finally caught.