Grant can’t sleep. He guessed that Julia would duck out, at least to go check on Ned in person, and he watches from his upstairs bedroom window as his sister sneaks into the greenbelt. She’ll walk right past the tree where the money was left for him, and he wonders if he should stay at the window, waiting for her return.

Or go out to the tree and see what’s there now. What if it’s more money?

What are these lies he’s been told? What is the bad thing his father’s done? He doesn’t want to believe it has to do with Danielle. It can’t. That’s his dad.

Be the cat, looking out the window.

Does that mean the person leaving stuff for him in the tree can see him right now? He goes back to the window, the room lit up behind him, and stares out into the night.

Then he thinks about it: How does the Sender know about his tree? Who knew? His family. Did either of his parents tell people about it? Maybe they told Danielle? Oh, guess what Grant does. It’s so funny. Who would remember that? Who would care? He’s sure he hasn’t mentioned it to anyone.

He needs to find a way to catch the Sender. If they’ve left him something in the tree again, they might do so a third time. He could catch them then.

But he’s scared to go out in the night and check the tree right now. Danielle went out in the night and died. Julia just went and he did nothing, but he can guess where she’s going. Mike’s house, to see Ned. He wonders how Mike and Peter and Ned are doing. Instead he goes to the computer.

He opens the Sender’s email and reads it again. He hates email. It’s so much worse than texting. Maybe this is an older person who doesn’t text? His friends have complained about grandparents who won’t bother to learn texting. So he has these few clues to go on: the pictures sent to him, the Gmail address, the spoofing of Drew’s address to send him the original mail.

You don’t have to wait for the Sender to tell you who he or she is. You could find out. His parents were always telling him this—to take the initiative, to be a leader. It looks good on college applications, and it’s simply never too early to worry about that.

How do you trace an email?