Love, Like Father Like Son novel · Chapter 13 of 24

Chapter 13: The Price

Russell went back into the house, and the doorway was empty again.

I got up from my father's knee and did not look back at the house.

I went out through the garden doors and down the lawn, because I knew where Chet would be.

He was on the stone bench at the end of the garden, with his elbows on his knees.

The Sound lay black below him, and the lights of the port were strung along the far shore.

"He told you to say that," I said.

"He told me nothing." Chet didn't look up. "He likes saying it, that's all."

I sat at the other end of the bench.

"Then tell me what I cost you."

"It isn't you. It's what I'd have to say to explain it."

"Say it."

He was quiet so long that I thought he wouldn't.

"My mother has a house in Spokane," he said. "It's small, and she cleans offices at night to pay the loan on it."

"What loan?"

"The one my father left her with when I was nine. The bank sold it two years later, and the company that bought it is the one on your mother's paper."

I saw the post office box in my mind.

"The managing partner," I said.

"Same box, same name. He has owned her debt for twenty years, and every spring he sends me the statement." His voice was dry and even. "If I cross him, a letter goes to her bank. Then she has thirty days."

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