"Dean Ing - Flying To Pieces" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ing Dean)

And this time, with most of his fellow Farts pushing seventy or more,
maybe it would end without major trouble for somebody. Yeah; right.

Lovett inverted his schedule at the last minute after calling Roxanne,
and flew first to Santa Cruz. It seemed that Chip had a piano recital on
Wednesday night and Roxy hinted that, first, the kid would appreciate
his granddad's putting in an appearance, and second, a little culture
wouldn't hurt her father any. Lovett sighed and complied. Sure, it might
cost him a sale in Wichita, but you couldn't expect Roxy to think along
those lines. Unlike her father, Roxanne needed more money like Manuel
Noriega needed more zits.

Moving to Santa Cruz with Tess after the divorce, Roxanne Lovett had
grown tall and comely like her mo on Tess's schedule
Roxy had married Tom Mason, a regular guy, the only son in a "good,"
meaning flush with real estate, Santa Cruz family. Tom had lived long
enough to influence his son Childress-Chip-and, thank God, Tom had hit
it off right away with Wade Lovett in spite of Mason family reservations
about a clapped-out old test pilot who traded noisy little airplanes for
a living.

Tom Mason had reared Chip to the age of ten, cheered him at Little
League and steered him toward respect for Lovett, before a zonked
trucker hunted Tom off the Coast Highway one night. Along that cliff
side stretch, a man who leaves the macadam doesn't need an airbag; he
needs an ejection seat with chute attached.

After that, Roxanne Lovett-Mason raised Chip. With Mason money and a
full-time maid in her yuppie Santa Cruz chalet, Roxy had plenty of
time to redirect her son in genteel ways. She remained her mother's kid
but she still loved Wade, wrote him faithfully three times a year, and
had no objection to letting Chip spend a few weeks in Wichita every
summer as a birthday present.

"He thinks you're from the Planet Gosh," she once told Lovett, then gave
her other reason with'an ominous murmur;

and there is very little surfing in Kansas." The surfing off Santa Cruz
was, she felt, an altogether too-seductive competitor to Chip's piano
lessons.

So when Wade Lovett greased his Varieze onto the runway at Watsonville
Municipal, ten miles from Roxy's Santa Cruz place, Chip was waiting with
his mom's mud-brown Mercedes.

Chip offered a hand. as Lovett clambered down, and they traded
boisterous hugs. "Jeez, when are you gonna quit growing." Lovett grinned
up at his grandson who now towered several inches over Lovett's
five-eight.