Page 9 of For the Love of the Lawyer

"This is the first real home I ever had, ya know? I mean, I lived at the Bar K in the bunkhouse, and Mr. and Mrs. Kessler were real nice to us hands, but Josh and Katie made me feel like family.” Mickey felt his eyes prickle before he turned his head to hide the tears he was sure would fall.

Tim chuckled as he pulled Mickey into his arms. "I know the feeling, my friend, but it's time to move on to bigger and better pastures. Besides, I could use somebody to play video games with me. Matt hates them."

Mickey nodded, brushing his hand over his wet eyes. "I’ve never played ’em, but I'll learn."

"Yes, my friend, you will. Your life is going to grow in ways you never imagined." Tim pulled away, and they both smiled. It was a new day for Michael Warren, and he welcomed it with open arms.

Chapter Four

“Ronni Turnberry.”

"This is Jonathon Wells. I represent Matthew Collins, and I received a message that you wanted to speak with me. I hope this is about a domestic partnership agreement I've advised my client to put into place.”

Jon always took the dominant role in conversation with opposing counsel. It was important to show Ronni Turnberry that he wasn’t about to be taken in by a gold digger and his attorney. He was there to fight for Matt’s rights and his ranch, and the sooner the woman learned he wasn’t a pushover, the more leverage he’d have in the negotiations.

Ronni was speaking softly to someone, so he waited for her to respond. "I’m sorry, Mr. Wells, for the interruption. Uh, no, this isn't about any type of domestic partnership agreement, though I wish to hell it was. My client wants to add Mr. Collins to his trusts and deeds to the properties involved in the trusts. He also wants to set up a separate trust for Ryan Collins, whom I'm assuming you'll represent as well.” Jon could hear her turning pages on the other end of the line, but he wasn’t about to be distracted.

He was, however, confused by her comments. "Miss Turnberry, I'm pretty sure your client paid Roberta Collins fifty-thousand dollars to terminate her parental rights and disappear from their lives. I can't advise my client to reciprocate with titled property or joint ownership of the livestock and machinery involved at the Circle C. I'm sure your client's a nice person, but Matt's already been fleeced by his ex-wife. He's not looking for another gold digger."

When the line went dead, he was surprised. "Hello?"

Clearly, the connection had been dropped, so he let it go. He wasn't sure what Tim Moran was trying to pull, but he'd call Matt and have a discussion. It was time to check in with his client—or give him a reality check regarding the way the real world worked.

"I don't know, Audie. This isn’t exactly my strong suit, you know.” Jon wasn’t in the mood to offer his opinion regarding his choice of engagement ring as they perused the Tiffany & Co. website. They were in Audrey’s office eating sushi from a place down the street they both loved while Audrey researched engagement rings. Jon was there for moral support.

It had been a week since their dinner and his breakup, or the shedding of unnecessary baggage, as Jon thought of it. Audrey and he had been busy with clients, but when she asked him to stay and help her out with something after the workday ended, he agreed. Had he known it was shopping for engagement rings—the last thing he thought he'd ever do—he’d have invented a crisis of his own to get the fuck out of there.

"Come on, Jonny. If you were going to ask Mr. Right to marry you, what would you choose?" It wasn’t a surprise that Audrey wasn’t taking his silence for an actual answer.

He rolled his eyes as he bit into his salmon skin roll. After he swallowed, he looked at the offerings she'd chosen and laughed. "I sure as fuck wouldn't get a guy anything with the descriptor of princess cut, but I'd guess Lyla might like it. She's a bithigh-may, right?"

His friend slapped him on the arm. "She's a dance teacher, Jonny. Of course, she's a bit of a prima donna. She's taught ballet for eight years, and she deserves something called a princess cut. Just because she doesn't worship the ground you walk on doesn't mean she's not right for me. I love her, and it's time for me to show her and all the world I want to spend the rest of my life as her wife. I'm ready for the commitment.”

Those words,literally, shook him to his core as he sat next to her. He had no idea she was so ready to walk the aisle because she hadn’t mentioned anything, leading him to believe things between them had turned serious. If Audrey told her parents shewas getting engaged to a woman, he'd need to admit to his own parents a few things he simply wasn't ready to divulge.

When Jon delivered the news that he wouldn’t be marrying Audrey Langley, the first expressions on his parents’ faces would be disappointment at his announcement, then the inevitable, “Why?” He couldn’t imagine answering that question for Ally and Ham.

Audrey had to be mistaken about being ready to get engaged to the evilest creature Jon had ever met in his life. He needed to get her thinking more in his lane. "Come on, Audrey. You're no more ready to settle down and adopt babies than me.”

The night bell rang before she could respond to Jon’s observation. Audrey picked up her phone and pressed the code to answer. "Langley & Wells, Audrey speaking."

Jon watched a slow smile form on her lips. "Please hold while I connect you." She put the call on hold and turned to him, holding out the receiver. "It's Matt Collins, and he's not happy."

Without waiting for his response, she hit the button to connect the call. Jon had no choice but to answer. "Hi, Matt. How are you? How's the family?"

"You busy this weekend? We need you to come out to the ranch for a meetin' with Tim's lawyer, who called him today and said you were an unreasonable jackass. We need the two of ya to work together to help us out with some financial arrangements we're going to make. Tim’s lawyer told him that she would call ya, and you two could start the paperwork, but she called him this evenin’ to say you ain’t feelin’ so cooperative. Timmy's upset, and when he's upset, I ain't happy myself, Jon. What'd ya say to her?"

Jon swallowed, remembering the stupid phone call from earlier. He should have known the female attorney would be a problem for many reasons he wasn't ready to articulate to his client over the phone. "Tell me when to be there. I'd like to meetMiss Turnberry in person. She has some explaining to do as well, Matt." He heard the cowboy laugh and he remembered how Matt and he had become acquainted in the first place.

Matt had called Jon after receiving a referral from Ed Marshall, a farrier Jon had assisted by drawing up a will. Matt had apprenticed under Ed when Jon was just starting out at Langley & Wells. Jon studied probate laws to assist Ed, having specialized in family law in law school.

Ed Marshall had tended to Jon’s mother's horses over the years so when he asked her for a lawyer to help him with estate planning, she gave him Jon's name. From that connection, Matt became his very first solo client when the bull rider notified him his wife had taken their son and then later when Matt ultimately filed for divorce.

Next thing Jon heard, his client was being harassed by his former mother-in-law, and there was a new man in his life who was muddying up the waters. From what Matt told him in El Paso, Tim was a younger man, and he brought nothing to the table as far as Jon could ascertain.

It seemed to be a classic setup of Matt being taken to the cleaners for everything he had by a young Lothario, and Jon wouldn't let the bull rider lose anything more than he'd already lost to Roberta Collins. He'd defended Matt's best interests and won the custody case. He'd persevere in the palimony case as well.

"Saturday at the ranch. No need for anything formal because we're casual here. You can stay at the house. We just finished the remodel.” That was troublesome news as well because Matt hadn’t bothered to notify him regarding any improvement plans at the ranch.

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