Joe drives to Austin with Jeremy and meets Terry Bremer at a café. Bremer confirms that he evicted Kathy after her arrest and temporarily stored her belongings. He later rehired her as his bookkeeper. Joe is astonished that Bremer trusts his mother to take rent payments and handle cash. Bremer reveals that he gave Kathy a second chance because he understands what she was going through; he is himself in long-term recovery and shows Joe his 25-year sobriety medallion. He explains that Kathy went through a halfway house and a sober house, then asked to return to her old apartment to face her past. He confirms that she has remained sober and steady. When Joe expresses his trepidation over the idea that his mother could relapse at any time and states that he cannot expose Jeremy to such behavior again, Bremer signals his understanding. He also mentions that Kathy will be attending an open AA meeting that evening in the basement of Grace Lutheran Church; Bremer will be the main speaker, and he invites Joe to attend and see the changes in Kathy for himself. Joe is noncommittal. Bremer promises not to tell Kathy about this conversation.

Joe parks across from the church at 7:30 and slips inside with Jeremy after the AA attendees have arrived, warning his brother to remain very quiet. He and Jeremy sitting on the top step of the basement stairs, within earshot but out of view of the gathering in the room below. As the meeting commences, Bremer asks Kathy to speak in his place and tell her story. While Kathy begins, Joe suddenly receives texts from Moody Lynch, who insists on meeting in person at 1:00 the next day with no police; Moody claims that he did not kill anyone, and he wants Joe to hear him out as Angel’s brother. Joe quickly agrees, wanting to return his attention to his mother’s speech.

In the basement, Kathy tells the gathering about her addiction, openly admitting her failure to protect Jeremy from her boyfriend’s abuse. She also recounts a painful memory of a day when she impatiently dragged the young boys out in the cold, and Joe went running back into the house to fetch Jeremy’s coat, which she had forgotten. She says that during her recovery, she saw two boys together in the park, and as one boy helped the other into a coat, her memories broke through her denial and made her realize her failures as a mother. As she speaks, Joe follows Jeremy down the stairs and into the room; Kathy sees them and collapses in shock, and Bremer helps her to the floor as a tearful audience looks on.

Bremer leads Kathy, Joe, and Jeremy out of the church. Jeremy greets Kathy briefly, and as Joe begins to feel awkward with the small talk, Bremer suggests that they go to her apartment. Joe observes that for the first time in his memory, the apartment is clean. He acknowledges that Kathy looks different and no longer seeks attention for its own sake. Kathy starts a movie for Jeremy—The Lion King—and sits with Joe at the kitchen table. She tells him that she takes lithium for her bipolar disorder and is now in therapy. She states that her PTSD stems from the trauma of her mother’s death. When she was a teenager, she argued with her intoxicated mother, insisting that her mother attend her volleyball tournament that night or forfeit the right to call Kathy her daughter. Her mother drove to the tournament drunk and had a fatal car crash that Kathy witnessed firsthand.

When Joe asks Kathy whether Toke Talbert was really his father, Kathy says she believes so but acknowledges she was sexually active with multiple men at the time. She confirms that Toke and Charlie hated each other and tells Joe that as a teenager, Toke walked in on Charlie sexually abusing a young child named Poppi Sanchez at the Talbert family’s informal day care; the family covered it up. Joe tells her that Toke has been killed in Buckley. Kathy asks Joe and Jeremy to stay the night. After leaving briefly to think it over, Joe decides to leave Jeremy with Kathy, so he buys his brother extra clothes and leaves a voicemail for Lila, acknowledging that she was right about his mother having changed for the better.

Joe has breakfast at Kathy’s and is surprised when she cooks real pancakes, as his childhood was full of fast-food meals. As Joe drives back toward Buckley, he decides to keep his in-person meeting with Moody despite the risks of meeting a potential murderer. To fulfill his promise to keep the Buckley police informed, he calls Jeb and tells him the time of the meeting but not the location. He also refuses Jeb’s request that he wear a, and he declines to promise Moody anything beyond a fair hearing of his side of the story. Moody texts Joe GPS coordinates that lead him to a spot 20 miles north of Buckley, near the river. Having bought sandwiches for Moody as a gesture of goodwill, Joe arrives at an isolated barn. His cell phone rings, but when he answers it, no one speaks. He hangs up and brings sandwiches inside the barn, calling out. Moody answers from the hayloft, but when Joe sees that Moody is holding a gun, he demands that Moody set the weapon down. Moody complies.

Moody comes down from the hayloft, his face visibly bruised. As he takes a sandwich, he makes Joe open his shirt to confirm that he is not wired, then describes his first meeting with Angel and recounts his relationship with her. He says that Angel had been acting secretive just before Toke’s death and had told him that she was going to speak with Jeb about something. On the night of Toke’s death, Moody received a text from her and went to the horse barn on the Hix farm around midnight, parking at a boat launch and walking up a horse trail. He found Angel unconscious on the floor of the barn. Suddenly, Toke appeared and attacked him with his fists and a coil of rope. Overpowered, Moody desperately grabbed a metal gear from the wall and struck Toke once in the head; Toke fell to the ground. Moody dialed 911 on Toke’s phone, wiped his fingerprints from the phone and gear with a rag, and sat with Angel until he heard a vehicle approaching, at which point he fled.

As Moody is recounting his story, Sheriff Kimball, Jeb, Calder, and other officers suddenly storm the barn. Moody surrenders, demands a lawyer, and glares at Joe as Calder cuffs him. The officers cuff Joe as well.

Jeb drives the handcuffed Joe to the Sheriff’s Office, explaining that he found the meeting spot by having the dispatcher call Joe’s cell phone and trace the location. Deputy Calder, Sheriff Kimball, and Jeb interrogate Joe about his meeting with Moody, threatening to saddle him with charges of aiding an offender because he brought sandwiches. Realizing that they are guessing about the sandwiches and that there is no hard proof that Joe bought them, Joe calls their bluff. He then demands to see Toke’s autopsy report in exchange for giving them Moody’s account of events. Kimball agrees, specifying that the information is off the record. Joe relays Moody’s version: that Angel was already in the barn unconscious, that Toke attacked Moody with a rope, and that Moody struck once in self-defense before calling 911. Calder dismisses the account entirely, convinced that Moody is lying. Once Joe is released, he convinces Jeb to give him a ride back to his car. On the way, Jeb informs him that the DNA results confirm that Joe is Toke Talbert’s son.

Joe pulls over, overwhelmed by the prospect of inheriting millions, then drives to attorney Bob Mullen’s home. Mullen reports that his State Department contacts investigated the warehouse fire that killed Charlie’s partner years ago; the investigators found epoxy blocking the sprinkler heads, and because there was no smoke in the partner’s lungs, they suspect arson and homicide. However, Charlie’s alibi prevented them from bringing any charges. Mullen states that this information must remain confidential. He warns that Charlie has filed adoption papers for Angel; as Angel’s adoptive father rather than just her guardian, Charlie would be able to inherit the Hix estate in the event of Angel’s death.

Mullen believes that because Charlie has heavy gambling debts, he may be willing to kill her for her money. Mullen urges Joe to petition for guardianship himself, since Charlie’s adoption would require a guardian’s consent. Joe protests that he is already Jeremy’s guardian and cannot take on another ward. As the two continue to talk, Mullen recounts his experience of leaving Buckley as a young man, wanting to travel the world. However, he found travel empty, and returned to marry his former sweetheart, Sarah, realizing that “sometimes home isn’t a place, it’s a person, and my home had always been right here, with Sarah” (241). He again urges Joe to consider his request.

Allison Cress calls Joe to inform him that the AP will publish a follow-up story identifying Penny as Joe’s source on Senator Dobbins. Furious that the AP would give up his source, Joe immediately resigns. He goes to the Snipe’s Nest, where Vicky is filling out a college application to Minnesota State Mankato. Joe orders a Jack and Coke to celebrate his imminent inheritance and tells Vicky that the DNA results confirmed his paternity. As they drink and flirt, Charlie enters with a heavily intoxicated Harley Redding in tow. Joe confronts Charlie, taunting him by mentioning Poppi Sanchez, the child Toke once witnessed Charlie abusing. Charlie’s composure breaks, and he returns to his booth and whispers to Harley, who attacks Joe. In the mayhem, Charlie pins Joe’s arms while Harley strikes his ribs. Joe knocks Charlie down and grapples with him. The cook calls the police, and Calder arrives and arrests Harley. Charlie claims that he was breaking up the fight, but although Vicky contradicts him, Calder lets Charlie leave. Joe, who now has bruised ribs and a possible concussion, accepts Vicky’s help in walking back to the motel. Charlie watches them furiously from his car.

Vicky helps a dazed Joe into his motel room, insisting that she stay until Nathan Calder comes to take his statement. She arranges his pillows and eases him onto the bed. As they discuss whether Harley could have killed Toke, Vicky impulsively kisses Joe, who does not stop her even though he knows that he should. A knock interrupts them. Assuming that Calder has arrived, Vicky opens the door to see Lila standing there. When she sees Vicky and Joe together, she runs to her car in tears. Joe, hindered by his injuries, cannot reach her before she drives away.

Still smarting from the bar fight, Joe drives frantically back to St. Paul, calling Lila twice without receiving an answer. He enters the apartment and finds her on the bed, crying. In the ensuing conversation, he explains how he met Vicky and describes their interactions. He says that when he got into a fight, Vicky walked him home, and they kissed once. Lila accuses Joe of failing the simple task of being a decent man. When Joe mentions the inheritance, she rejects the implication that money matters to her. Lila explains that she had driven to Buckley to surprise him before her bar exam, feeling guilty about having left him to deal with his problems on his own. Now, she orders him to leave and says she does not want to hear from him because she needs to focus on the exam. Knowing that there is nothing more he can say, Joe departs, hoping that the relationship will not be lost.