She Hired My Company to Haul Her Late Father’s $900,000 Car to Arizona in Five Days. Then She Climbed Into My Cab

I climbed into the passenger seat. It was cold in the trailer. The leather smelled like old oil and her father’s pipe tobacco.

For a long time I didn’t say anything.

“Tell me about it,” I said finally.

“I was eleven when he started restoring it.” She wiped her face with her sleeve. “Every Saturday for six years. He did the engine. I sanded the fenders. He let me pick the color. I picked this blue because it matched his eyes.”

She ran her hand over the dashboard.

“When I got my license, he let me drive it once. To the end of the street and back. I hit the mailbox. He laughed for a week.”

“Audra. There are other ways to pay an estate tax bill.”

She looked at me.

“I’ve been doing this for twenty-five years,” I said. “I’ve hauled cars for a lot of estates. The IRS lets you set up an installment agreement. Some banks will lend against a car like this as collateral. And your brother’s share can be bought out over time, if he’ll agree to it. You don’t have to sell the only beautiful thing your father ever owned in five days because a lawyer who calls you ‘dear’ said so.”

She stared at me in the dark.

“Why didn’t anyone tell me that?”

“Because nobody gets paid when you keep the car.”

I made some calls in the morning. To my own estate lawyer in Baltimore, who owed me a favor. To a private bank in Phoenix that does collector car loans.

By Arizona, we had a plan on paper.

We were sixty miles from Scottsdale when her phone rang. She listened. She went pale.

“That was the auction house,” she said. “A collector saw the photos. He’s offering one point two million. Private sale. Before the auction. But he wants an answer by midnight.”