At five o’clock in the morning, Jamie wakes to find Simon is missing from his room. A frantic search of their home reveals that while his Jeep is still in the garage, Simon himself is gone. Fearing he has died by suicide, Jamie runs into the backyard to search for his body. Jamie confronts Rory, whispering that she knows he was aware of what Simon did to Nina. When she presses him on whether he actively helped Simon, Rory admits that he did, because he loves Simon and Jamie. They agree that they must find Simon and get him away somewhere new, with both parents agreeing they will help their son manage his guilt.

Andy carries Simon’s body down the mountain to an empty house, calls Leanne, and confesses that he killed Simon. Leanne immediately takes control, formulating a plan to cover up the crime. Before leaving the house, she uses Andy’s phone to create a digital alibi for him, sending texts and emails and spending 20 minutes scrolling through YouTube. She then drives to the local supermarket, Mehuron’s, where she is seen by acquaintances before eluding a trailing journalist by slipping out a back door. 

Leanne drives to house, where she finds Andy waiting with Simon’s body. Andy wraps Simon’s body in plastic and refuses Leanne’s help loading the body into her trunk. To avoid being seen on the drive home, Leanne makes Andy hide in the trunk with the corpse. Back at their property, they use a mini excavator to dig an eight-foot-deep grave under the floor of their barn. After burying Simon, they meticulously replace the bricks and establish their coordinated alibi, agreeing to never speak of the murder again.

At police headquarters, Matthew learns from Sarah Jane that, in addition to the three vehicles the Jordans are known to drive, they also own an old Dodge Ram truck without a GPS system, which Simon could have used to move Nina’s body without being tracked. Sarah Jane finds evidence that Simon was live-streaming online the night he would have had to move the body, stopping at two o’clock in the morning. Matthew calculates that this leaves a four-hour window in which Simon could have committed the act. 

Later, when the detectives follow up with the Jordans’ lawyer about Simon’s phone, Waugh claims that the phone is unavailable because Jamie accidentally dropped it into a lake at their Stowe property. Skeptical, Matthew secures a warrant to send a dive team to search the lake. He confirms with the head of forensics that it is highly probable they can retrieve the phone and recover data from it.

Jamie and Rory discover Simon’s hiking gear is gone and conclude that he has fled to Canada via the Long Trail. They devise a plan to stall the police for several days by claiming Simon is sick with COVID-19. Their plan is abruptly thwarted when their lawyer calls to inform them that police are already at their Stowe property with a warrant to search the lake for Simon’s phone. A panicked Rory demands that Waugh stop them from searching the lake. Confused, Jamie follows Rory out to his car, pleading with him to tell her what’s going on. 

Rory races to Stowe with Jamie to stop Matthew and his team from diving for the phone, but he’s too late. As they watch, the divers searching for the phone surface with Nina’s body, wrapped in the cream rug and weighed down by weights from the Jordan’s home gym. In that moment, Jamie realizes what has happened and quietly asks Rory if he put Nina in the lake. He admits that he moved Nina’s body to hide Simon’s crime because he “wanted it all to go away” (472).

Matthew visits the Fraser family to inform them that Nina’s body has been found and that Simon, the primary suspect, is now a missing fugitive. After Nina’s funeral, the family learns that Rory has been arrested as an accessory to murder. The police theory, supported by some forensic evidence, is that Simon punched Nina, causing a fatal fall against a fireplace in the living room. 

Months later, after the Frasers have returned to Waitsfield, Jamie appears at their door. She tells Leanne that even though the police are still searching for Simon, she believes Simon is dead, not on the run. She says that if the situation were reversed, she might try to hurt the person who killed her child. She begs Leanne, “mother to mother” (481), to simply nod if she knows Simon is dead, so that she can have peace. Leanne sees Jamie’s deep suffering but chooses to protect her own family’s secret. She tells Jamie, “I can’t help you” (482), and shuts the door.