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Calvin was beaming. If it were earlier, they could go out and celebrate. "Look, there's a bottle of Taittinger in the cellar left over from Christmas. Twenty minutes in the freezer and it'll be chilled. What do you say we light a fire, snuggle up around the check and get goofy?" |
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But Terry wasn't in the mood. Betty Gorawlski's call had deflated her spontaneity, even though she agreed that Matty was too sensible to experiment with drugs and that Betty was getting back for Matty rousting her son and his goons. |
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Calvin, however, was reeling with excitement. He had never seen such a large check in his life. Never even visualized one. "She couldn't know much about real estate," he said. |
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Terry pulled back the blanket and slipped into bed. "Well, there is one catch. She wants us out in three weeks." |
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"Three weeks? For this kind of money, we can be out in three days." |
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"And just where are we going to live? And what about Matty? He's got school until the end of June, and Little League until July 7. We haven't even thought about finding a place in Argyle yet. We can't be out by then." |
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"He wouldn't have to miss a day. I'll call Priest to find us a storage company. We can move everything out except for essentials, find an apartment for a couple months. If not, we can stay in a hotel and fly up there on weekends until we find something. It'll be inconvenient for a while but so what?" With a lunatic grin he flapped the check in the air. "And we can afford it." |
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He didn't know anything about Argyle-on-the-Hudson, but the cost of housing had to be less than Greater Boston, which ranked third in the nation. He could fly up there on a weekend and buy a place with the deposit alone. "Terry, this is your basic once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing. Even if it means living out of Motel 6 for a month, we'll be rich." |
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Terry settled on her pillow and closed her eyes. "Let's talk about it tomorrow." |
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"Okay." He kissed the check and laid it on the night table. Before getting into bed, he flexed his biceps in the wall mirror. "The biggest biceps in the English department," he said. |
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