Opening
Retired detective K. William Hodges breaks into the Hartsfield house and uncovers a dead mother upstairs and a high-tech lair below—proof that Brady Hartsfield runs his crimes from home and plans for erasure. While the police chase a mob-related red herring, Hodges’s team nearly triggers a total data wipe, and Holly emerges as the investigation’s new backbone.
What Happens
Chapter 116: Breaking and Entering
Hodges gets no answer at the Hartsfield residence and picks the back-door lock with his father’s old tools. Inside, the kitchen is almost unnaturally neat, the kind of order that signals a solitary, controlled life. As he moves through the hushed rooms, a faint sour smell rides the stairwell. He clears a sterile guest room, then follows the odor into the master bedroom.
Under a coverlet on the bed lies Deborah Ann Hartsfield. Her skin is waxy, her body unmarked. Hodges studies the scene and concludes she likely choked to death on her own vomit after a bender—a grim self-undoing rather than direct filicide. He checks Brady Hartsfield’s room: mess, a Terminator poster, and then a small study with a framed photo of teenage Brady and his mother, posed disturbingly close—more lovers than parent and child. The image throws a spotlight on their warped bond and the Dysfunctional Family Dynamics that shape Brady. In the kitchen, Hodges finds a door to the basement and descends into a converted command center: a clean, sophisticated bank of computers and gear. Out of his technical depth, he decides to bring in his partners.
Chapter 117: The Suicide Program
Hodges summons Jerome Robinson and Holly Gibney. Holly immediately identifies the smell upstairs as death. In the basement, the trio take in the immaculate array and tight organization. Holly argues it wouldn’t be fair—or wise—to hand everything over to the police when they’re the ones who uncovered the killer. Hoping for a clue, Jerome powers on a machine.
A large “20” fills the screen and starts counting down. As Hodges and Jerome hesitate, Holly shouts at them to shut it off and slams a finger on the power button until the monitor dies. She explains that the program is likely a “suicide” script designed to wipe the drives at zero, and that only a specific keyboard sequence or a voice key could abort it. Brady’s booby-trap lays bare the weaponization of tech and the reach of Technology and Modern Crime.
Chapter 118: A Desperate Plea
Back in the kitchen, the weight of the house—and what they’ve found—lands on Hodges. He tells them he has to call the police. His Guilt and Responsibility run deep: he can’t risk another atrocity or continue exposing two civilians to danger. Jerome pledges his support. Holly explodes.
She tells Hodges he’s the only one who can catch Brady, invoking his connection to Janelle "Janey" Patterson and the victims. In a burst of anguish, she punches her own forehead and cries, “How can you give up?” The plea is raw and personal, rooted in the deaths of her cousin Olivia Trelawney and Janey. Still, with the computers locked, Brady gone, and his conscience pressing, Hodges steps outside to call his former partner.
Chapter 119: The Red Herring
Hodges reaches Pete Huntley, who answers in a rush of triumph. Pete is at King Virtue Pawn & Loan, where police have just cracked a massive arms bust. The owner is the grandson of Fabrizio Abbascia, a mobster Hodges helped put away. Among the crates: Detasheet, the rubberized explosive used in the car bomb that killed Janey.
Pete tells Hodges the case is solved: a mob revenge hit. He calls Hodges “a lucky old sonofabitch” for surviving. Hodges says little. Two realizations hit at once: the police are chasing a complete red herring, and every detective and media outlet is consumed by it. No one will spare attention for a fugitive computer tech. Seeing official avenues slam shut, Hodges ends the call without mentioning Brady.
Chapter 120: A New Assertiveness
Hodges returns to hear Holly on the phone with her mother, Charlotte, speaking with surprising calm and resolve: she’s safe, she’s with friends, and she’ll come home when she’s ready. Jerome admits he urged her to call before Charlotte reported her missing. Holly hangs up flushed but steady and tells Hodges again: they are the only ones who can find Brady.
With the police sidelined, Hodges agrees to hold the case a little longer. Holly moves immediately: take Deborah Hartsfield’s laptop. A controlling mother, she argues, would monitor her son and likely write down passwords or prompts. Hodges agrees. When he asks, half-stunned, when she became so assertive, Holly steps outside to smoke and answers without looking back: “I guess when I saw pieces of my cousin burning in the street.”
Character Development
Hodges’s instinct to protect collides with his need to stop Brady, pushing him to the edge of turning the case over—until the system proves useless. Holly, galvanized by grief, transforms from tentative outsider to decisive partner. Jerome steadies the team and amplifies Holly’s growth.
- K. William Hodges: Breaks the law to enter the house; nearly surrenders to duty; recognizes the police are off-track and recommits to the off-the-books hunt.
- Holly Gibney: Uses sensory acuity and technical intuition to save the data; confronts her mother; articulates a clear investigative strategy (Deborah’s laptop); claims her voice and purpose.
- Jerome Robinson: Loyal and practical; catalyzes Holly’s boundary-setting and stays calm under pressure; acts as moral and tactical support.
- Pete Huntley: Embodies institutional misdirection—earnest, triumphant, and tragically wrong—functionally removing official aid.
Themes & Symbols
The case pivots fully into Vigilantism and Justice Outside the Law. With the police consumed by a flashy mob bust, Hodges’s trio becomes an independent agency, forced to rely on intuition, trespass, and quick thinking to counter Brady’s traps. Justice now depends on rule-breaking and personal accountability, not institutional process.
Brady’s basement and the countdown screen literalize Technology and Modern Crime: the villain’s command center is both brain and bunker, and the “suicide program” ensures silence at discovery. The photo of Brady with his mother and the pristine-versus-squalid rooms reflect Dysfunctional Family Dynamics, showing how intimacy curdles into control and how that control shapes a killer. At the same time, Hodges’s impulse to call the police and Holly’s refusal to let go dramatize Guilt and Responsibility as both burden and fuel, forging courage from trauma.
Key Quotes
“How can you give up?”
Holly’s cry breaks the spell of Hodges’s caution. It reframes the investigation as a moral obligation rather than a procedural choice and exposes how personal the case has become for all three—especially Holly, whose pain drives her clarity.
Pete congratulates Hodges as a “lucky old sonofabitch.”
The swaggering line signals institutional blindness. While the department celebrates a clean narrative—mob revenge—Hodges hears the hollowness. The contrast heightens isolation and urgency for the vigilante team.
“I guess when I saw pieces of my cousin burning in the street.”
Holly’s answer fuses trauma with resolve. It marks her turning point from anxious bystander to agent of justice and anchors her transformation in lived cost, not sudden bravado.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
These chapters mark a decisive turn: the whodunit ends; the manhunt begins. The police, diverted by a plausible but wrong lead, leave Hodges, Holly, and Jerome to operate outside the system, where speed, nerve, and unconventional thinking matter more than warrants. The near-loss of Brady’s data proves how thin the margin is—and how essential Holly is to keeping the trail alive.
Most important, Holly steps into heroism. She saves the evidence, supplies the next lead (Deborah’s laptop), and reorients Hodges when he falters. The trio emerges as equals, bound not by official authority but by shared responsibility to stop Brady before he strikes again.