Loveday Writing

Harry gives her the case of the week, the kidnapping and murder of Marcus Farrow, 28, owner of Uncharted Tours. Uncharted Tours specialises in offering wealthy clients a boutique wilderness experience. Marcus died of blunt force trauma to the head and a brick was found next to his body but no fingerprints. The main suspect is a man named Jared O’Loughlin, Jared worked for Marcus and was at his house when he went missing, and Marcus was found in Jared’s storage locker. Jared is also a young man that Harry has been mentoring as part of a rehab program for young offenders and was turning his life around. Marcus’ brother, Connor, who was also his business partner, got a ransom call for $100,000 around 9pm that evening, and Harry traced the call back to Marcus’ fiancée’s phone.

Alexa interviews Marcus’ fiancée, Dennie. Dennie is antagonistic towards Alexa straight away and tells her that she is a personal trainer and Jared showed up around 10am, wanting to talk to Marcus about not getting paid. Dennie also tells Alexa that she last left her phone in the hallway, Alexa then asks her how she called Connor at 6pm if her phone was missing. Dennie responds that she used a landline. Alexa also brings up Marcus’ one million dollar life insurance, only for Dennie to angrily tell her to leave.

Later, Alexa and Madison go to Uncharted Tours. Alexa talks to Connor in his office, where he reveals he runs the financial and administrative aspects of the business, and Marcus asked for his help running the business. Meanwhile, Madison speaks with another employee, Vincent, who tells her that he was meant to see Marcus on the day he died but he never showed up. Connor tells Alexa he learnt Marcus was missing around 6pm after Dennie called.

Later, Alexa and Madison talk to Connor and his wife, Lena, together, who tell them that the ransom call came at 8.53pm, as Lena looked at the clock when the call came. Connor assumes Jared made the ransom call, and dipped into Uncharted Tour’s safe to secure some of the ransom funds, but the instructions never came. Connor also tells them that the young offenders program that Jared was a part of came to do a tour and that he liked Jared, but Marcus didn’t want to hire him, Connor talked him into it. Afterwards, Alexa and Madison go to the place where the ransom call was traced and Alexa questions why he’d make the ransom call so close to Marcus’ house and Uncharted Tours, but so far away from the storage locker.

Alexa goes to see Jared in jail and asks him about Dennie’s phone, as Dennie says he took it. Jared tells her Dennie’s lying and that he went to work but wouldn’t do anything until Marcus paid him, as he hadn’t been paid in a month. Jared says things got heated between him and Marcus, Dennie cooled him down, Marcus promised to pay him later and he left. Dennie rang him to cool him down after her gym session with a client. Madison traces the phone call, but it didn’t come from Dennie’s phone, it came from the Uncharted Tours office.

Alexa goes to the Uncharted Tours office and talks to Vincent. Vincent says he spoke to Marcus over the phone and denies Marcus calling him “baby”, a nickname Jared overheard when he saw Marcus. Meanwhile, Madison and Harry meet for a coffee, Madison wants to see Jared, but Harry tells her Jared may not want to see her, as it was hard to convince him to meet with Alexa. Madison tells Harry how she got into police work and how the police officer who caught her hired her to give her a second chance, and that she can use that to relate to Jared. Harry tells her that Jared ended up in juvie as he took the fall for his uncle so his cousins wouldn’t end up in foster care.

Later, Madison sees Jared, and he admits that his confrontation with Marcus almost became violent but he didn’t want to let Harry down. He drove up north, calmed down. When Madison gets back to Alexa’s apartment, she tells her that she has a theory – Jared was arguing with Marcus about not getting paid, if he took Dennie’s phone and turned it off three minutes later that had to have happened while they were arguing, who formulates a kidnap and ransom plan in the middle of a blow-up argument? Madison also tells her that Marcus was insolvent, yet he went on a luxury holiday to Paris, staying in the lovers’ suite, two months earlier. Later when Alexa meets up with Harry, he tells her that there was a theft at the hotel Marcus was staying at, so the hotel staff photographed the IDs of the guests, revealing that Vincent went to Paris with Marcus.

Alexa goes to see Dennie, who reveals that she and Marcus were in an open relationship. She also tells Alexa after his parents died, Marcus had issues with addiction, the business struggled and when Connor came back to help, Marcus improved and wanted to earn Connor’s trust. Later, Madison and Harry go to Jared’s storage locker, Harry finds a photo of Jared in front of the locker and discovers that the padlock in the photo doesn’t match the padlock that the police broke to get into the locker when they found Marcus’ body.

Later when Madison returns to Alexa’s apartment, they debate the possibility of Dennie and Vincent working together as they both have motive. Alexa points out that if the intention was to collect on Marcus’ life insurance, he always had to die and therefore the ransom call was a red herring.

The next day, Connor brings Alexa to see Vincent, who’s sitting on a bench near a cliff. Alexa asks Vincent where he was the day Marcus was killed. Vincent angrily jumps up and confronts Alexa, saying Marcus loved him and storms off. Madison calls Alexa, telling her that Vincent has a solid alibi on the day of Marcus’ murder, and that Marcus went to Paris to gamble, embezzling money from the business and from Connor, who is also inheriting Marcus’ house. Connor sneaks up on Alexa and takes her phone, but Alexa manages to run away.

Connor tries to chase Alexa, only to hear her scream. He finds her jacket in the ocean and assumes she fell to her death, but Alexa is dangling off the cliff. He then throws Alexa’s phone in the ocean after Madison rings her, concerned for her welfare. After Connor walks away, Alexa climbs back up to the top of the cliff, while Madison calls Harry to form a search party for her. Just as Madison leaves the apartment to join the search party, Alexa shows up. When the power goes off in her apartment again and Alexa sees her oven clock flashing after the power’s restored, she figures out how Connor murdered Marcus.

Alexa goes to see Lena and asks to look at her clocks. Later, Connor returns and Alexa is there waiting for him. Alexa asks him if he got offers on their parents’/Marcus’ house. Alexa reveals to him, Lena (and the audience) that he slipped into their parents’ house grabbed Dennie’s phone and waited until Dennie and Jared left to kill Marcus. He took Marcus to Jared’s garage and replaced the lock. There was also no ransom call, he turned off Dennie’s phone so it couldn’t be tracked, he left his phone outside the door, switching on the auto answer function so he could pretend he got the ransom call, and he set the clocks back 20 minutes so he could give himself an alibi. Alexa asks Connor if he was angry at Marcus for gambling away his money after all he sacrificed to help him. Connor says everything she said is circumstantial, but Harry walks in and tells him they found Marcus’ blood in the boot of his car.

The episode ends with Harry visiting Alexa as Jared ditched him for a date with Madison. Jared and Madison talk about their criminal history and how far they’ve grown since being caught in their crimes.

Overall I felt that this was a solid episode, the in media res start to the episode brought some fresh air to the show, and the technological aspects of the murder were original. I also appreciated getting some insight into Harry, with the reveal of his mentoring and his taking the case personally.

Stray Observations:

Running gags – Madison wanting to call an electrician to fix the circuit breaker in Alexa’s apartment, and Harry showing up early to everything.

-Madison’s surname is Feliciano.

Best one liners and interactions:

• “For goodness sake! If you know I’m always going to be late, it would be polite for you to be late too!” (Alexa to Harry)
• “I was 16 and illegally accessed a government inquiry on climate change.” “So, shoplifting for nerds.” “Ah, excuse you, bank robbing for nerds.” (Madison-Harry-Madison on how she got into police work)
• “Can you fix it?” “God no, I thought we were just staring at it together in solidarity.” (Alexa-Harry on her circuit breaker)
• “I could ask him to come and take a look this weekend.” “Is he an electrician?” “No, but at least you know him.” (Harry-Alexa-Harry on Jared taking a look at Alexa’s circuit breaker and the fact that Alexa doesn’t like letting people she doesn’t know in her apartment)