Boyfriend from Hell (Saturn's Daughters) Read Free Page A

better or reduce my guilt over losing the deposit. If Andre docked my next month’s pay for his lost cash, I couldn’t pay rent or buy groceries. I’d have to drop out of school within weeks of finals. Or study in the streets.
    With medics and cops to care for the kids, I sat dejectedly on the bus stop bench and tried Max’s number, again. No answer.
    What in hell had I ever seen in him in the first place? Yeah, he was a sexy bad boy who made my heart go pitter-pat when he grinned, but grins and hot sex didn’t make a relationship.
    Facing my uncertain future, I finally understood that I couldn’t afford his chronic irresponsibility. I’d never really had someone I could count on, but repeating the mistakes of the past was not a sign of intelligence. I’d been a sex-starved idiot. Six months of neglect was more than enough to prove that he would never change—especially now that he wasn’t taking my calls. I knew I wasn’t any prize and that Max could have any woman he wanted. I could either get mad or get depressed. I chose the former.
    Buoyed by self-righteous rage, I tried to reach him one more time. This time, when all I got was his cheery “Enjoying life. Later!” I shouted, “We’re finished! Done! Kaput! Bring me my car and get the hell out of my life, Maxim MacNeill!”
    I wasn’t so good at laying it on the line in person.
    I don’t know why I’d put up with Max and his bad habits for this long. Because my mother would hate him, was my best guess. But my mother was in Bolivia with the Peace Corps and hadn’t been home in years. Dee Clancy had barely been able to wait for me to leave for college before taking off. Motherly, she was not.
    Which was no explanation but an excuse.
    I was still sitting on the bench long after the ambulances and police cars had departed, furious to the point of tears. I was making up lists of all the things I would say to Max should I ever speak to him again, when a weak, prolonged blare of horn rattled my already overstimulated nerves. I sought the source, but the semi pulling into the intersection blocked the view of the hill behind.
    Cursing the limp hair falling in my face, I brushed it out of my eyes and stood up to see around the semi as its trailer cleared the intersection. Behind it, coming down the hill, I recognized the rusting hood of my old red Escort.
    From the way he was hitting the gas, Max must have received my message. Fine. Let him be mad. He couldn’t be any angrier than I was. And I had far more reason.
    Wishing I had enough hair to pin the limp strands out of my face so I didn’t look so pathetic, I stepped up to the curb. I blinked in astonishment when the Escort didn’t slow down.
    He wasn’t stopping.
    The Escort was accelerating like a rocket launcher —right at me.
    I froze so long that I could see Max’s eyes narrowed in fury and his fingers clenched white-knuckled on the steering wheel.
    My boyfriend was trying to kill me!
    Shocked into action, I dived for the protection of the concrete bus stop bench. With as much anguish as fear, I screamed, “Damn you, Max!”
    The heat of the engine was almost upon me as I fell to the sidewalk behind the bench on already bruised knees.
    At the pain, I automatically cried out, “Damn you to hell!”
    The rusted Escort slammed into the light pole where I’d just been standing. I shivered and huddled in the protection of the bench. In horror, I watched as the pole cracked and the car kept on going, careening into the bank’s brick wall. Metal and mortar flew.
    I felt the impact like a small earthquake. Scrambling backward, I could only stare in alarm as the cracked light pole split in two, teetered ominously, and then tilted. Snapping under the tension, live wires crackled and sparked—igniting the gas from the shattered car in a ball of fire that engulfed the Escort.
    With Max inside it.
    I screamed. And screamed some more.
    • • •
    The paramedics insisted on taking me to the hospital. I had