Chapter 11 - Dana’s Missing FileGrant listened to Corinne’s recorded call twice.
“Dana knew?”
Mara nodded.
“That’s what she claims.”
“About Reid?”
“We don’t know.”
Grant stood near the hotel window.
Dana had died four years earlier.
Reid had been at Mercer Ridge for eleven.
If Dana had suspected him, why had she never told Grant?
Then Grant remembered the final year of her life.
Hospitals.
Treatment.
Pain medication.
Board meetings he left early.
Conversations postponed because Dana was tired.
Folders she said they would discuss later.
Later disappeared before either of them noticed.
Grant sat.
“She tried.”
Mara looked at him.
“What?”
“To tell me something.”
He rubbed his forehead.
“Two months before she died, she asked if I trusted Reid.”
“What did you say?”
“I said yes.”
Mara waited.
Grant continued.
“She told me to audit the company.”
“Did you?”
“I asked Reid.”
Mara’s expression hardened.
“You asked the person she was concerned about whether an audit was necessary?”
“I didn’t understand.”
“What did he say?”
“That Dana was anxious because of the trust planning.”
Grant’s voice broke.
“I believed him.”
Mara sat slowly.
“Did Dana leave company records?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where are her personal files?”
“Storage.”
Grant stood abruptly.
The Mercer family kept archive boxes inside a secured records facility in Aspen.
Police accompanied Grant and Mara there the next morning.
Dana’s boxes had not been opened since Grant moved houses after marrying Corinne.
Most contained medical paperwork.
Tax records.
Old photographs.
Letters.
Then Mara found an index card inside a box labeled CHARITY / 2021.
Dana’s handwriting.
G.M. — if Reid says I’m imagining it, ask why the Granite account ends in 4417.
Grant stared.
Mara searched the box.
Nothing.
“What’s the Granite account?”
“I don’t know.”
They contacted Mercer Ridge’s bank.
No official corporate account ended in 4417.
But federal financial investigators discovered an account at another institution opened under a subsidiary called Granite Crown Hospitality Services.
Grant had never authorized the subsidiary.
Reid had.
Money flowed through it for six years.
Amounts were small at first.
Fifty thousand.
Eighty thousand.
Then hundreds of thousands.
By the time Dana became ill, more than $2.3 million had moved through the account.
After she died, the transfers accelerated.
Seventeen million dollars eventually disappeared through related entities.
Mara looked at the records.
“Dana found the beginning.”
Grant sat silently.
“She tried to warn me.”
“She may not have known the full scale.”
“I dismissed her.”
“You trusted your CFO.”
“I trusted Reid over my wife.”
Mara said nothing.
That truth belonged to Grant.
He had to carry it.
Inside one box they found another clue.
A flash drive taped beneath a folder.
Police forensics copied it.
The drive contained a spreadsheet Dana had created six weeks before her death.
She had tracked suspicious vendor invoices.
Three companies.
All eventually traced to businesses associated with Reid.
At the bottom was one note.
Tell Grant when I have proof. Do not accuse without proof. He’ll defend Reid.
Grant read that sentence until the words blurred.
Dana had known him too well.
He had been loyal.
And lazy in that loyalty.
He hated conflict inside his inner circle.
He preferred explanations that preserved relationships.
That weakness had survived Dana’s death.
When Sadie complained that Corinne was “mean,” Grant had explained.
When Corinne and Sadie argued, Grant had mediated.
When Sadie became quieter, Grant called it growing up.
He had always searched for the interpretation that demanded the least confrontation.
And Corinne had learned exactly how to use that.
Back at the hotel, Grant showed Sadie one piece of Dana’s recovered material.
Not the financial evidence.
A short handwritten letter tucked between folders.
Sadie, if you ever find this someday, remember that courage is not doing what scares you because someone pressures you. Courage is knowing when to step forward and when to step away. Both can be brave. Love, Mom.
Sadie read it twice.
Then once more.
“Did she write this for me?”
“Yes.”
“How old was I?”
“Six.”
Sadie pressed the paper against her chest.
“Corinne said I was weak because I wouldn’t jump.”
Grant sat beside her.
“Your mom disagreed.”
Sadie’s mouth trembled.
“I wish she was here.”
“So do I.”
That evening, Ortiz received an encrypted email.
Corinne.
Attached was one photograph.
It showed Reid sitting at a table beside several Northcove documents.
A calendar lay beside him.
One date was circled.
August 26.
The day of the cliff.
Across the photograph Corinne had typed:
HE PLANNED THE DATE. I CAN PROVE IT.
Ortiz replied through the controlled channel.
Turn yourself in.
Corinne’s response came five minutes later.
Not until Reid is in custody.
Ortiz typed:
Why are you afraid of him?
May you like
The answer took longer.
Because Sadie wasn’t the first person he decided was expendable.
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