Chapter 7 - Grant Was Hired Before the Hotel
Grant’s full name was Samuel Grant.
Former private investigator.
Former Chicago police detective.
And, for eleven years, occasional security contractor for Margaret Vale.
Eleanor felt betrayed by another dead person.
Sofia placed Grant’s photograph on the table.
Eleanor recognized him immediately.
He had attended Margaret’s funeral.
He stood near the back.
Eleanor assumed he was an old business acquaintance.
Daniel recognized him too.
“Mom used him for background checks.”
“On who?”
“Executives. Contractors. Sometimes people connected to family investments.”
“Richard?”
Daniel hesitated.
“Yes.”
Eleanor laughed without humor.
“Of course.”
Margaret had investigated Richard before the wedding.
Daniel claimed the report found nothing alarming.
Debt.
Ambition.
A tendency to overstate business success.
No criminal history.
No hidden family.
Nothing that stopped Margaret from eventually accepting the marriage.
But Grant remained in her orbit.
Why would he help Martin cover up Luis’s death?
Sofia searched financial records.
Grant received monthly payments from a Vale family security account until Margaret died.
Then payments continued from another source.
Halston House Holdings.
Eleanor stared.
“I never hired him.”
Daniel did not either.
Who authorized the payments?
Martin.
Using a legacy vendor code.
Grant had been embedded inside the hotel finances long before Luis died.
Police located Grant’s registered apartment.
Empty.
They found burner phones, cash, and photographs.
Richard.
Martin.
Luis.
Vanessa.
Daniel.
Eleanor.
Everyone had been watched.
One photograph showed Margaret leaving a medical office.
Another showed her meeting Luis at a diner.
Grant had been following Margaret too.
That made no sense if she hired him.
Unless someone else took control of him.
A burner phone contained deleted messages recovered by technicians.
M:
M is asking questions.
G:
Then stop giving her answers.
M:
She has Luis.
G:
Not for long.
Eleanor’s stomach turned.
M could mean Martin.
Or Margaret.
But context suggested Martin.
Then another:
G:
R will fold if E learns about the refinancing.
M:
R is manageable. D is the problem.
D.
Daniel.
They had been watching her brother.
Why?
Daniel found the answer.
Two years earlier, he had discovered an unexplained lien attached to a parcel adjacent to Halston House.
He asked Martin about it.
Martin said it was an old recording error.
Daniel forgot.
But the lien holder was Northstar Hospitality.
The same company Richard secretly approached about a sale.
Northstar had lent $12 million to a shell entity connected to the project.
Eleanor never approved it.
The loan was secured by future hotel revenue.
If the hotel failed, Northstar could claim operating assets.
Not the land.
But enough to cripple the project.
“Richard knew?” Eleanor asked.
Daniel checked signatures.
Richard had signed the loan.
Her chest tightened.
Another betrayal.
But the loan documents showed something else.
Northstar transferred only $7 million.
The documents stated $12 million.
Five million had vanished before reaching the project.
Martin arranged the transaction.
Grant enforced silence.
Richard used the money to keep construction alive.
Everyone had a different piece.
No one saw the whole theft.
Eleanor finally understood why Margaret built the land trust.
She had discovered the financing structure.
She knew the hotel could be stripped.
So she made sure the ground itself remained beyond their reach.
Then Martin woke at the hospital.
Sofia allowed Eleanor to hear his first recorded statement later.
He was weak.
Bruised.
Terrified.
“Grant is cleaning everything,” Martin whispered.
Sofia asked where Grant was.
“I don’t know.”
“Who does he work for?”
Martin started crying.
“Not me.”
“Then who?”
“I thought Margaret.”
Eleanor leaned closer to the screen.
Martin explained Grant approached him three years earlier, during the earliest hotel planning.
He claimed Margaret wanted discreet monitoring because she did not trust Richard.
Grant offered to help Martin “protect the family.”
At first, that meant gathering information.
Then Grant began suggesting ways to move money without Richard noticing.
Martin participated.
Small amounts.
Then larger.
By the time he understood, Grant had evidence against him.
Blackmail.
Martin created shell vendors.
Grant directed transfers.
Richard discovered some irregularities but chose to exploit them rather than expose them.
Everyone became compromised.
Sofia asked about Luis.
Martin closed his eyes.
“I pushed him.”
Eleanor felt sick.
“He hit the scaffolding. He was alive.”
“Why call Grant?”
“Because Grant always fixed things.”
“And what did Grant do?”
“He killed him.”
Martin’s voice broke.
“He told me Luis would talk. Richard left. I stayed. I watched Grant hit him.”
Eleanor looked away.
Sofia asked why Martin directed Eleanor to Room 814.
“Because I couldn’t live with it anymore.”
Then came the question.
“Who is Grant really working for?”
Martin whispered:
“I found out last week.”
“Who?”
Martin looked toward the camera.
“Northstar.”
Eleanor froze.
Northstar was not merely a buyer.
May you like
It had planted a fixer inside the project before the hotel was even purchased.
And someone at Northstar had known Margaret’s private security arrangements well enough to turn her own investigator against her.
