Chapter 4 - The Fourth Property
Mom died on a Wednesday morning.
Dad told me she suffered a sudden stroke after breakfast. By the time the ambulance arrived, she could no longer speak.
I reached the hospital twenty minutes before she died.
Madeline arrived later with Grant.
At the time, I had been too numb to notice that his shoes were wet from the lake even though he claimed they drove directly from Denver.
Now Madeline stood in my old bedroom and admitted he had been at the house.
“Why did you lie?” I asked.
“He told me Dad would be blamed.”
“For what?”
Madeline sat beside the cedar chest.
“Mom found financial documents in Grant’s briefcase. They argued downstairs. Dad tried to calm them.”
“And then?”
“Mom went into the study. Grant followed her.”
“What happened inside?”
“I heard something fall.”
Madeline found Catherine on the floor beside the desk. Grant stood near the safe holding the sealed envelope.
Dad ordered him to call an ambulance.
“He said we needed to move Mom first,” Madeline whispered. “He said the study would make the paramedics suspicious.”
“Why?”
“There were broken glasses and papers everywhere.”
“How long before anyone called?”
She looked down.
“Eleven minutes.”
Eleven minutes during a stroke could decide whether a person walked again, spoke again, or survived.
“You helped move her.”
“Yes.”
“You let me believe she collapsed at breakfast.”
“I was scared.”
“Of Grant?”
“Of losing everything.”
The words were painfully honest.
Madeline had built her identity around houses, clothes, trips, and photographs. Grant convinced her those things would disappear if Mom exposed him.
She chose the lifestyle.
Mom paid the price.
Naomi entered holding the original deed for the lake estate.
The property had been purchased with money Catherine inherited from her mother. Robert never owned it.
Catherine later transferred it to Northstar, but the final beneficiary page remained sealed.
The missing envelope likely contained that page.
“Grant needs the fourth property for more than its value,” Naomi said.
The lake estate sat above a natural water access corridor connected to several mountain towns. A private utility company had recently offered thirty million dollars for rights beneath the land.
Northstar rejected the offer.
Grant’s development company secretly accepted it.
If he obtained the property, he would collect the payment immediately.
“The attempted transfer is worth closer to forty million,” Naomi said.
Madeline covered her mouth.
“Grant told me it was worth eight.”
“He planned to hide the utility agreement from you too.”
Her humiliation shifted into something colder.
For years, she joined Grant in mocking me because she believed they shared power.
He considered her another person to manage.
Downstairs, investigators discovered that Grant had left through the rear entrance.
His car remained outside.
He had taken Dad’s boat.
Robert sat in the library refusing to explain where Grant might go.
I placed Mom’s video camera on the table.
“Madeline told me what happened.”
Dad’s face changed.
“She is upset.”
“She said you waited eleven minutes to call an ambulance.”
“Your mother was already unconscious.”
“You moved her away from the evidence.”
“I was protecting her dignity.”
“You were protecting Grant.”
Dad stood.
“You have always believed life is simple because your mother shielded you from difficult decisions.”
“No. She shielded me from you.”
His hand struck the table.
“I spent forty years building this family.”
“Mom built the properties.”
“I managed the people.”
“You managed silence.”
Naomi placed the utility agreement beside him.
“Grant used Robert’s family trust as a guarantee.”
I stared at my father.
If Grant failed to obtain the lake estate, the utility company could pursue every asset inside Robert’s trust.
Dad had not helped him out of affection.
He was financially trapped.
“You signed the witness page because Grant promised to save your money.”
“He promised to preserve what Catherine intended for all of us.”
“Mom intended Northstar for me.”
“That is what she told you.”
A security alert appeared on my phone.
The basement wine room had opened.
Someone used Catherine’s old access code.
The investigators and I rushed downstairs.
The wine room was empty except for an open wall safe.
A ledger was missing.
The security camera showed Grant entering through the boat tunnel twelve minutes earlier.
He had never left the property.
He had been beneath us while we searched.
The final frame showed him carrying Mom’s sealed envelope toward a stone door hidden behind the wine racks.
I had lived in the lake house for years.
May you like
I had never known the door existed.
Continue to the next part: Claire enters a hidden records room and discovers Grant has already borrowed millions against all three vacation homes.
