The Good Samaritan

Ryan’s parents and his brother, Johnny Smith, were present when the police delivered the news that Charlotte’s body had been found at the base of cliffs in East Sussex. An unidentified man died with her, but his body was swept out to sea.

Two new detectives, Detective Sargent O’Connor and Detective Sargent Carmichael, take over the case the following day. The detectives reveal that an eyewitness saw Charlotte and the unknown man calmly holding hands as they walked off the cliff. The witness also stated that both were holding cell phones to their ears. Based on this account, the police suggest that it was a suicide pact. Ryan reacts with furious denial, while his family appears to quietly accept the police’s explanation. Overwhelmed, Ryan storms into the bedroom to be alone.

Ryan researches Birling Gap, the location where Charlotte died, and develops a theory that erosion caused an accidental fall. His hope is shattered when DS Carmichael shows him dashcam footage from a nearby car. The video clearly shows Charlotte embracing the unknown man before they deliberately join hands and walk off the cliff together.

Broken by the video, Ryan is forced to accept that he did not truly know his wife. He wanders to a park, where he finds the anniversary gift still in his pocket. He opens the box to look at the key to a new house he secretly purchased for their growing family, wondering if knowing about the purchase would have changed Charlotte’s mind.

Ryan ransacks the apartment searching for a suicide note but finds nothing. Unable to remain there, he moves in with his parents. His grief is compounded when Charlotte’s parents, Barbara and Patrick, return from a cruise and openly blame him for their daughter’s death by suicide.

This accusation forces Ryan to re-evaluate Charlotte’s final months. He recalls her severe prenatal depression and his attempts to support her. He now sees her apparent recovery, during which she spent a great deal of time on online message boards, as a masterful deception. He is tormented by the memory of her telling him she loved him on the morning she died while secretly planning to die by suicide.

Ryan, struggling with grief, takes a train to London. He visits the street where he and Charlotte shared their first apartment, attempting to reconnect with their early happiness. Instead, he questions if her depression was a secret she carried even then.

Ryan then travels to Borough Market, another place filled with memories, but he is too overwhelmed to enter. The journey does little to soothe him. He reflects on how his friends’ reactions have been divided, with some offering sincere pity and others treating him with thinly veiled suspicion.

DS Carmichael informs Ryan that the coroner’s report determined his and Charlotte’s baby was a boy. Ryan privately names his lost son “Daniel” and torments himself by imagining the life they could have had. This new information causes his grief to curdle into intense hatred for Charlotte, whom he now blames for “murdering” their child.

After a brief interaction with a shopkeeper, Mrs. Verma, Ryan buys several bottles of alcohol. He retreats to his parents’ garden with their dog, Oscar, and drinks heavily. He obsesses over the potential suffering of his unborn son during the fall, eventually becoming physically ill. Alone, he verbally expresses his bottomless hatred for Charlotte.

DS O’Connor meets with the family. He reports that police have found no prior link between Charlotte and the man who died with her. The investigation has, however, uncovered a significant lead: In the weeks before her death, Charlotte made nearly 100 calls to a suicide helpline called End of the Line. These calls stopped abruptly one week before she died.

O’Connor explains that the investigation is stalled because the helpline operates under a strict policy of caller anonymity, and police believe Charlotte was using a second, unrecovered cell phone. He warns the family that the story is about to break in the media. Two days later, the story is published, and Ryan turns off his phone to escape calls from journalists.

Ryan attends Charlotte’s funeral and the coroner’s inquest, where her death is officially ruled a suicide. He feels numb and detached throughout the proceedings. His doctor signs him off from work, and he moves back into the apartment he shared with Charlotte, though he avoids the nursery and their bedroom.

While in a pub one evening, he finds a promotional leaflet for the End of the Line helpline. Later, back in his flat, he calls the number and speaks to a male volunteer named Kevin. Ryan explains that his wife recently died by suicide and, through the anonymous conversation, feels he gains a small insight into why Charlotte might have called the service, but the number of calls she made continues to baffle him.

When the police return Charlotte’s phone, iPad, and laptop, Ryan discovers that she meticulously erased every photo of them from her devices. While looking through her iPad, he finds a hidden calculator app. Suspecting it is a decoy, he enters the date of her death as a password and unlocks a secret vault.

Inside, Ryan finds folders with links and screenshots from pro-suicide websites and online communities. As he reads a message board thread, he learns of an urban legend about a female volunteer at End of the Line who secretly helps callers die, known only by the alias the “Freer of Lost Souls.” Ryan becomes certain that finding this woman is the key to understanding Charlotte’s death.

Driven by a new purpose, Ryan resolves to identify the anonymous helpline volunteer. He first tries to get information from users on suicide forums, but they offer no help. He then decides to find her by systematically calling the helpline. He invents a convincing suicidal persona named Steven, meticulously documenting his plan.

For weeks, Ryan’s life is consumed by this hunt. He uses a Dictaphone to record every call and a spreadsheet to log each volunteer. To his family, he presents a facade of recovery, hiding his obsessive project. The hunt for the woman becomes his sole reason for living, and his methodical plan is eventually successful.