Chapter 13 - The Hotel Nobody Wanted to Remember
I knew the Old Harbor Hotel. That was where my security career had ended.
I called Marian Bell from the back of the west reception room. She answered on the first ring.
"Iris is safe," I told her.
"Thank God. Listen carefully. Pike's firm was paid through Marsh Point before Vanessa moved the foundation's housing contracts there."
"How do you know?"
"The same invoice descriptions appeared in an old compliance file. I recognized the name and dug out the records."
My skin went cold. Five years ago, at Old Harbor, I had reported an emergency stairwell locked during a smoke alarm. A maid named Marlene nearly got trapped on the wrong side. Pike called the violation a paperwork error. Hotel management called my report misconduct.
"You kept the file?" I asked.
"Marlene kept it. She's willing to talk now."
I found a chair because my legs were suddenly unreliable. I'd spent years thinking I had failed the only person who spoke up with me.
"What does that have to do with tonight?"
"Pike's contractor billed for security inspections that never took place. Different property, same pattern. Vanessa hired him after he brought her to Marsh Point. She's been using false completion reports for years."
Marian emailed the old inspection numbers, which matched codes on the newer invoices. They weren't proof by themselves, but they gave investigators a way to trace the work.
I forwarded them to Monroe and Nadia, making clear which records were historical and which belonged to Haven Bridge.
Then Elliot approached, holding his phone like something poisonous.
"My finance director just sent me the contractor ownership chart," he said.
"Brock Sterling?" I asked.
"Yes. But Brock is only one shareholder."
He turned the screen toward me. The second name was a company belonging to Elliot himself.
"I didn't know," he said.
May you like
I couldn't tell whether that meant he was innocent.
Or whether he'd spent years choosing not to know.
