Page 26 of A Mile of Ocean (Pelican Pointe #19)
T he meeting with Kinsey Wyatt was enlightening in many ways that Trent and Tate hadn’t expected. They sat transfixed as new details emerged from the lawyer.
“I had noticed tension between your grandparents, especially over the last two years. For one, your grandmother vehemently opposed establishing the Painted Heart Foundation.”
“That’s what set this off, isn’t it?” Tate declared. “She didn’t want Granddad funding any of it.”
“Initially. But then she began to get upset over other things. It became a contest of sorts between them. Barrett couldn’t do anything right. And apparently neither could I.”
“Similar to how she reacted to his choice of burial site,” Trent said. “Should Tate and I have stayed out of that?”
“Once again, I believe his choice reflected how tense the situation had become. At the time, I asked him why he chose Turtle Ridge instead of the family cemetery where Travis and Linley were buried. I’m not completely clueless; I knew the family burial plot existed. However, his response was quite revealing. He said, and I quote: ‘Because it would piss off Duchess.’ And he was correct. I anticipated her objection and figured it was inevitable. Additionally, I found it strange that she didn’t attend the reading of the will when she was just upstairs refusing to leave her bedroom.”
Trent nodded. “Yeah. Same here.”
“But I didn’t feel like dealing with the will either,” Tate noted. “I thought it was too soon. It never occurred to me that she was in her room the entire time, talking to Cooper Richmond about creating a family tree. I still don’t understand why she did that if her family had such a dark past.”
“I think I know why,” Kinsey offered. “To explain it, I need to go back about a year earlier when your grandparents were in here about another matter. Duchess didn’t seem to know much about Barrett’s background, which bothered her.”
“How can that be when they were married for almost sixty years?” Trent asked, astonished at the revelation.
“Good question. All I know is what happened at that meeting. Duchess kept drilling him for details about where he grew up, where he kept his birth certificate, and what his family was like. She grew impatient when he couldn’t tell her much about his family. Thanks to Cooper, we know that Barrett wasn’t lying. He didn’t know many details to share about his parents because he was raised in an orphanage. So, my theory is that she hired Cooper to dig up some dirt on the Callums in case she needed it later.”
Trent leaned back in his chair. “Ah, in case we brought a lawsuit against her once we discovered she’d taken all the money.”
Kinsey removed a set of papers from a file folder. “As you’ll see, I kept a copy of everything related to my dealings with your grandparents. Her goal, I believe, was to get rid of Barrett first, then make sure the Rio Verde Ranch failed financially. She wanted to move back to Green River and devote all her attention to her prized baby, the Triple C.”
“So why didn’t she simply move back? Why did she have to kill Granddad to do that?”
“No idea. But I do have a theory. She didn’t want to share her financial empire with anyone —certainly not Barrett or you. And she definitely didn’t want anyone to learn how she had finagled the Triple C out of Noble Colter’s hands—which is still a bit of a mystery.”
“We’ve decided to give the Triple C back to the Bohannon family,” Trent announced.
Kinsey looked surprised. “It’s a multi-million-dollar operation. Are you sure you want to do that? We could probably —”
“No. We want it gone,” Tate said. “We’re washing our hands of the whole nasty mess. Send a letter informing the family’s attorney of our decision. However, Trent and I would like to know what happens to her will and anything pertaining to Rio Verde now that she’s dead. You were her lawyer, right?”
“Originally, I was. But about six months ago, she informed me that she’d retained counsel in Green River, that she’d made a new will, and that I could forget about the one I’d drawn up. I told her I needed that in writing. Several days later, she dropped off a letter. That’s when I believe she began planning her move back to Wyoming.”
“Six months ago,” Trent said, shaking his head. “Who was her new beneficiary?”
“Chester de Haviland, the man Brent has in custody.”
Trent rubbed his chin. “Interesting. Is the cousin still talking to law enforcement?”
“Absolutely. The guy is cooperating because he wants to cut a deal. He insists he didn’t murder anyone. However, even if he’s convicted of the lesser accessory to murder by helping to conceal the murder weapon, I guarantee he won’t see a dime of her millions. It might even revert to the original will, depending on how a Wyoming judge rules. I have the original will dated two years earlier, naming you two as her beneficiaries. I have no idea what changed with Duchess during those two years.”
“But something did,” Tate surmised. “It must’ve been major for her to commit murder.”
“Remember that Chester de Haviland is still on the hook for making the pipe bombs,” Kinsey informed them. “The ATF will probably get involved. Then there’s the whole situation in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Brent is communicating with the local authorities about what Chester knows regarding Colter Bohannon’s apparent suicide. This will likely become complicated.”
“Murder always complicates things,” Tate muttered.
“If Duchess had lived to face prosecution and had been found guilty, she couldn’t have profited from Barrett’s estate. Barrett’s will would have reverted to both of you. I admit his estate right now is messy, waiting for the probate judge to sift through all the documentation. But the law is clear that her estate cannot benefit from murdering your grandfather in any way.”
“But she was never convicted,” Trent said.
“No, she wasn’t. However, those two videos you gave to Brent will sway any judge regarding her guilt in the matter. That being said, retrieving the funds she transferred from the business accounts back to the ranch will still take some time. I won’t lie; it could take months for this to reach a court date.”
“What if we had the information to retrieve the money ourselves from the overseas accounts?” Trent proposed.
“I’m sorry,” Kinsey began, “but I didn’t hear the question.”
Trent repeated it.
“No, I mean you never brought that up to me during this meeting,” Kinsey stated emphatically. “I cannot advise you on that particular matter. But if somehow you gained access to the money, so much the better. You’d have operating capital. If that doesn’t happen, you could go to Nick at the bank for a bridge loan for operating expenses. I would be more than happy to write up a legal opinion for Nick to put in the file justifying the loan.”
Trent and Tate exchanged knowing smiles.
“So we’ll be okay, one way or another? Is there anything else we should expect in the coming months?” Tate asked.
“Keep your calendar free. Avoid taking any long vacations. Because this could either move like a glacier or like a flash flood, depending on which judge we get.”
After the meeting with Kinsey, they decided to head to the police station and talk to Brent. They found him in his office going through a stack of paperwork.
“What can I do for you?” Brent asked.
“We hear that Chester is cooperating,” Tate started. “We wanted to know if he said anything that might help us in court with the judge to get some of our money back belonging to the ranch.”
Brent let out a sigh. “Chester has said a lot of things about a lot of topics. I think you have a solid case to get your money back. If the ranch can hold out until we get his sworn statements to a judge, I think you and the ranch will be fine.”
“Is he putting everything in a sworn statement?”
“Let’s put it this way, he’s keeping all of us busy. And his boot impressions match what we found at the ranch. He admits to making the pipe bombs using what he found online.”
“Okay, then, I guess we should share that with Kinsey,” Trent extolled.
“She’ll want to get it before the judge as soon as we get her a notarized copy of his statement. But we aren’t rushing him as long as he continues to talk. He continues to offer valuable insight into your grandmother’s past, specifically two murders that occurred when she was much younger back in Green River that are of interest to the local authorities.”
“I suppose that makes sense,” Tate agreed. “I’ve always heard the old saying that justice moves slowly.”
“I hope you’re that understanding when it comes to the murder of your parents. I’m not sure how to approach this with you. Eastlyn and I talked it over. She was all about leveling with you. Keep in mind that there’s nothing concrete to back this up. Yet.”
Trent exchanged looks with Tate. “What is it?”
“Colt and Theo have been delving into the police report about the accident your parents had twenty-two years ago. All they have to go on is what’s written in the case file.”
“And?”
“You understand that your mother was driving. A rifle shot hit their right front tire on the truck, causing Linley Callum to lose control and veer off the bridge into the lagoon. From the start, the investigators knew it wasn’t your run-of-the-mill accident.”
Brent leaned forward to continue. “Two weeks after the incident, the sheriff’s investigator wrote up a theory because he’d had an accident investigation team recreate what happened. From his report, the bullet entered the outside sidewall and exited through to the inside, taking a large chunk of the tire with it. The tire disintegrated, causing the tire to deflate in seventeen seconds or less, which in turn caused the driver to lose control. When your mother went over the side of the bridge, the truck flipped, ending up upside down in the water. The investigator was able to save a piece of sidewall where the bullet had entered. Your mother literally had no time to react, as the rim would’ve hit the ground in less than one and a half seconds. It all happened in an instant.”
“They have more information than I was led to believe,” Trent said.
Brent nodded. “Colt and Theo concur with that investigation team that the bullet came from a .30-30 rifle.”
Realization dawned on Trent. “Are you saying that Duchess could’ve been the person who fired that shot, killing our parents?”
“It’s possible, especially if she knew which direction they’d be traveling. All she had to do was pick a spot at the bridge and wait in the rain to spot Travis’s pickup. Maybe she thought no one would question a truck that veered off the bridge in slippery weather. I don’t know.”
“Why on earth would she do that?” Tate implored.
“Wait a minute,” Trent muttered. “Maybe our dad discovered her secret about the Triple C back then and threatened to tell Granddad.”
“That conniving witch!” Tate exclaimed. “No wonder she didn’t want Granddad bringing it up.”
“Well, we confiscated her Winchester. Ballistics might help solve the mystery. It’s a long shot but not out of the realm of possibility.”