Free Giving Him Hell: A Saturn's Daughter Novel (Saturn's Daughters Book 3) by Jamie Quaid

prompted.
    “I’m trying to prevent those,” I reminded her. “Sometimes, the news ought to warn people before the fact.”
    “Doesn’t sell papers. Will do what I can.”
    She rang off. Cynicism bites.
    I decided I could make these calls just as easily from my front room with my cat on my lap to keep my tension levels below electric wire proportions. Doing my best not to look toward the dark back of the lobby, I locked up and crossed the street. The fog was finally lifting.
    My cell rang before I made it up the stairs. “Wassup?” I asked wearily and unprofessionally, recognizing Max’s ringtone.
    “Happy birthday, Tina,” he said in the same weary tone. “The gas lines erupted two streets from Hell’s Mansion.”
    Rich people going without heat didn’t roll my wheels as much as poor ones. I chose to smile that he remembered my birthday instead of fretting over what I couldn’t control. I unlocked my locks and welcomed Milo’s cry of greeting.
    “Can you get solar panels?” I asked frivolously. “And what do you know about Acme condemning the Zone with eminent domain?”
    “They can’t do that, can they?” he asked, diverted from his own predicament. “I mean, I’m all for it. The place should have been condemned ten years ago. Andre will walk away with a lot more than he put into the place. But Acme can’t do a thing. The state has to condemn the property for a public purpose, like a highway.”
    “Or a medical research clinic?” I wasn’t going into the argument about people giving up their homes and lives, yadda yadda. We’d had it before. Max had grown up rich and privileged. His family probably owned half a dozen houses. They had country clubs, private schools, and ivy league colleges for networking.
    Those of us in the Zone were lucky to have one hovel apiece. We hung on to our jobs by our knuckles. We used the street for playground, community, and education. Taking away our neighborhood would take away more than just our homes and livelihood—it robbed us of the village we needed for support.
    “Nonprofit research, for the public good, maybe,” Max said dubiously. “But Acme’s never been a nonprofit.”
    “We have a Graham Young down here declaring he’s building a tribute to medical science on our land. MSI just got a grant for a bundle of money from the university. You really, really do not want normal people down here. And if they condemn our homes, I’m sending everyone in the Zone up to Hell’s Mansion to live with you.”
    “So the place can blow up faster. Good thinking, Justy. I don’t understand why you defend that disaster zone.”
    Sitting on my window seat in the front bay window with Milo on my lap, I watched Tim carrying a box of stone gnomes up to my office door and leave it on my step. If I was really lucky, Graham Young with his smug arrogance was freezing his butt off in that box. And Max wanted to know why I defended the Zone.
    “You’d have to live here to understand. And if Granny blows up her mansion, you might just end up living with us and find out. Should we call in a priest to exorcise her?”
    “Couldn’t hurt,” he agreed wearily, giving up the Zone argument. “A posse of them maybe.”
    I knew I should be worried and horrified. Except, after living through the time with Max in hell’s outer dimensions and gas attacks that left my friends comatose, I couldn’t get too riled by exploding grannies. I was still striving for normal. “Can I watch?”
    “Sure. Bring the Mormon tabernacle choir and we’ll have the film at ten.”
    I giggled. On a day like this, I giggled. That was my old Max talking, the man I missed, who’d once ridden a Harley, fixed car engines, and made crazy mad love to me.
    “Benedictine nuns,” I suggested. “They’re closer.”
    “I’ll give you a date,” he agreed. “Thanks, Justy. And I’ll look into the eminent domain thing. Christmas at the mansion doesn’t offer better entertainment.”
    I heard a boom in