Dean Koontz - Winter Moon

She went to the wall phone, dialed part of the number, then hung up.

This was once-in-a-lifetime news. She would never have another opportunity to spring something this deliriously wonderful on him, and she must not screw it up. For one thing, she wanted to see his face when he heard about the inheritance. She took the notepad and pencil from the holder beside the phone and returned to the table, where she read the letter again. She wrote out a list of questions for Paul Youngblood, then returned to the phone and called him in Eagle's Roost, Montana. When Heather identified herself to the attorney's secretary and then to the man himself, her voice was tremil she was half afraid he would tell her there had been a mistake. Maybe someone had contested the will. Or maybe a more recent will had been found, which negated the one naming Jack as the sole heir. A thousand maybes.

Rush-hour traffic was even worse than usual. Dinner was delayed because Jack got home more than half an hour late, tired and frazzled but putting on a good act as a man in love with his new job and happy with his life. The instant Toby was finished eating, he asked to be excused to watch a favorite television program, and Heather let him go… She wanted to share the news with Jack first, just the two of them, and tell Toby later. As usual, Jack helped her clean the table and load the dishwasher. When they were finished, he said, "Think I'll go for a walk, exercise these legs."

"You having any pain?"

"Just a little crdmping."

Though he had stopped using a cane, she worried that he wouldn't tell her if he was having strength or balance problems. "You sure you're okay?"

"Positive." He kissed her cheek. "You and Moshe Bloom could never be married. You'd always be fighting over whose job it was to do the mothering."

"Sit down a minute," she said, leading him to the table and encouraging him into a chair. "There's something we have to talk about."

"If Toby needs more dental work, I'll do it myself."

"No dental work."

"You see the size of that last bill?"

"Yes, I saw it."

"Who needs teeth, anyway? Clams don't have teeth, and they get along just fine. Oysters don't have teeth. Worms don't have teeth. Lots of things don't have teeth, and they're perfectly happy."

"Forget about teeth," she said, fetching Youngblood's letter and the photographs from the top of the refrigerator.

He took the envelope when she offered it. "What're you grinning about?

What's this?"

"Read it." Heather sat across from him, her elbows on the table, her face cupped in her hands, watching him intently, trying to guess where he was in the letter by the expressions that crossed his face. The sight of him absorbing the news gladdened her as nothing had in a long time.

"This is…I… but why on earth…" He looked up from the letter and gaped at her. "Is this true?" She giggled. She hadn't giggled in ages. "Yes.

Yes! It's true, every incredible word of it. I called Paul Youngblood. He sounds like a very nice man. He was Eduardo's neighbor as well as his attorney. His nearest neighbor but still two miles away. He confirms everything in the letter, all of it. Ask me how much a substantial amount of cash' might be." Jack blinked at her stupidly, as if the news had been a blunt instrument with which he'd.been stunned. "How much?"

"He can't be sure yet, not until he has the final tax figure, but after everything's said and done… it's going to be between three hundred fifty thousand and four hundred thousand dollars."

Jack paled. "That can't be right."

"That's what he told me."

"Plus the ranch?"

"Plus the ranch."

"Tommy talked about the place in Montana, said his dad loved it but he hated it.

Dull, Tommy said, nothing ever happening, the ass-end of nowhere. He loved his dad, told funny stories about him, but he never said he was rich." Again he picked up the letter, which rattled in his hand.

"Why would Tommy's dad leave everything to me, for God's sake?"

"That was one of the questions I asked Paul Youngblood. He says Tommy used to write to his dad about you, what a great guy you were. Talked about you like a brother. So with Tommy gone, his dad wanted you to have everything."

"What do the other relatives have to say about that?"

"There aren't any relatives." Jack shook his head. "But I never even met"-he consulted the letter- "Eduardo. This is crazy. I mean, Jesus, it's wonderful, but it's crazy.

He gives everything to someone he hasn't even met?" Unable to remain seated, bursting with excitement, Heather got up and went to the refrigerator.

"Paul Youngblood says the idea appealed to Eduardo because he inherited it eight years ago from his former boss, which was a total surprise to him too."

"I'll be damned," he said wonderingly. She removed a bottle of champagne that she had hidden in the vegetable drawer, where Jack wouldn't see it before he heard the news and knew what they were celebrating. "According to Youngblood, Eduardo thought that surprising you with it… well, he seemed to see it as the only way he'd ever be able to repay his boss's kindness." When she returned to the table, Jack frowned at the bottle of champagne.

"I'm like a balloon, I'm floating, bouncing off the ceiling, but… at the same time…"

"Tommy," she said. He nodded… Peeling the foil off the champagne bottle, she said, "We can't bring him back."

"No, but…"

"He'd want us to be happy about this."

"Yeah, I know. Tommy was a great guy."

"So let's be happy." He said nothing. Untwisting the wire cage that restrained the cork, she said, "We'd be idiots if we weren't." know"

"It's a miracle, and just when we need one." He stared at the champagne. She said, "It's not just our future. It's Toby's too."

"He can keep his teeth now." Laughing, Heather said, "It's a wonderful thing, Jack." At last his smile was broad and without reservation.

"You're damn right it's a wonderful thing-now we won't have to listen to him gumming his food."

Removing the wire from the cork, she said, "Even if we don't deserve so much good fortune, Toby does."

"We all deserve it." He got up, went to a nearby cabinet, and removed a clean dish towel from a drawer. "Here, let me." He took the bottle from Heather, draped the cloth over it. "Might explode." He twisted the cork, it popped, but the champagne did not foam out of the neck of the bottle. She brought a couple of glasses, and he filled them. "To Eduardo Fernandez," she said by way of a toast. "To Tommy." They drank, standing beside the table, and then he kissed her lightly. His quick tongue was sweet with champagne.

"My God, Heather, do you know what this meanst' They sat down again as she said, "When we go out to dinner the next time, it can be someplace that serves the food on real plates instead of in paper containers."

His eyes were shining, and she was thrilled to see him so happy. "We can pay the mortgage, all the bills, put money away for Toby to go to college one day, maybe even take a vacation-and that's just from the cash. If we sell the farm-"

"Look at the photographs," she urged, grabbing them, spreading them on the table in front of him. "Very nice," he said. "Better than very nice. It's gorgeous, Jack. Look at those mountains! And look at this one-look, from this angle, standing in front of the house, you can see forever!"

He looked up from the snapshots and met her eyes. "What am I hearing?"

"We don't have to sell it."

"Live there?"

"Why not?"

"We're city people.". n:. ^: "And we hate it."."Angelenos all our lives."

"Isn't what it once was." She could see that the idea intrigued him, and her own excitement grew as he began to come around to her point of view. "We've wanted change for a long time," he said.

"But I was never thinking this much change."