Chapter 13: The House

Ryan looked at Roxie. “Well, honey, you arranged all of this. Why don’t you tell them?”

Roxie walked over to stand between Simon and Mark, one hand resting lightly on the back of Simon’s chair. She was still in the tiny bikini. The light had gone low enough that the string bottoms looked even smaller. She smiled at both of us.

“We solved your house problem,” she said.

Sarah and I looked at each other in disbelief, wondering if this was a joke. Ryan picked it up.

“About ten years ago, the company was losing its best people because nobody could afford to live close enough to the office. So they bought a dozen houses in the subdivision a few blocks from here. They make them available to senior people at a rate that doesn’t require selling a kidney. There are only twelve of them, so they stay full unless someone leaves, gets transferred, or upgrades and buys something of their own. Roxie and I started in one of them. They’re not huge, around two thousand square feet. No pools. But they’re solid houses, newer and considerably cheaper than anything you’ll find on the open market right now, and the commute is fifteen minutes on a bad day.”