Chapter 9 - Why Grant Tried to Pay Peter LangGrant didn't remember initiating the transfer.
At least not at first.
Forensic review of the phone helped.
Text messages.
Most deleted.
One thread recovered.
Unknown number:
You want the truth about the boat? Pay me.
Grant:
Proof you're Lang.
A photograph followed.
Peter Lang standing beside Grant's damaged sailboat before the disappearance.
Then:
900K. You get the video.
Grant had been negotiating.
Not bribing a potential attacker.
Buying evidence.
Charles felt relief and frustration simultaneously.
Grant had recovered enough cognition to conduct a secret transaction.
Yet not enough trust in the people around him to ask for help.
Why?
Because everyone he knew at Seabrook had been chosen by Damon.
The phone itself was smuggled in by a physical therapist who thought Grant deserved outside contact.
Grant used it secretly.
He discovered Charles wasn't dead only two weeks earlier after searching news.
Then why hadn't he called?
Grant answered after resting.
“I didn't know who had lied.”
Charles understood.
If Damon lied about Charles, who else was involved?
Was Charles?
Meredith?
Savannah?
Police?
Grant no longer knew.
“So you went after Lang alone.”
Grant smiled weakly.
“Family habit.”
Charles almost laughed.
“Yes.”
Savannah sat beside him.
“Dad, stop doing that.”
Grant looked at her.
“Doing what?”
“Trying to solve everything without telling us.”
The twelve-year-old had become the wisest person in the room.
Grant nodded.
“Fair.”
The recovered text thread continued.
Lang claimed to possess video recorded from his service boat.
Grant demanded proof.
Lang sent three seconds.
Night.
Waves.
Grant's sailboat ahead.
A voice said:
Damon said make him turn back.
Not “kill him.”
Turn back.
That distinction mattered.
Another voice—Peter—answered:
Weather will do the rest if he doesn't.
Then clip ended.
Grant remembered now.
“He followed me.”
“Why?”
“To scare me.”
“How?”
Grant closed his eyes.
The memory came in pieces.
Peter's boat pulled alongside.
Shouted that Meredith had been hurt.
Grant didn't believe him.
Then Peter tried to force Grant toward shore.
At some point the boats touched.
Grant's already damaged steering failed during evasive turn.
Storm waves hit.
Mast equipment snapped.
Grant went overboard.
“Did Peter rescue you?”
“No.”
“Did he see you fall?”
“I think.”
“Did he leave?”
Grant's eyes filled.
“Yes.”
That moved Peter's conduct from intimidation toward something far more serious.
He may not have intended the initial accident.
But leaving Grant in storm conditions after causing or contributing could be criminal.
“Who ordered him to follow you?”
“Damon.”
“How know?”
“Peter said his name.”
Grant's memory strengthened when discussing the moments before impact.
“What did Damon want?”
“To stop me from reaching you.”
Charles felt cold.
Grant had planned to sail overnight, clear his head, then meet Charles the next morning with financial records.
Damon knew.
“Meredith told him?”
Grant looked away.
“Yes.”
Savannah stiffened.
Grant continued.
“She told Damon I was going to expose everything.”
“Did she know Peter would follow?”
“I don't know.”
Important.
“Did she know boat was unsafe?”
Grant nodded.
“Yes.”
Charles felt anger again.
“She knew steering had been tampered with.”
“Yes.”
“Then let you sail.”
Grant looked toward window.
“We had a terrible fight.”
“That isn't an excuse.”
“I know.”
Grant wasn't protecting her.
Just explaining.
“What happened after they found you?”
Grant remembered little of first weeks.
Hospital.
Pain.
Faces.
Damon.
Meredith.
He eventually remembered enough to identify himself.
Damon told him Charles had died while searching for him.
A cruel lie with just enough emotional logic to work.
“Did Meredith hear that?”
“Later.”
“Did she correct it?”
“No.”
Savannah looked down.
Grant reached for her hand.
“Sav.”
She looked at him.
“I am sorry.”
“You didn't do it.”
“I stayed silent before the accident.”
“What?”
“I knew Meredith was in trouble.”
Savannah frowned.
“I thought if I fixed her debt quietly, she'd stop helping Damon.”
Charles stared.
Another layer.
“How much did you pay?”
“Three hundred thousand.”
“You paid her debt?”
“Part.”
“And didn't tell me.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Grant smiled bitterly.
“I thought I could keep the family from blowing apart.”
Charles sat back.
Grant had participated in the same culture.
Not fraud.
But concealment.
He protected Meredith from consequence.
That gave Damon more leverage.
Grant understood now.
“I made it easier.”
“Yes,” Charles said.
No comforting lie.
Savannah looked between them.
“Can we stop saying we protected people when we mean we hid things?”
Both men stared.
Then Charles smiled sadly.
“Yes.”
Federal agents traced Lang's messages.
Burner routing.
But one metadata error placed him near Providence two days earlier.
He hadn't left the state.
A surveillance team located him at a motel near Warwick.
Before they could arrest him, Peter Lang fled.
A short pursuit followed.
He crashed into a barrier at low speed.
No serious injuries.
Taken into custody.
Inside his backpack:
Cash.
Three passports.
And a waterproof memory card.
The full boat video.
Investigators watched.
Peter's boat approached Grant.
Voices.
Threats.
Then Grant shouted something that made Charles stop breathing.
“You tell Damon the Blackwater account is already copied!”
Peter answered:
“Then you just made this worse.”
Minutes later, steering failed.
Collision.
Grant went into the sea.
Peter circled once.
Could have helped.
Didn't.
Then Peter called someone.
“It's done.”
A man's voice answered.
Damon.
“Did you get the drive?”
“No.”
Silence.
Then Damon said:
“Then find it before Charles does.”
The accident hadn't only been about stopping Grant.
May you like
Damon believed Grant carried evidence.
And that evidence was still missing.
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