Page 50 of Due At The Same Time
“It’s a lie!” she cried.
Her car was blocking the exit and I was hemmed in by the hedge on the other side. Shit, I didn’t think I could make it out of the way of her peach Mercedes if she tried to pin me against the garage door.
“Give me Finn!” Astrid shrieked, drumming her hands on the wheel. “I’m sorrrrrrrry for having sex with your husband. I thought he was gonna be better. But you don’t have to punish me by taking away my DREAM MAN.”
“Finn doesn’t want you,” I retorted, trying to edge sideways, but with the size of my belly, I wasn’t built for edging.
“Oh, you’re not going to get away with this!” she cried, rolling the car forward so the hood was only an inch from pinning my legs into the garage door.
“Stop!” I suddenly heard my ex-husband order, and then Ambrose was there, pouncing up on the hood of her Mercedes and grabbing hold of the windshield wipers, ripping them off in his hands.
Astrid’s Mercedes was her baby and clearly, this was the only thing that could have distracted her.
She backed up and gunned the car at Ambrose.
“You will pay for those, you brute! They cost $500 apiece!”
She knocked the car painfully into his shins but Ambrose wasn’t even looking at her.
“Move, Indi,” he ordered, and once again, his commanding tone was not helping my revolting little secret arousal at his voice, making my knees feel weak and wobbly.
“I hate you so much!” Astrid shrieked. “What kind of man cheats on his wife and then goes crawling back to her? Andyou’renot getting away that easy, bitch!”
She spun the car back around to me as I tried to get out of the way but just as I started to move a huge Braxton-Hicks contraction tightened my belly painfully and I clutched it, wincing in pain.
Shit, too slow
Because Astrid was really gunning for me. Her face behind the twisted windshield wipers looked maniacal, her lipstick a crooked slash across her face.
But before she could touch me, Ambrose charged forward into the path of her car and swung me completely out of the way, only a second or two before Astrid jerked the Mercedes forward. The movement trapped his legs against my garage door, but I was laid down as soft as a pillow on the other side of the hedge as he was ground into the fender.
“Give it up!” Ambrose gritted out to her. “Everything I ever did with you was a mistake I wish I could take back!”
I cast madly about for a weapon, anything to distract her, but there was nothing.
“Let him go!”
“Indi, do not make me tell you twice!” Ambrose bit out again, his eyes flaming at me. “She’s fucking nuts! Get out of here!”
“God, you’re such a wound-up asshole!” I seethed, my hormones clawing at me like tiny knives down my skin. “Calm down! I’m not going to just leave and let you get flattened.”
Suddenly, there was a firm peppering sound like a lot of smallish rocks hitting her windshield, and Astrid shrieked in horror.
“What—who the fuck? This is a $35,000 windshield!”
There was another spray of rocks, more this time, splattering across the glass and gouging little chunks out of the car.
I turned my head and there was Harold in an old-fashioned pajama set and nightcap with a slingshot he’d bought to keep my bird feeders free of squirrels but then been too soft-hearted to use.
“How dare you impregnate me with your ancient geriatric sperm? I’m going to kill you!”
In a rage, she reversed, the car brakes squealing, and then twisted the wheel toward Harold.
Ambrose moved like a flash, grabbing at something in my garden, and when he got up he had one of my sharp metal trellises for tomatoes in his hand. With one smooth motion, he jammed it into Astrid’s front tire. It immediately made a terrific popping sound and began to rapidly deflate, much like the lipstick melting off Astrid’s greasy face.
“Nice work, son!” Harold praised, because unlike me he did not hold grudges at all.
Ambrose yanked open the car door and pulled Astrid out by the back of her dress, then walked her firmly over to my compost bin and stuffed her head in.
