In the first episode of “The Last Thing He Told Me,” the primary engineer at the software company The Shop, Owen Michaels (Nikolaj Coster Waldau), goes missing, leaving his wife Hannah (Jennifer Garner) and her stepdaughter Bailey clueless about the situation. The second episode follows up immediately after a US Marshal visits Hannah and asks her to contact him if anything comes up. Here’s what happens in the second episode.
Spoilers Ahead
The Troubles On The Day After
As the news about The Shop’s fraudulent software, Clean Slate, being non-functional, and the organization being raided by the FBI makes news, Hannah Hall stands in the kitchen and thinks about a day she’d spent with Owen. He’d fallen asleep working and said that he needed a vacation, and she wanted to go to New Austin, but Owen said it reminded him of his times in college. Owen consumed an awful amount of recreational drugs and didn’t want to talk about that, but Hannah had reassured him that there’d be nothing he could tell her that’d drive them apart. She’s brought back to her senses by the news of The Shop’s CEO, Avett Thompson, making bail and heading to his mansion and that other employees of the software company are being investigated, and Hannah turns the TV off. She calls their family friend and lawyer, Carl, and leaves a message in his voicemail saying that she hasn’t heard from Owen and that a US Marshal has shown up; she also adds that she might need a lawyer.
In her room, Bailey is staring at her phone, looking at the unanswered texts she sent her dad when her boyfriend Bobby texts her to ask if he’s back or not. Someone named Lynn Williams has been tagging Bailey on every news story about the bust at The Shop. Hannah asks Bailey if she wants to share something with her stepmother, but the teenager chooses silence again. While taking Bailey to school, Hannah notices a car tailing them, and she suddenly speeds up and takes a different route to school, even telling the teenager that she’ll wait for Bailey after the last period. At her school, all the classmates are talking about Bailey, as Lynn Williams has named her the daughter of one of the employees in The Shop. While driving back, Hannah talks to her friend Jules and mentions the car that was tailing them. Jules’ partner Max arrives and informs Hannah that Owen is a material witness and the cops are looking for him. Hannah says things are really bad with Bailey and adds that she has Owen’s laptop and is inclined to go through his mail. She hangs up because she’s at her studio.
The FBI Gets Involved
Hannah carries Owen’s laptop to the garden and opens it to find his latest will, but the document is password-protected and isn’t opening despite Hannah’s inputting Bailey’s birthday—the provided hint. Just then, two FBI agents arrive, and Hannah tells them this isn’t the best time, and then they wave a warrant and take the laptop. Hannah is leaving when the agents mention Bailey and that if Owen doesn’t arrive in the next 24 hours, the state will have to get involved, and she says that she’s already discussed all this with a US Marshal named Grady Bradford. However, the agents are surprised and ask her not to talk to any random person about this matter so openly, and Hannah retorts back, saying they need to contact her lawyer Carl if they wish to speak to her, and warns them to leave Bailey out of this fiasco.
A Ponzi Scheme
Hannah drives to Carl’s house and leaves a message saying she has no idea why he’s not picking up her calls, and when she does show up, nobody answers. However, someone is keeping watch on her from a distance, like in Episode 1. Just as Hannah is about to leave, someone flips open the blinds and immediately drops them, but she notices it and begins calling Carl again until he peeks his head out and says it isn’t a good time and that they shall talk later. She tries saying she needs his help, but he parts the door to show his daughter’s birthday party is being celebrated, as Carl’s wife Patty hands him their daughter and walks out to speak to Hannah. Patty says that they’d invested most of their life savings in and shames Hannah for running a Ponzi scheme in The Shop, but the bewildered Hannah says she had no clue about any of this until she heard about it, and her husband has been missing for a day. Patty says that every marriage has a liar and a fool, and if Hannah is truly a fool, she feels sorry for her, but they can’t help her anymore. She stands there, insulted, after Patty slams the door in her face, while in the distance, the man who presented himself as the US Marshal keeps watch on her.
Who’s Jake Davis?
Bailey has a hard time at school with the classmates laughing and talking in hushed tones about her father until her boyfriend Bobby spots her, and she finds comfort in his arms. Hannah decides to call Jake Davis, as her mind flashes back to a time when she and Owen shared champagne while sitting on a beach, and she mentioned Jake—a great lawyer and her ex-boyfriend. She asked him about Bailey’s mom, Olivia, and wanted more details than just the fact that she died when their daughter was a child. Owen told her that Olivia lost her life in a tragic car accident and Bailey was still a child which is why she doesn’t remember much of her mother, so it’s probably a good thing. He adds that even though Olivia’s death was the worst thing to happen to him, finding Hannah might’ve helped him.
After contemplating the time with Owen, she calls Jake, who immediately assumes something is up since he hasn’t heard from her since her engagement. She says she needs a lawyer because her husband is in trouble because he’s the primary engineer at The Shop, FBI agents have grilled her, and a US Marshal showed up at her doorstep. Jake understands the FBI and warns about SEC involvement but is surprised to learn about the Marshal because Marshal Law is involved only if there’s a fugitive involved. Jake is adamant about the fact that Owen must be guilty of something because he chose to run, while Hannah pleads with him to look at Owen with a little less preconceived notion. Jake finally agrees to help and says he can have a private investigator do some digging to see if he can find out anything about Owen, if possible, and Hannah agrees.
A Breaking And Entering?
Bailey is lying on Bobby’s lap in the field when his coach congratulates him for getting into Duke University, and she walks away, upset that Bobby accepted the offer before even informing her. She runs back home, drenched in the rain, and goes upstairs upon hearing noises coming from her dad’s room, but is terrified upon seeing the window near the deck opening and runs out. Hannah is working in her studio on a piece, but for a moment, her mind plays tricks, and she thinks she saw Owen, making her drop the piece and break it. Bailey barges in, and Hannah raises concern about how it’s not safe for her to be leaving school all by herself when Bailey says someone might’ve broken into the house because she heard noises and the window was open.
Hannah calls 911 to report a break-in, but the cops don’t find any signs of forced entry, so she thanks the officer for their help as the neighbors speak among themselves because the Michaels are the gossip of the town at the moment. Upon entering the house, Hannah checks to see if anything has gone missing, from her jewelry to the bag of cash, but nothing seems out of order. Hannah pours herself a glass of wine and is preparing Bailey a grilled cheese when someone knocks at the door, and the two women are immediately tensed. Hannah approaches the door and asks the stranger to identify themselves when Jules announces that she and Max brought pizza. Max asks about Owen, and Hannah tells her not to bring it up immediately, and things are about to get a little tense when Hannah apologizes and explains that this is the longest she’s gone without talking to Owen ever since she got to know him.
While Max and Hannah speak about the situation Han finds herself in, Jules and Bailey enjoy salted caramel ice cream, and the teenager tells her that Bobby will be leaving for Duke. Bailey says she’d told Owen about her plans to go away with Bobby and his parents for the weekend, but her dad freaked out about something and seemed scared that Bailey would be a lot further away from him. So it seems very strange that he’d stay away this long and not speak to his daughter. Max tells Hannah that the US Marshal seems suspicious because he didn’t show any official identification, and Hannah remembers that he wrote his number on a napkin instead of a card. When Max takes a look at the number and says it has an Austin area code, Hannah remembers Owen’s lack of enthusiasm when she’d asked him to join her at a woodworkers’ convention in Austin when she receives a text from Carl, who wants to meet. Carl meets her and says that they didn’t invest in The Shop, and instead, he lost the money in sports betting, so Hannah asks him to talk to his wife so that Patty doesn’t spread any further lies about Owen. She then asks if Owen ever mentioned Austin to Carl, and he remembers that once upon a time, when the two visited a concert in Austin, Owen seemed adamant on the way home that he’d never been to Texas.
The Dark Orange Stadium
After Carl leaves, Hannah calls the Austin Marshals Office and asks if Agent Bradford is available, but she immediately disconnects when the director says they’ll patch her through to him. Once again, she spots the same man who’d been keeping watch at her home in Episode 1, and she hurries back home. On the deck, Bailey is going through the pictures of her father and her when Hannah joins her and says she’s got an idea about the note Owen left her. Hannah asks Bailey if the father-daughter duo spent any time in Austin and adds that a US Marshal had shown up in the morning and that he’s based out of Austin. Bailey thinks hard and has a faint guess that Owen might’ve taken her to a football game in a dark orange stadium once, and it could’ve been Texas, but she can’t recall. She dismisses a call from Bobby and shoos Hannah away when she asks about it.
What Does Hannah Plan?
Hannah calls Jake and asks him to use his college football knowledge to tell her the colors of the Austin football team, and she’s surprised to learn they’re white and burnt orange. She says that Owen might’ve taken Hannah there for a football game and connects the dots by saying the US Marshal is from Austin, so it’s possible Owen is running for some different reason altogether, having nothing to do with the fraud at The Shop. Hannah goes back on the deck and agrees that Bailey shouldn’t go to school the next day and that she’s got a plan. The next morning, Marshal Bradford arrives outside the Michaels’ place, but he just finds Hannah’s truck parked. Hannah and Bailey are on a plane by then, and they’re heading to Austin, and that’s what her plan was. That’s where they’re headed to solve the mystery of Owen’s disappearance and find out why the Marshal is chasing him.
