Pip conducts a brief follow-up interview with Emma Hutton to test new rumors about Andie Bell. Pip asks whether Andie was seeing someone older while dating Sal Singh. Emma confirms that Andie claimed she was, though Andie never named the man and enjoyed keeping the secret from her friends.

Emma says Andie began mentioning the older man around March, not long before Andie disappeared. Emma explains that she and Chloe Burch were the only friends who knew, but Emma never told the police because she doubted whether the man was real and assumed Andie might have invented him for drama.

Pip then asks whether Andie ever had tension with Naomi Ward. Emma says she knows of no problem with Naomi, but remembers Andie strongly disliking Elliot Ward, Naomi’s father and a history teacher at Kilton Grammar. Emma cannot say why, guessing it might have been something ordinary like a dress-code reprimand.

After the interview, Pip is disturbed that another lead points toward someone close to her. Pip reasons that Andie’s dislike of Elliot might be innocent, but it conflicts with Elliot’s earlier claim that he barely knew Andie in the final two years of her life.

Pip reluctantly considers whether Elliot could be the secret older man. Although Pip resists the idea because she knows and trusts Elliot, she recognizes that a teacher involved with a student could be “ruined” if exposed. Pip decides she needs to confront Elliot for facts before paranoia makes her suspect everyone around her.