On the flight from St. Lucia to Dublin, Steve begins sus­pect­ing Max High­field after read­ing an inter­view where Max declared his film *The Rose of Sara­so­ta* as his best work. Dis­ap­point­ed by its lack of acclaim, Steve man­ages to endure only eight min­utes of the movie before humor­ous­ly not­ing that Max’s char­ac­ter is an army explo­sives expert nick­named “Joe Blow.” As he and Rosie head to Dubai, Steve recalls mem­o­ries of feed­ing his cat, Trou­ble, left­overs from his neigh­bor Mar­garet’s roast chick­en, which spoiled the cat for store-bought food—a sit­u­a­tion he now par­al­lels with his dis­com­fort on this pri­vate Lear­jet.

Despite being lux­u­ri­ous, this jet feels cramped com­pared to oth­ers, and Steve is dis­ap­point­ed there’s no pri­vate chef avail­able for his crav­ing of a bacon sand­wich. He resolves that after they con­front Max and iden­ti­fy François Lou­bet, he will avoid fly­ing again. Sit­ting with Rosie, Steve acknowl­edges their find­ings: they’ve con­firmed Max is indeed Joe Blow, thanks to influ­encer con­nec­tions. Rosie play­ful­ly cri­tiques the jet’s size, and a light ban­ter ensues about celebri­ty meet­ings.

Rosie express­es cau­tious con­cern about pos­si­ble threats from Eddie Flood or Vasiliy Karpin. Their con­ver­sa­tion shifts to more mun­dane top­ics like a quiz com­pe­ti­tion, reveal­ing con­trast­ing personalities—Rosie, who now lives on a pri­vate island, and Steve, whose feline com­pan­ion is his clos­est friend. As they engage in deep­er dis­cus­sions about age and loss, both reflect on the inevitabil­i­ty of death, evok­ing a melan­cholic yet humor­ous tone.

Steve sug­gests Rosie could lever­age her sec­ond-biggest-author sta­tus to meet with Max, hint­ing at col­lab­o­ra­tive ideas. They dis­cuss their ongo­ing inves­ti­ga­tion regard­ing Lou­bet, express­ing trust in their col­league Jeff, while anx­ious­ly pon­der­ing whether Max could also be impli­cat­ed as Lou­bet. Rosie doubts Max’s intel­lect, rem­i­nisc­ing about his clue­less­ness seen in a *Van­i­ty Fair* inter­view. The chap­ter wraps up with Steve mus­ing about miss­ing these moments, even the lit­tle incon­ve­niences of pri­vate jets, sig­nal­ing a bit­ter­sweet real­iza­tion about rela­tion­ships formed amidst their inves­ti­ga­tions.

In Chap­ter 81 of “All the Col­ors of the Dark,” Saint and her grand­moth­er, Nor­ma, vis­it the Cas­tor Riv­er Shut-Ins. Through her Nikon, Saint cap­tures the stun­ning pink gran­ite and the sur­round­ing beau­ty, includ­ing a Saint Bernard play­ing in the plunge pools. As they stroll through the Ami­don Memo­r­i­al Con­ser­va­tion Area, the atmos­phere shifts as Nor­ma express­es con­cern for Sain­t’s emo­tion­al well-being, reflect­ing on the tur­moil that has affect­ed their lives.

Nor­ma ques­tions how much Saint wor­ries about Joseph, who has been leav­ing cryp­tic mes­sages on their answer­ing machine, ram­bling about dreams and a girl. Despite Norma’s warn­ings, Saint believes she can help Joseph. The con­ver­sa­tion reveals deep­er fam­i­ly dynam­ics, as Nor­ma admits her dis­ap­proval of Joseph, not­ing how dif­fer­ent he is from the boy she once knew. While she acknowl­edges the bond between Saint and Joseph, she fears for Saint’s hap­pi­ness and encour­ages her to look ahead to the future.

Saint, in response, feels trapped between her loy­al­ty to Joseph and her grandmother’s pro­tec­tive instincts. She pas­sion­ate­ly insists on find­ing the girl from Joseph’s dreams, despite Nor­ma’s warn­ings about los­ing her­self in the process. This emo­tion­al ten­sion cul­mi­nates as they return home in silence, with Saint grap­pling with the weight of her com­mit­ments.

Upon return­ing, Saint dis­cov­ers an invi­ta­tion in their mail­box for Misty Meyer’s six­teenth birth­day par­ty. While ini­tial­ly resis­tant, Nor­ma insists that she should attend, par­tic­u­lar­ly because Joseph will be there. Saint, dis­tract­ed by her obses­sion with find­ing the girl for Joseph, strug­gles to grasp the sig­nif­i­cance of the occa­sion and reflects on what it means for their rela­tion­ship. Nor­ma urges her to remind Joseph that he hasn’t lost every­thing, high­light­ing the poten­tial for recon­nec­tion amidst their shared chal­lenges. The chap­ter ends with a poignant reminder of the emo­tion­al depth and strug­gles that define their lives.