For six years, nobody at the company had seen founder Henry Brooks in public.

The storm outside was still raging, but inside the grand dining room, the atmosphere had shifted into a solemn, respectful stillness.

Henry Brooks stood by the table, leaning heavily on his wooden cane, looking down at the empty chair where Toby Miller had sat twenty minutes earlier.

"Find him," Henry instructed Harold Cross, his voice dropping into a quiet, urgent register.

"We already have, sir," Harold replied, opening a digital tablet. "Building security tracked his employee ID. Toby Miller lives in a third-floor walk-up on Ashland Avenue. His shift logs show he was scheduled to finish at ten, but he was escorted out the service entrance at nine-ten."

"Get the car," Henry said, turning toward the grand exit. "We're going to find him."

Twenty minutes later, a sleek, matte-black armored Mercedes-Benz glided out from the underground parking garage of The Grand Brooks, cutting through the blinding sleet and swirling puddles of downtown Chicago.

Inside the rear passenger cabin, Henry Brooks sat in silence, staring out the rain-streaked window at the glittering, indifferent lights of the city. He thought of Eleanor—of her bright, fierce laughter, her unwavering belief that wealth was a responsibility rather than a shield, and her constant, haunting fear that after she was gone, the men in suits would turn her beloved hotels into cold, heartless machines.

Tonight, her fear had nearly come true. But a nineteen-year-old busser with chapped hands and a torn vest had stood in the breach.

The car turned down a narrow, dimly lit residential street in a working-class neighborhood on the near West Side, pulling to a halt outside an old, weathered brick three-flat with peeling green paint on the porch.

The driver shifted into park, but Henry waved his hand, opening the heavy armored door himself.

"Wait here," the old man commanded.