The argument didn’t start at the house. It started at a formal Christmas party where everyone noticed the same thing at the same time: Nick showed up in a hoodie while everyone else wore suits and dresses. He looked disheveled. People whispered he seemed high. Then he clashed with his father in front of witnesses—sharp words, a scene that didn’t fit the room. When the party ended, the family left with that fight still burning.

At about 4:00 a.m., Nick used his credit card to check into a hotel in Santa Monica.

That receipt becomes the first fixed point in the timeline because Nick supposedly lived with his parents—so he had no obvious reason to be paying for a room in the middle of the night. Witnesses at the front desk said he looked “tweaked out,” but they also said something that later mattered even more: they saw no blood on him, no cuts, no visible injuries. He booked for one day. He never checked out.

A few hours later, hotel staff entered the room. What they found turns the timeline from suspicious to urgent. The shower was full of blood. There was blood on the bed. The windows were covered with bedsheets, as if someone wanted privacy fast.

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