Back at school, Patch moves through the halls with his head down and withdraws completely. Teachers leave him alone, and when the principal calls him in to ask how he is doing and talks about fear, bravery, and opportunity, Patch takes that opening to leave the office, walk out of school, and act on his own.

On Main Street, Patch sees Mr. and Mrs. Roberts going into Lacey’s Diner. Because he wants transportation, he goes to their house, uses the spare key under the mat, and steals the keys to their new mustard Aspen. He drives the car to the public library in Panora, where a librarian helps him use the microfiche so he can search missing-person reports from newspapers across a wide area.

For two hours, Patch studies case after case of children who vanished and were never found. The reports make him think about the damage left behind for families, and he notices how overwhelmingly the victims are girls, usually very young. His search becomes part investigation and part grim recognition that Callie may fit into a much larger pattern of predation.

Saint finds Patch at the library because her grandmother’s route passes by there and she recognizes the Robertses’ car outside. Together they look at a newspaper image of Callie Montrose, and Patch asks whether Callie was taken after him and when Grace arrived. Saint says Callie could be the girl Grace mentioned, but Patch realizes he cannot know for certain.

Patch then questions Saint about Eli Aaron, and Saint repeats what the police have told her: Eli Aaron photographed girls, may have selected victims from those pictures, left behind evidence of many vehicles, may not have acted alone, and the search of his land is still unfinished. She also tells Patch that the three recovered bodies had rosary beads wrapped around their throats. When Saint offers to return the stolen car keys to Nix and soften the consequences, Patch gives her the keys, then rejects her attempt to draw him into ordinary life and tells her to warn Nix that if law enforcement will not keep looking for Callie, Patch will. He ends by promising to burn through everything in his path until he finds her, showing that his grief has hardened into a dangerous new resolve.