53 pages 1 hour read

Riley Sager

The Only One Left

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2023

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Chapters 23-30Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 23-27 Summary

Carter confides to Kit that he might be Lenora Hope’s grandson. Carter thinks Ricardo Mayhew killed Lenora’s family to avoid having to take responsibility for her pregnancy, leaving Lenora alive because he couldn’t kill his unborn child. Mary was on her way to the lab with blood samples from Lenora and Carter on the night she died. Their conversation is interrupted by what feels like an earthquake, as a piece of the cliff on which Hope’s End sits calves off and topples into the ocean.

Miss Hope confirms that an infant is gone, but is unresponsive when Kit asks her to elaborate. Kit is apprehensive about trusting Archie, but approaches him anyway. Archie confirms that he was Miss Hope’s best friend, but when asked about the baby, he insists that Lenora was never pregnant.

In an Interlude, the typist explains that she and Archie were each involved in romantic relationships. When she trusted him with the secret of her pregnancy, Archie was supportive, but implored her to consider the consequences and determine if Ricky was the kind of man she should entrust with her future. Archie offered to help her secure an abortion.

In the present, Kit becomes suspicious when she discovers that the cassette player with Jessie’s audiobook is turned off—this could only have happened if Miss Hope unpressed the button with her paralyzed arm.