Arrow's Rest by Joel Scott (best books to read all time .TXT) 📗

Jared unlocked the door and stood aside for her. He took a deep breath and followed Sally in and everything was just like he remembered. He went past the living room with the two stuffed chairs facing the TV, one of them deeply pocketed where the old man had sat and watched the church channel, and continued on upstairs to his room. They had taken down the pictures, the bed and desk were gone, and the old chest of drawers in the corner was empty. It was like he’d never lived there.

He went back downstairs and found Sally standing in the middle of the kitchen alongside the ash table with the high-back chairs.

“Some nice old furniture,” she said. “My partner has an antiques business. She’ll make you a good offer for some of this if you’re not planning on keeping it.”

“She’ll need to pick it up today,” Jared said. “It will all be gone by tomorrow.”

Sally made the call and they walked over to the barn. The value of the listing was mainly in the land, she said, but the old barn was a plus for the hobby farmer types who would be attracted to the offering. The house needed a lot of upgrading but could be a candidate for renovation for some buyers. After a walk around the property Sally suggested an asking price a hundred and twenty K above the farmer’s offer. Jared said he’d think about it.

When they arrived back at the house, Sally’s partner was waiting. They settled on a lot price and Jared helped the women load up their van and trailer with some of the old dressers and the harvest table and chairs. It was getting dark when they finished. The McClary kitchen stove was nickel plated and charming but burned out inside and not worth the trouble.

He watched them drive away, then climbed into his rental and headed for the motel he’d checked in to after he left the lawyer’s office. The one with the bar three doors down.

Jared had set the alarm early so he’d have plenty of time. He popped a couple of ibuprofen and washed them down with the remainder of a can of warm beer sitting beside the bed. After a quick shower he packed his knapsack and checked out. He stopped at a co-op station and bought gas and a large can of Clamato juice to go with the beer from his motel fridge. When he reached the farm, he parked at the top of the slope and looked down at the old house and thought about the ten years he’d spent there with his grandparents after his mother and father died. He sat in the car for an hour, drinking beer. After his third he called Sally and told her he would take the neighbour’s offer for the property.

Then he opened the trunk of his rental and took out the gas cans and walked down the slope to the house.

Chapter 58

“That much?” Danny was incredulous. In all the years he’d known Jared he might have heard him mention his grandparents half a dozen times. And now all this money.

“Yep. Less a few thousand for cleanup at the site. The realtor is arranging for a bulldozer to come in and do some grading and levelling where the old house stood. There was a fire.”

Danny regarded Jared thoughtfully but let it go. “So what are your plans?”

“I thought I’d like to take Cat on a trip later on. We’re thinking about flying to French Polynesia and chartering something to cruise around in for a few weeks. She’s never been to the South Pacific. Maybe you and Jordana could come out and join us for a while, and we’d get to try out one of the French Cats. See how fast we could get her going. Twenty plus knots is not unheard of in the right conditions.”

Jordana was the high-flying real estate agent Danny had originally contacted to discuss some of the options at Annie and Joseph’s old address. Since her release from hospital, their mother was uncertain about returning to the old property with all its recent bad memories and her sons were considering building a spec house on the lot that she and Joseph could sell. One thing had led to another.

“She’s always busy, but I could check when you firm up your plans and give me some dates. I’d have to drop her phone overboard within the first hour, of course. Her monthly data bill is higher than my monthly rent; I think she must have her ear buds plugged in fourteen hours a day. I keep waiting for her to ask if she can leave them in when we have sex.”

They were sitting around the Annie J’s table, sipping hot rum on the coldest day of the year to date, with snow in the forecast. Sailing in the South Pacific sounded like a hell of a fine idea.

“You said later on for the trip. I guess you’ll be having too much fun looking around for a new sailboat to leave town just now, huh? I want to come along and check out some of the eye candy with you. I’m really excited for you,” Danny said.

Jared smiled weakly.

“A brand-new Beneteau or Hanse or even a lightly used Catana is well within your reach now,” Danny said. “Or a Wauquiez Pilot. Something around fifty feet. Just think, laminated go-fast sails, big self-tailers, electric furling, a cockpit enclosure, a beautiful smooth-handling leather-wrapped wheel instead of a clunky old wooden tiller; hell, two leather-wrapped wheels, one on each side for opposing tacks. Why not? They’re common now on the big cruisers. Instrument pods, an open transom, electric dinghy mounts, a remote-controlled anchor winch.” He paused for breath.

Jared fiddled with his watch, stared out the window, sipped his coffee.

Danny was relentless. “And never mind all that sweet sailing stuff. Can you just imagine living aboard on something like that? It would be a palace