Page 33 of For the Love of the Bull Rider

“I’m sorry. Please make yourself at home.” Tim extended his hand for her to take a seat. Once she was settled, she placed a briefcase on her lap, opening it and pulling out a stack of papers.

“You’re a hard guy to track down, Mr. Moran.” The woman gave Tim a smile that was non-threatening. She didn’t seem to be combative, so he wasn’t overly concerned about the visit.

“I wasn’t aware anyone was looking for me.”

“I work for Clauson Associates in Philadelphia. Your paternal grandmother, Joanne Moran, was a client of ours. We’ve been managing your trust since her death. You turned twenty-three on May 3, correct?” The woman already knew the answer.

If it had anything to do with his grandmother, Tim was pretty sure it was bad news. “I did. What’s this about? She didn’t like my father, and she liked me even less. I can’t imagine she’d leave me anything more than a chunk of coal.” Just then, his phone chimed with a text from Matt.

The young woman, who he was guessing was about thirty-years-old, smiled at him and studied the papers in front of her for a moment. She looked up, staring into Tim’s hazel eyes.

“Your grandmother wasn’t the easiest client we’ve had, to be sure. Richard Clauson was her lead attorney and managed all her business ventures until she died. Along the way, they became personal friends, but he moaned about dealing with her every time she came into the office.”

Tim chuckled. No doubt the man complained. The woman was a pain in the ass.

The woman continued. “Richard knew what happened with your father, and he worked very hard to keep Joanne’s name out of the press during the inquest because your grandmother was a woman of means. She was extremely disappointed by the choices your father made, including his marriage to your mother, but you are her blood relative and she respected familial ties more than family relationships. These papers are a list of her assets; the investments made on behalf of the trust over the years; and an accounting of the expenses associated withthe administration of the estate, including the fees our firm has collected acting as trustee.”

Tim wasn’t sure why the woman was sitting in front of him with a notebook while saying the wordsblood relative.“I’m sorry. I’m completely confused. Did you say a trust?”

“Yes, Mr. Moran. She insisted a trust be established to manage the inheritance until your thirtieth birthday. When you enrolled at Penn State after your mother’s death, she revised the trust documents so the proceeds could be turned over to you on your twenty-third birthday. We lost track of you after graduation, unfortunately.” Tim was more confused with every word.

The first thing that popped into his head came out of his mouth. “Look, I don’t have a lot of money. I work here for my uncle and aunt, part-time. I work at another ranch in the area part-time as well. If there are fees associated with this mess, just keep whatever there is left by the old woman. I don’t have the time nor the inclination…”

The young woman turned the folder to face him and pointed to a line at the bottom of the page, stopping Tim’s ramblings dead in their tracks. He flipped through the pages, trying to understand what the hell he was seeing.

There were a lot of properties listed around Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, including the house where he and his mother, Sherry, had lived when they resided in New Jersey before his father hunted them down. “What are these? Houses?” His confusion was evident in his voice.

The young attorney cleared her throat. “Your grandparents were pioneers in the house-flipping business in Pennsylvania. They bought up deteriorating properties around Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, including ten multifamily dwellings, and they remodeled them, earning more in rental fees than the houses had been worth prior to the purchase.

“The only good thing your grandmother did after your grandfather died was to freeze the rents in those apartment buildings. She made certain that as the tenants aged, they were still able to afford their residences so as not to have them displaced.”

“Imagine that. I didn’t think she did anything nice for anyone.” Tim had a hard time believing what he was hearing.

“She held all the properties and banked the rents since they were free and clear of mortgages. When your parents split up, she bought the house your mother rented and lowered the rent to a sustainable level in order for the two of you to have a roof over your heads.”

Tim remembered his mother questioning the management company about the notice that the rent had been cut in half. She’d even dragged him to a church in the neighborhood one night so they could thank God for the blessing. He wondered what Sherry would have said if she’d known it was thanks to Joanne.

“As far as we’ve been able to ascertain, your mother never knew your grandmother owned the property. After the murder and your relocation, Joanne had the house boarded up, but she held the property. She wanted you to do with the house as you saw fit, but she recommended tearing it down and building some sort of a community garden or a park in dedication to your mother.” The idea brought tears to Tim’s eyes.

None of it made sense to Tim because none of it sounded like the grandmother he vaguely remembered. Somewhere in the paperwork, there had to be a clerical error. The lawyer was obviously looking for someone else, though the facts she’d recited, chapter and verse, fit the history he remembered of his family.

“Look, Ms. Turnberry, I’m not sure if someone put you up to this to pull a prank on me, or if you’ve confused me withsomeone else, but Joanne Moran disowned me when she found out I’m gay. I’m sure if you dig a little deeper into the records, there’s paperwork filed somewhere stating she revoked this trust and changed her will, or whatever you call it. It’s probably on file with another attorney somewhere because she wanted nothing to do with me, which is why I didn’t go to the funeral.” Tim tried very hard not to become upset. Joanne Moran wasn’t worth it.

The attorney smiled again. “Look, Mr. Moran, I dealt with Joanne one time as a second-year associate. She was horribly nasty, but she was clear in her wishes. You are the sole heir to her estate. The only expenses charged against it were her funeral, our fees, and the continued maintenance and insurance of the properties in her portfolio.

“Her personal home in Philadelphia was left to the Episcopal church where she was a member. They’re using it as a space for an after-school and youth program for neighborhood children. She established a trust to fund the program from the sale of her personal effects. The church named it “Moran House” in honor of Joanne.

“Anyway, the bottom line is you own approximately twelve, single-family, and ten, multi-family properties in Philly, Pittsburgh, and Trenton. The trust is currently valued at $5.5 million dollars. The annual tax burden is…” She leaned over the desk and pointed to lines on the documents. Unfortunately, Tim didn’t hear a word of her analysis. It was all too much to take in.

Later that afternoon, Tim was in the office of Matt Collin’s home at the Circle C, working on updating the ranch’s website with new information regarding recent sales of stock. The links on the various websites he’d constructed to correspond with the ranch site would update at midnight, so he was rushing to finish the project.

In all honesty, Tim was trying to block out the crap from earlier in the day which was weighing heavily on his mind. Thatwas when he’d decided to change the scenery and had driven out to the ranch.

He’d called Jeri and told her he’d pick up Ryan at school, but she insisted the boy would be happier riding the bus. Matt was in Richmond meeting with his lawyer about the Mona situation, so Tim was at the ranch, alone, waiting for Ryan.

The shit Ronni Turnberry had told him kept spinning around his brain, making it difficult to really do anything of substance. Updating the website was the task he’d chosen because it was simple, and it would take his mind off the fact he’d suddenly become a multimillionaire.

Hell’s bells, Tim didn’t even know how to budget the small amount of money he had left from his mom’s life insurance policy that had paid for the expenses his scholarship didn’t cover. He surely had no handle on what to do with millions.

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