The team returns to the incident room. Gamache privately calls Cameron’s former team, the Alouettes, and learns that Cameron was released from the football team for excessive holding penalties, not roughing. Lacoste reports that Gerald Bertrand’s alibi checks out, and he appears truthful. The team discusses why Vivienne kept calling the same wrong number, concluding she likely wrote it down incorrectly. Beauvoir refuses to eliminate Bertrand as a suspect and orders surveillance.

Cloutier reveals her work on Tracey’s Instagram account and her connection with his website manager, Pauline Vachon, to Gamache and Beauvoir. The posts show the affair and include incriminating messages from the day of the murder. The team believes this proves premeditation.

Gamache wants to release Homer, but Beauvoir worries he will try to kill Tracey. Gamache argues that holding Homer longer will increase his rage rather than cool it. Beauvoir agrees, and Gamache offers to let Homer stay with him. Cameron reports that Tracey bought abortion drugs. Beauvoir presents his theory: Tracey beat Vivienne, left to get drunk, returned to find her calling for help, then followed her to the bridge and pushed her off.

At Clara’s studio, art critic Dominica Oddly arrives. Ruth reveals that she invited her to Three Pines, hoping Oddly would defend Clara’s work. Instead, Oddly reveals she has attended all Clara’s shows and initially hated her work but slowly came to appreciate Clara’s subversive vision. However, she declares Clara’s latest miniatures appalling, cowardly, and insulting—a betrayal of her talent. She gives Clara a copy of her review, due to be published, sharply condemning the new work.

Gamache and Cloutier release Homer. Gamache insists Homer stay with them in Three Pines rather than go home alone. Homer initially refuses, worried that when he kills Tracey, it will reflect badly on Gamache. Eventually, Gamache persuades him by appealing to their shared connection as fathers.

Beauvoir sits at his desk, checks his gun, and reflects on how the weapon has begun to feel heavy and foreign, wondering when Gamache stopped carrying one. He recalls the moment he shot Gamache (in a previous novel) and feels a wave of revulsion. He knows it is time to leave police work.

Gamache, Beauvoir, and Cameron track the drug dealer who sold the pills to Tracey to an apartment building. The situation escalates into a tense standoff in an alley with a 15-year-old named Toby, who points a gun at Beauvoir. During the confrontation, another teen takes Beauvoir’s gun. Beauvoir de-escalates the situation by sharing his own past trauma and convinces Toby to surrender without violence.

Lacoste interrogates Pauline Vachon, who appears younger than her social media photos suggest. She wears inexpensive makeup and discount clothing but carries herself with self-possession. Vachon admits to being Tracey’s web designer and confirms their affair through photographs but claims ignorance about the murder. Lacoste tells her Vivienne was pregnant and asks who the father was. Vachon, believing Tracey—who claimed the baby was not his—expresses sympathy for him.

Meanwhile, Toby and Daphne, the teenage drug dealers, are being booked. Toby mentions the viral video of Gamache killing children. Beauvoir searches online and finds both the doctored video and the original raid footage, posted anonymously, he assumes by Ruth. Reine-Marie, with friends in Myrna’s loft, views the videos and feels sick. The station commander has also seen them. Chief Superintendent Toussaint watches at her desk, feeling physically ill at images that could be her own son, and composes a response.

Gamache calls the families of officers killed in the raid to warn them that their loved ones’ deaths are being displayed publicly again. He absorbs their rage and anguish. When alone, he breaks down, remembering holding a dying young agent. Beauvoir stays with him through the calls, refusing to leave him alone.

Lacoste questions Vachon about the abortion drug, which Vachon admits buying for herself after becoming too ashamed to return to her doctor. She told Tracey about it when Vivienne became pregnant, claiming it was none of her business what he did with the information. Lacoste reveals that she was pregnant again when she died. Vachon is surprised, saying that her drug purchase was last summer. The team realizes Tracey ended one pregnancy with the drug, but Vivienne became pregnant again—possibly the reason she finally decided to leave.

Vachon dismisses her affair with Tracey as meaningless. When Lacoste reads the incriminating Saturday posts, Vachon claims they were about clay and pottery purchases. Lacoste warns her that she will be charged with murder unless something changes, and outside, she tells Beauvoir that they can likely turn Vachon. The coroner confirms the fetus was Tracey’s daughter.

Clara confronts Dominique Oddly with the review of her work. Oddly confirms that she believes Clara has become lazy. Clara protests, but Oddly asks if she is certain. Oddly walks through Three Pines, expecting a quaint imitation of France but finding something genuine and authentic. The bistro particularly impressed her, with its blend of contemporary and timeless elements, its warmth and history. By the time Clara finds her at the bistro, Oddly is contemplating whether to move to Canada.

Cloutier drives Homer to Three Pines; when he squeezes her hand, she takes it as a moment of connection. At the Gamache home, Reine-Marie welcomes them, and Homer apologizes for hitting her. In the bistro, Clara is horrified to learn that Dominica Oddly’s flight has been canceled, and she will be staying the night.

Beauvoir and Gamache wait outside Tracey’s house. Cameron radios that the arrest warrant has arrived. Gamache suggests a ploy to tell Vachon that Tracey is about to be arrested. The plan works, and Vachon agrees to testify to save herself. Beauvoir and Gamache enter Tracey’s unlocked house and discover him passed out in a pool of vomit.