Colter Shaw Races Against the Clock for a Missing Girl -

Editor’s note: The below recap contains spoilers for Tracker Season 2 Episode 18.

Small town drama almost gets the best of Colter Shaw (Justin Hartley) on this week’s Tracker. One of the problems with cooperating with local law enforcement is that they come with history and biases about the people they grew up with — they might trust the wrong person or suspect someone who’s actually innocent. In Season 2, Episode 18, “Collision,” this is helpful and detrimental as Colter races against the clock to make sure that a missing blonde doesn’t become a headline.

Colter Shaw Searches for a Beauty Queen in ‘Tracker’ Season 2 Episode 18

This week’s missing person is Riley Adams (Annalisa Cochrane), a former pageant princess from Willow Creek, Michigan, who got into a minor car wreck after working at a garden center and never came home. After a quick call from Velma (Abby McEnany), Colter arrives at Riley’s mom’s house to find her and collect the $15,000 reward. He learns that Riley recently moved back to Michigan after living in New York and giving a modeling career a shot. She hasn’t really told her family why she returned, and while her mom can tell something is up, she has been trying not to pry.

Riley’s mom, Susanna (Reagan Pasternak), is really freaked out by her daughter’s disappearance. Colter deals with stressed-out family members all the time, but Susanna’s visceral fear shakes him a little bit. She’s already assuming the worst and is not hopeful that her daughter will be found alive at all. Her assumption is not surprising, given the number of true-crime documentaries we’re fed about missing pretty girls, and infamous murders like JonBenet Ramsey. Little does she know how complicated the situation is about to get.

Justin Hartley as Colter Shaw standing with Melissa Roxburgh as his sister Dory, both smiling, in Tracker

Colter Gets a Visit From Dory in New ‘Tracker’ Season 2 Images

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Colter gets help from the county sheriff, Katy (Mercedes De la Zerda), who knew Riley at school. Contrary to what Susanna told Colter about how Willow Creek lost funding for a police force during the pandemic and now relies on the county’s limited resources, Sheriff Katy is more than willing to help. When she makes a comment about becoming a cop like her father, but not joining the Navy because she’s scared of the water, he opens up to her about his fear of chickens. He loves to share personal information with strangers. After giving the area where Riley likely vanished the quickest glance, Colter finds a piece of a broken headlight on the side of the road. That, combined with skid marks on the road, is all Katy needs to get an official search started. Sometimes you just need a second set of eyes!

Colter talks to Riley’s coworker Cheryl (Summer Lynn Gillespie) first, who has a fun floral manicure and says she has been best friends with Riley since second grade. She takes Colter to Riley’s locker, where he finds a romantic poem from an unrequited crush and/or stalker inside a notebook. Cheryl comments on how pretty Riley is and how predatory men are around her. She alludes to Riley having fans. She then tells Colter that Riley was fighting with another coworker named Todd (Chris Pereira). But then, when Colter talks to Todd, he describes another dude who came to the shop and was, he thought, bothering her. Everyone has an opinion about who should be talking to Riley! He also doesn’t seem surprised that Cheryl tried to pin this on him. Such small-town behavior.

Riley’s Secrets Rapidly Unfold in ‘Tracker’ Season 2 Episode 18

Todd describes the man’s car, license plate, and produces a coffee cup from his hotel. That’s enough to give Colter a new location to check out. He calls Randy (Chris Lee) and Bobby (Eric Graise), who are now officially business partners. They identify the mystery man as a club owner named Vincent Rourke (Christopher Russell), who has been blowing up Riley’s phone. He has a wife and two kids back in New York. Randy does not call this behavior scandalous and makes a comment about how that “never stopped any dude in the history of ever” instead. Is Randy on his way to becoming a feminist ally?! Reno really did change him!

Colter convinces a valet driver that he’s there to investigate an insurance claim on Vincent’s car, which looks like it was recently in a wreck. He peeps Vincent’s hotel room number and swipes a key from the manager. When he gets to the room, Vincent attacks him! But then, shocking reveal: Riley’s five months pregnant, and he’s the father! (If you couldn’t immediately tell by his handsome Canadian face, Russell has been in a lot of Hallmark movies. Vincent isn’t a perfect dude, but there’s no way he could be the villain of this story.) He tells Colter that Riley was considering getting an abortion and that he wanted her to know he was there for her, at least financially, if she decided to have his baby. But then, seemingly out of nowhere, someone in a ski mask smashed his car. That’s odd.

The hotel manager refuses to let Colter look at security footage unless he has a badge. Colter mutters that he doesn’t have time for this and instead goes to meet with Katy and Susanna to inform them about the pregnancy. (Why isn’t Katy at the hotel looking through security footage? She has a badge! It’s her job! Whatever…) They’re now convinced that Riley had a stalker who kidnapped her and damaged Vincent’s car out of jealousy. And the footage, which Bobby and Randy took care of, reveals that the person who smashed Vincent’s car has fun floral nail polish: Cheryl. Immediately, Katy reveals some more small-town gossip. Cheryl wasn’t so much Riley’s friend as she was her shadow.

They find Riley’s car and phone stowed away in Cheryl’s garage. Inside the house is a tragic and disturbing scene. Cheryl is dead, and on the wall above her body are the words “RILEY IS MINE FOREVER” written in blood. Strewn around the room are love letters, poems, and romantic journal entries about Riley that match the one in Riley’s locker. This wasn’t “cool girl worship,” as Katy used to think about Riley’s relationship with Cheryl. It was a decades-long crush that intensified when Riley came home from New York pregnant and reunited with Cheryl at the garden shop. But Riley is still nowhere to be found. If this is a murder suicide, where is the other victim? Colter gets his Dexter on and notices that the bloody handwriting doesn’t match the love letters. Not only that, but the message is too clean. There’s no way that it was written by someone who was bleeding out. Someone took advantage of Cheryl’s feelings for Riley and framed her for the disappearance.

A Desperate Couple Emerges in ‘Tracker’ Season 2 Episode 18

A still from Tracker Season 2 Episode 18 — Image via CBS

Randy runs a GPS locator on Cheryl’s phone and tracks it to the home of a couple named Monica (Hayley McFarland) and Tyler Harper (Tom Stevens). The wife is a nurse. The husband is a maintenance fixer-upper type who was working on Cheryl’s house. Katy says that they’re good people. At their house, Katy and Colter find two graves in the backyard for Monica’s miscarried babies. Not only have they had a rough time trying to have a child of their own, but that suggests a possibly heightened level of intensity regarding fertility and pregnancy. It’s not necessarily a red flag, but sure enough, they’re the ones who took Riley and killed Cheryl.

Riley wakes up in a creepy nursery with a cradle and medical equipment where Monica performs an ultrasound on her and then informs Tyler that they’re having a girl. She shames Riley for even considering ending her pregnancy. Yeesh! Monica and Tyler are low-key homophobic, anti-abortion murderers. Meanwhile, Team Colter’s legal one-woman band, Reenie (Fiona Rene), pulls the Harper’s records and confirms the fertility struggle and Tyler’s criminal history. She also finds out that Monica’s real name is Lisa, and that she was recently referred to a psychologist after posing as a NICU nurse. Between the two of them, they’d never be able to pass the background check necessary to adopt a child. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Colter and Katy bring Tyler, who in the meantime got into a chase with the cops and shot an officer, to the sheriff’s station. Colter tells him that they already have invoices for housework linking Tyler and Cheryl. (Monica said that one reason Cheryl had to die was because she connected them to Riley. But they forgot about the paper trail. They’re not exactly criminal geniuses.) He also suggests that Monica might kill him and Riley after the baby is born to further tie up loose ends. It’s a wild theory, but it does get Tyler talking. He indicates that his wife and Riley are still somewhere in their house. Colter also opens up to Tyler about his dad. Again with the oversharing to strangers!

Anyway, they go back, and Colter notices an attic above the garage that he and all the cops missed the first time around. Sure enough, that’s where they are. Cornered, Monica threatens to kill a sedated Riley. All Colter has to do, however, is point out that the sedative is bad for the baby, and she folds. Monica is arrested. Riley goes home to a supportive Susanna. Colter has a new friend in Katy. Vincent is MIA, and nobody seems to care that Cheryl is dead, which is a major bummer, but other than that, it’s a job well done for Team Tracker.