Ch.11, Pt. 3: “You want us to live together?”
“You want us to live together?”
“We’ll have the best view of some of the other properties. I’ll be able to sit up there and count my investments.”
“What other properties?”
“It just has to be rezoned to estate residential. Big houses. Good sized yards. No rinky dink little bungalows like my house. We’re talking curving stairs, cathedral ceilings, bay windows and sunrooms. The whole shebang. Top of the line, top dollar homes for people with money. Bring some class out here! And ours will be the biggest home of all.”
“Rezoned,” Katherine repeated.
“We just need to get permission from the town to put in the infrastructure and access roads. That way there’ll be a paved and maintained road right to our driveway! It’s called The Highlands. Like that name?”
”For the house?”
Rick brushed her cheek. “No, the whole development. ‘Move up to The Highlands.’ That’s our slogan. Think it’ll sell?”
“Let me just see if I understand this.” Katherine sank onto a kitchen chair. “You’ve bought up all the land around here for houses. You want to develop this whole countryside. Turn it into suburbs called The Highlands. Are you kidding?”
“Not suburbs. The finest residential park in the area.”
“How many houses are you talking about?”
“The houses will be on one-and-a-half to two-acre lots.”
“So what’s that?” When Rick didn’t answer, she tried to figure it out herself. “540 acres, you said? Does that come to 250, 270 houses? At least? You’re kidding, right?”
Rick was looking out the kitchen window. “We haven’t figured out yet exactly how many houses we can build. Roads take up a lot of land. And we might have to have some parkettes.”
Katherine felt stunned. “There are only something like 10 or 15 houses on the whole line! You want to add more than 270?” She shook her head. “This won’t be country any more.” She had to make Rick understand. “I moved here because it’s country. But you want to develop all around my property! Why didn’t you discuss this with me?”
Rick spun around. “I’m discussing it with you now! I thought you’d be thrilled that we’d build a house together. Was I wrong? You don’t want to live with me?”
Katherine held up a finger. He was mixing things up. “That’s a separate issue. I might want to live with you, but not necessarily move, and to a subdivision! And we’re going about this backwards. First you tell me about this house you want to build. You should ask me to live with you first, and then we’d discuss how and where. This is a major decision.”
He paced the floor. “That’s what I’m telling you! It makes all my other deals look small.”
“I mean moving in together is major. Building a house together is major.”
“Not really. It’ll be one of many built at the same time. It’s no big deal.”
Katherine turned away and took a sip of vodka to steady herself. “I mean emotionally it’s a big deal. It’s a big commitment. To each other.”
“Well, yeah, it is that.” He looked at her a moment. “Oh, you want me to say some more about that. Okay. I guess I’ve kind of thrown a lot at you.”
Katherine nodded, smiling. “Yeah, you could say that.”
Rick grinned as he slowly knelt down on one knee. Katherine stared at him, faintly thrilled, faintly horrified. He looked like he was about to propose. “All right. I understand women’s priorities. Emotions first, right? Let’s see. I love you, I want you to come in on the deal, we can make some good money, and we’ll live together. How’s that?”
“You love me,” Katherine repeated.
“Sure, I love you, I like you, I respect you, I want you…what more do you need?” He stood up and reached for his glass.
“Nothing, I guess. That’s a lot. That’s plenty. But just so I understand, we’d live together. Not get married. This isn’t about getting married.”
“Live together, get married…There’s not much difference, is there? And right now I think we’ve got enough on our plate. There’s enough major stuff happening. We don’t have to worry about getting married right now as well.”
“No of course not.” Katherine felt childish even mentioning it. “Wow. This is a lot to take in all at once. I feel kind of overwhelmed.”
“To celebrate, I want to take you out to dinner. Let’s go to the Mill Wheel Inn and really splurge. I can tell you some more about the project over dinner. How’s that sound?”
Katherine didn’t move. Something was bothering her. “You said you’ve been working on this for a long time?”
“Seems like forever.” Rick gestured toward the stairs. “Don’t you want to get changed?”
Katherine looked down at the kitchen table. “Since before you met me?”
“Yeah. Come on, let’s not be late.”
She looked up into Rick’s face. “Why didn’t you buy this property when it was up for sale?”
“We tried. Things got a little complicated then. For some reason, Hilts didn’t want to sell to us. We couldn’t even get him to sell to our front. We thought we might have to wait until he got Parkinson’s disease or something, or died and left it to his children!” Rick glanced at Katherine’s face and looked ashamed. “OK, that’s not particularly nice, but we were really pissed off at him. He was also asking a pile of money. What he wanted for this little piece of land was what we were paying for 100-acre farms. I think he was on to us, the bastard. Wanted to subdivide his property himself. But we showed him! Especially if you come in on it.” Rick threw back his head and chuckled.