Chapter 13 - Everybody Runs From Grant
Serena became both defendant and missing witness.
Police did not assume she had been abducted.
Her monitor was cut cleanly.
No signs of struggle.
She could have fled.
Yet a camera outside the rental property showed Serena leaving with a man wearing a ski patrol jacket.
The man’s face remained hidden.
The jacket belonged to Silver Crown.
Derek ordered a full inventory.
One was missing.
Assigned to Eric Shaw.
The contractor who had broken into Mason’s apartment.
Eric was already in custody.
Someone had taken it from his storage locker.
Grant knew resort systems intimately.
He could move through properties without attracting attention.
Mason looked at Derek.
“You built a kingdom with too many keys.”
Derek nodded.
“Yes.”
The board suspended Grant immediately and appointed Susan Park interim CEO.
She reinstated Mason.
She also froze the Summit Crest transaction pending audit.
Victor Lang exploded.
“You are pushing this company toward insolvency.”
Susan answered, “Then perhaps we should determine why forty-three million dollars disappeared before selling assets to Grant Mercer’s preferred buyer.”
Victor left the meeting.
Federal investigators followed him.
Derek returned home to find Caleb packing a backpack.
“What are you doing?”
“I want to go to Aunt Margaret’s.”
Margaret was not his aunt, but Caleb had begun calling her that.
“Why?”
“You said Serena can’t come here.”
“Yes.”
“But Grant can.”
Derek froze.
“Why do you think that?”
Caleb pulled a phone from beneath his pillow.
An old prepaid phone.
Derek had never seen it.
“Where did you get that?”
“Serena gave it to me.”
“When?”
“Before Christmas.”
“Why?”
“She said if I ever got lost, call her.”
Derek took it carefully.
There was one unread message.
Received that morning.
A photograph of Frostline.
Then:
TELL YOUR DAD TO STOP THE AUDIT.
Derek’s blood went cold.
Another message arrived while he held it.
OR THE NEXT RIDE WON’T HAVE A MASON.
Derek called Ortiz.
Police moved Caleb to a confidential location with Margaret under protective measures.
Derek was not told the exact address initially.
The decision wounded his pride.
He accepted it.
“You’re okay with not knowing?” Benjamin asked.
“No.”
“But?”
“But safety matters more than my comfort.”
Another lesson.
The prepaid phone gave investigators a lead.
The threatening messages originated from Wi-Fi near a storage facility outside Denver.
Police arrived too late.
Grant was gone.
They found burner phones, cash, forged identification, and copies of Hale Mountain board documents.
One page concerned Frostline.
Another listed Caleb’s trust terms.
Grant had highlighted the remainder clause.
If Caleb died before twenty-five, Derek inherited Frostline.
Derek stared at the yellow line.
Grant had built his plan around a child’s death.
He left the room.
Mason followed.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Good answer.”
Derek looked at him.
“I keep thinking if you had been ten seconds farther away—”
“Don’t.”
“I have to.”
“No.”
Mason stepped closer.
“You have to remember what happened. You don’t have to torture yourself with every version that didn’t.”
Derek was silent.
Then he asked, “How do you know?”
Mason looked toward the mountains.
“My dad died in an avalanche.”
Derek remembered vaguely.
Mason continued.
“I was supposed to be with him that morning. I stayed home because I was sick.”
Derek understood.
“You spent years imagining you could have saved him.”
“Yes.”
“Could you?”
“No.”
Mason’s voice became quiet.
“But guilt likes stories where you have more control than you actually do.”
Derek thought of Emily.
Caleb.
Serena.
The company.
“So what do you do?”
“You control what comes next.”
That afternoon investigators identified another hidden source.
Summit Crest Capital’s managing partner agreed to cooperate after federal agents confronted the firm with the White Pine transfer.
The partner claimed the three million was not a bribe.
It was a “success fee.”
Success meant obtaining Frostline access.
When asked why White Pine received it before access was secured, the partner became less confident.
Emails showed Grant promising:
TITLE ISSUE RESOLVES BEFORE Q1.
If Caleb remained alive and the trust refused sale, title could not “resolve.”
Unless the forged option succeeded.
Or Caleb died.
The conspiracy narrowed.
Then Serena called Derek from another burner phone.
He answered under police monitoring.
She was crying.
“Grant knows where Caleb is.”
Derek’s entire body stiffened.
“He can’t.”
“He has Margaret’s phone mirrored.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where are you?”
Silence.
“Serena.”
“He has me at Frostline.”
Derek looked at Ortiz.
Ortiz was already signaling officers.
“Where?”
“The old weather station.”
Derek knew it.
High above Blue Ridge.
Serena whispered:
“He says if you don’t withdraw the audit and support the Summit Crest sale by sunset, he’s going after Caleb himself.”
May you like
Then she added the sentence that made Derek’s blood run cold.
“And Derek… Grant was the one who aimed the tube.”
