If Something Happens to Me

Poppy meets with Chantelle over lunch to talk about the case. Poppy fills Chantelle in about Ryan and decoding the note. She also tells Chantelle about Fincher. Chantelle recognizes that Fincher’s talking points come from Malcolm Gladwell (a name Poppy doesn’t recognize). Chantelle has also followed up on her tip about the custom suit and has the name of a tailor in Philadelphia. She picks up her phone to call him.

Poppy wonders if they should get a warrant, but Chantelle shushes her. Chantelle pretends to be the daughter of the deceased man as she talks to the tailor. She maneuvers him into revealing the name of his dead client: Patrick Donnelly.

Ryan is driving to the south of France. Alison’s ancestors lived in a town called Cordes-sur-Ciel that she nicknamed the “Place in the Clouds.” Ryan realizes her note means to look for her there. The sketch of her grandparents’ house that she carries comes from her trips there.

Ryan pulls off the highway to FaceTime Nora. To his surprise, the entire law student group crowds on camera. A worried Nora confided in them, and they are all eager to help Ryan, even if it means coming to France. Eddie also reveals that he’s known Ryan’s true identity since their first semester. Ryan is touched and tells them that he needs them to help his search digitally. The group agrees to use their different computer, coding, art, and language skills to look for traces of Alison in public records, to search for the house in Alison’s sketch, and to see if any art galleries in the town are displaying work that reflects Alison’s style.

Alison—now going under the name Sophia Rosseau—talks with her father about Ken’s warning. She dreads the prospect of having to start over yet again. She insists on going into her art gallery and keeping a normal routine for at least one more day. She leaves her dad tinkering with his car and rides her bike to work. She muses on her past and thinks of Ryan. She is the one who had talked her father and Ken into planting the evidence on the MRK. As she bikes, she gets an uneasy feeling that she is being watched.

Ryan reaches Cordes-sur-Ciel and starts driving aimlessly through the town. Then, his friends deliver. They send him three potential locations. The first is a bust. He suddenly spots a woman on a bicycle and recognizes Alison. He tries to follow her through the town’s old and winding streets but loses her. He pulls over and checks his location. One of the three addresses his friends uncovered is an art gallery that is only a 100 feet away. There is a bicycle parked out front.

Ryan sees a sketch by Alison of two young lovers caught in the rain, confirming he’s at the right location. Another man enters the gallery before Ryan arrives. He decides to wait to talk to Alison alone until he sees a tattooed hand turn the gallery’s sign to “Closed.” He thinks back to the killer on the CCTV in England and recognizes the man who entered. Ryan bursts into the shop to see Alison at the counter and no one else in sight. She mouths the word “Run.”

A man bursts into Michael’s house with a gun, and Michael runs to get his own gun. To his surprise, the intruder lowers his weapon and reaches for his phone. He identifies himself as Brian O’Leary and shows Michael a photo of his daughter with a gun to her head. When Michael begs for her life, Brian proposes a deal. Since no one knows how much Michael has made by investing the O’Leary money, he can send $15 million to Shane’s account and secretly send $5 million to Brian. If he does, then maybe Alison will escape. Michael (though secretly skeptical) agrees. He claims that he has set up his accounts so he can only transfer money in person as a security measure. He says he can drive to the bank with Brian and start the transactions.

A menacing figure pops up from behind the gallery’s counter and shoots at Ryan with a silenced handgun. Alison knocks off his aim for the first shot. Ryan charges, dodging two more bullets, before grabbing a small sculpture and hurling it into the assailant’s chest. He tackles the man to the ground. The man manages to pistol whip Ryan, but Ryan is determined not to repeat his failure the night Alison was taken. He shrugs off the man’s attacks, despite his strength, and uses his fists to pound the man’s face until the man stops moving. Alison finally stops him.

Michael insists that they need to take his car since the bank manager would be suspicious if he shows up in another car. They arrive at the bank and park in front of the concrete barriers that protect it. As they talk, Brian lets slip that they killed Ken. Michael asks for confirmation that his daughter is still alive. However, when Brian tries to call his partner, no one answers. Michael decides his best chance lies with his secret contingency plan. He walks toward the bank and then suddenly ducks behind the cover of the barriers. He pulls a remote detonator from his pocket and presses the button.

Poppy and Chantelle trace Patrick Donnelly to the O’Leary crime family. They speculate that Alison and her father were in WITSEC. Then, Poppy gets a call from the sheriff’s office saying that no one has seen or heard from Ken. She agrees to look for him at the hospital with her dad and at his home. After reluctantly saying goodbye to Chantelle—she has enjoyed bonding with her—she gets in the car. She hears a voice from the back seat.

Ryan stands up, grabbing the gun. The intruder is unconscious but alive. Ryan hears sirens in the street and goes outside to check, but he determines they are headed to another part of town where smoke rises from an explosion. Returning inside, he sees the intruder is back on his feet and holding a garrote around Alison’s neck. Ryan hesitates, doubting he can shoot the man without hurting Alison. Before anyone can react, however, Michael enters stealthily through the back door, grabs the intruder’s head from behind, and easily snaps his neck.

Poppy’s fear turns into anger as she discovers Fincher in the backseat. Fincher has learned that Poppy has learned Patrick’s identity and suggests sharing information. Fincher confirms Alison and her father were fleeing the O’Learys but shoots down the theory of them being in WITSEC. Through a rambling tangent, Fincher tells Poppy about Anthony’s suicide, Alison’s role in it, the O’Learys’ murderous vengeance, the Harpers’ flight, and how the O’Leary family tracked down Alison using the viral video. Fincher offers two new tips. First, she says that someone in WITSEC and at her FBI office is dirty. That is why the pickup she arranged with WITSEC got replaced with the O’Leary ambush. Second, she claims that she knows this inside information because Patrick Donnelly was her CI (confidential informant). However, without knowing who the O’Learys control in her office and WITSEC, she’s been powerless to act on that information.

Fincher tells Poppy that it is her turn to share information. Poppy shares what she knows about Ryan, Peter Jones, and the decoded message. As they talk about Peter, they deduce that he gave up Ken. Fincher warns Poppy that she will probably never see Ken again.

Alison (now Sophia) refuses to leave her life behind yet again. Michael feels desperate. He swore to never to kill again after Iraq, yet for his daughter he considers blowing up the entire O’Leary tavern. Ryan urges them to enter WITSEC instead and testify to take down the O’Leary organization. When Michael says their last attempt failed, Ryan suggests reaching out through his lawyer and Poppy. When Michael realizes Poppy is his old friend’s daughter, he agrees.

Poppy investigates Ken’s home and discovers nobody home. She decides Fincher guessed right about Ken being taken. Poppy knows she needs to involve the FBI but hesitates about how to do it if Fincher was right about a dirty agent. At that moment, her phone rings. Ryan is calling her for help.

Michael, Alison, and Ryan have arrived at an apartment in Paris that belongs to Alison’s family to sleep and catch a flight the next day. Alison sneaks out with Ryan and they go to the Louvre to the memorial plaque she used for their code. They go to a café and Ryan realizes just how different Alison has become—she is sophisticated and very French. He finds himself thinking of Nora. He asks Alison why she never told him the truth about her past. Alison explains that she didn’t like her old self, Taylor, who bullied Anthony, and she resolved to change. Ryan says he struggled to forgive himself for letting her be taken; he says she has to forgive herself to become herself. Alison intuits that Ryan is in love with someone else and tacitly gives him her approval.