Read Online April at the Antique Alley by Bill McGrath - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Bill McGrath
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for it, so Samuels let me know that I should pick out a plot and a nice casket. Oh hurray just the kind of thing I enjoy doing.
If we could identify a next of kin in thirty days the business, the house, the stocks, the CDs, everything would go to that person. If we could not identify a next of kin in thirty days the business, the house, and the contents of each would be auctioned off and the funds they raised would be placed in trust along with her stocks and other assets for one year. If, at the end of that year a next of kin still had not been identified, then Dallas county would become the rightful owner. If an inheritor did come along they would have to pay a pretty stiff inheritance tax but then receive something like two million bucks.
Of course, all of this could change if a will were found. With that in mind Eric Samuels told me to investigate and inventory the house but to make sure I looked for anything that looked like a will and also be careful about address books and such as she might have the will filed with an attorney and he might not yet know she is dead. If I could find any contacts with lawyers we could at least ask them to see if she had ever filed a will with them.
So officially my vacation was over and I was back at work. I would get my standard fee plus expenses which would certainly help my financial status. The very first thing I did was document the time I had already put on the case hoping I could somehow slip that time onto my bill when the case concluded.
I asked Detective Samuels if they had done the background checks yet on all the store owners. He admitted they had not yet finished that task and told me he would let me know what he could when he could. With that I hung up from the long phone conversation.
I thought a bit about my standard contract that included my standard rate per day and so forth. I now had to admit that I had a partner. Jill was now living mostly in my house and helping with my cases. I would have to come to some agreement with her about how and how much I would pay her. I knew that if I raised my rate or charged an hour at that rate to a client that Jill had actually worked I would have to get her licensed. We had not yet done that.
For several years now my business had not been complicated. I would get paid for doing a job and out of that pay I would pay my bills and the rest would go in my savings account. Once it was there I sort of figured it was mine to do with as I wished. Currently I had plenty in the savings account but I had to admit that soon, if not already, Jill was entitled to some of that money. I would have to consider opening a completely new bank account so that I could separate out my own money from the money that belonged to my business and would get divided at some ratio so that Jill got her fair share. I would probably then have to hire some accountant to look over my accounting practices and make sure I wasn’t breaking any laws.
What had once been so simple would grow in complexity and I was just going to have to be a big enough girl to go with the flow. It was time.
CHAPTER-08.
There were three specific things I wanted to accomplish today, Wednesday.
First, I wanted to get by the antique alley when business started for the day and photograph the tires of the cars that likely belonged to the owners of the stores. It would be too easy to have one of these cars show off the strange diamond shaped tread, but unless I looked I would never know. That meant that I would have to go to the alley and make an excuse for talking to each store owner and hopefully being able to get a few quick pictures of his/her tires without them knowing what I was doing. I figured right when the business was opening was a pretty good way to insure that the owner’s vehicle and only the owner’s vehicle was in each parking lot. I also figured that announcing the date of the funeral would be a good excuse for showing up at their places of business. It is
If we could identify a next of kin in thirty days the business, the house, the stocks, the CDs, everything would go to that person. If we could not identify a next of kin in thirty days the business, the house, and the contents of each would be auctioned off and the funds they raised would be placed in trust along with her stocks and other assets for one year. If, at the end of that year a next of kin still had not been identified, then Dallas county would become the rightful owner. If an inheritor did come along they would have to pay a pretty stiff inheritance tax but then receive something like two million bucks.
Of course, all of this could change if a will were found. With that in mind Eric Samuels told me to investigate and inventory the house but to make sure I looked for anything that looked like a will and also be careful about address books and such as she might have the will filed with an attorney and he might not yet know she is dead. If I could find any contacts with lawyers we could at least ask them to see if she had ever filed a will with them.
So officially my vacation was over and I was back at work. I would get my standard fee plus expenses which would certainly help my financial status. The very first thing I did was document the time I had already put on the case hoping I could somehow slip that time onto my bill when the case concluded.
I asked Detective Samuels if they had done the background checks yet on all the store owners. He admitted they had not yet finished that task and told me he would let me know what he could when he could. With that I hung up from the long phone conversation.
I thought a bit about my standard contract that included my standard rate per day and so forth. I now had to admit that I had a partner. Jill was now living mostly in my house and helping with my cases. I would have to come to some agreement with her about how and how much I would pay her. I knew that if I raised my rate or charged an hour at that rate to a client that Jill had actually worked I would have to get her licensed. We had not yet done that.
For several years now my business had not been complicated. I would get paid for doing a job and out of that pay I would pay my bills and the rest would go in my savings account. Once it was there I sort of figured it was mine to do with as I wished. Currently I had plenty in the savings account but I had to admit that soon, if not already, Jill was entitled to some of that money. I would have to consider opening a completely new bank account so that I could separate out my own money from the money that belonged to my business and would get divided at some ratio so that Jill got her fair share. I would probably then have to hire some accountant to look over my accounting practices and make sure I wasn’t breaking any laws.
What had once been so simple would grow in complexity and I was just going to have to be a big enough girl to go with the flow. It was time.
CHAPTER-08.
There were three specific things I wanted to accomplish today, Wednesday.
First, I wanted to get by the antique alley when business started for the day and photograph the tires of the cars that likely belonged to the owners of the stores. It would be too easy to have one of these cars show off the strange diamond shaped tread, but unless I looked I would never know. That meant that I would have to go to the alley and make an excuse for talking to each store owner and hopefully being able to get a few quick pictures of his/her tires without them knowing what I was doing. I figured right when the business was opening was a pretty good way to insure that the owner’s vehicle and only the owner’s vehicle was in each parking lot. I also figured that announcing the date of the funeral would be a good excuse for showing up at their places of business. It is
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