Chapter 7 - THE PERSON MARLENE WANTED BESIDE THE COURT
Rachel found the name in an old draft.
The blank proposed-conservator section had not always been blank.
An earlier version listed:
David Jennings.
Sarah frowned.
“Uncle David?”
Marlene’s younger brother.
Sixty.
Retired accountant.
Lived in Lexington, Kentucky.
Sarah had seen him twice in five years.
“Why him?”
Ethan asked.
Rachel shrugged.
“We ask.”
David answered Sarah’s call.
He sounded genuinely confused.
“Conservator?”
“Mom put your name in a draft.”
Silence.
“Sarah, I never agreed to that.”
She believed him.
“Did she talk to you about me?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
David hesitated.
“That you were having trouble after Noah died.”
“Financial trouble?”
“She said you were making erratic decisions.”
“Like selling his building?”
David sighed.
“That came up.”
Sarah stared at the wall.
“What did you tell her?”
“That Noah left it to you.”
Sarah closed her eyes.
David continued.
“She didn’t like that.”
“Did Mom ask you to manage anything?”
“She asked whether I’d help if a court ever said you needed temporary financial oversight.”
“And?”
“I said I would talk to you first.”
Marlene removed his name from the next draft.
Ethan almost laughed when he heard.
“Because he wouldn’t cooperate.”
Rachel nodded.
“Likely.”
They kept digging.
The next draft proposed a professional fiduciary.
Not Marlene.
That complicated Sarah’s theory.
“If Mom wanted my money, why not appoint herself?”
Rachel answered:
“Maybe she knew that would look bad.”
Ethan looked at the property section.
“Or maybe control itself wasn’t the end goal.”
Sarah turned.
“What else?”
Ethan thought about Noah’s building.
Marlene did not need to own Sarah’s accounts.
She only needed someone to stop Sarah from selling.
A conservatorship petition, even unsuccessful, could delay transactions.
Create doubt.
Make buyers nervous.
Give Marlene influence.
“She wanted the building frozen.”
Sarah nodded slowly.
“Why that building?”
They already knew the emotional answer.
Noah.
Family legacy.
But emotional answers were not enough anymore.
Rachel pulled county records.
The building occupied a corner lot near a redevelopment corridor.
A neighboring parcel had been purchased six months earlier.
The buyer:
Jennings Family Holdings LLC.
Sarah stared.
“What is that?”
Ethan searched state records.
Organizer:
David Jennings.
Member:
Marlene Jennings.
Sarah called David again.
This time he sounded uncomfortable.
“That’s Mom’s?”
“Mostly.”
“Why did you create it?”
“She wanted to buy the lot next to Noah’s building.”
“Why?”
“She said someday the properties could be combined.”
Sarah felt cold.
“Combined for what?”
David paused.
“A medical office development.”
Ethan looked at Sarah.
Marlene had not merely wanted Noah’s building preserved.
May you like
She had a plan for it.
A plan Sarah had never heard.
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