Decker is sitting in his hotel room holding his pistol. The last message from the killer has caused him to contemplate suicide again. He wonders if this might not be the only way to finally end the murder spree.

Before he can act, Miller arrives. Noticing the gun, Miller says that if Decker commits suicide, the killers win: “‘Since you’re the only one who has a shot at taking them down. They get you to eliminate yourself, they have free rein to keep doing what they’re doing’” (304).

Miller gives Decker an update about the staged murder at the Lancaster house. None of the neighbors saw anyone suspicious. Decker says this is because the killers know how to blend in and appear nonthreatening.

Miller takes Decker back to the station house to go over canvassing reports of the neighborhood to “‘see what we can see’” (306).

At the station house, Decker has been going over reports from the Lancasters’ neighbors all morning. Jamison arrives to help him. He again protests that she should leave town, but she insists on working the case.

As they review more files, Decker ponders the possibility that the killers were posing as ordinary passersby or perhaps people who had access to the Lancaster house.