Libby and Nash’s purple powder is brushed over the blank page, and heat from a lamp reveals a hidden letter in Tobias Hawthorne’s handwriting. Zara grabs the letter first, reads it privately, and breaks down in tears before dropping it. Avery picks it up and reads the message aloud to herself and the others.

The letter is addressed to Zara and Skye. Tobias explains that if they are reading it, they have followed his trail together, and he confirms that Toby did not die on Hawthorne Island. Tobias says a local fisherman pulled Toby from the ocean badly burned, but Tobias never found him and believes Toby has spent years running, possibly from Tobias himself.

Tobias admits he failed all three of his children: he demanded too much from Zara, too little from Skye, treated both daughters differently because they were women, and hurt Toby worst of all. He says he tried to do better with the next generation and deliberately kept his fortune from his children because of burdensome legacies they should not inherit. The letter directs Zara and Skye to find Toby, lists locations where Tobias traced him, and points them to a safe-deposit box at Montgomery National Bank containing a police report and investigative files. The key is hidden under a false bottom in Tobias’s toolbox.

Avery realizes Tobias left that toolbox to Oren in the updated will, suggesting the old man intentionally drew Oren into the puzzle. Avery also notes that the letter refers to the previous twelve years, meaning Tobias wrote it eight years earlier, but he may have continued adding information to the safe-deposit box before changing his will and leaving everything to Avery.

Grayson focuses on Tobias’s warning about legacies his family should not have to bear, while Jameson pushes Avery to examine the list of Toby’s locations. Avery recognizes several places—Hawaii, New Zealand, Machu Picchu, Tokyo, and Bali—as the same locations on her mother’s blank postcards. She runs to her room, retrieves the postcards, and realizes her mother may have received them from Toby, linking Avery’s mother directly to the Hawthorne mystery.