Tracker airs tonight on CBS with an all-new Sunday, November 2, 2025, season 3 episode 3 called “First Fire,” and we have your Tracker recap below.
In tonight’s Tracker episode as per the CBS synopsis, “On Halloween night, when a nurse is murdered and arsonist Heston Koontz disappears from a psychiatric facility, Colter follows a trail of unsettling clues to uncover the truth with assistance from local officer Dundee”
Tonight’s episode is going to be great and you won’t want to miss it, so be sure to tune in for our Tracker recap between 8:30 PM – 9:30 PM ET! While you wait for the recap make sure to check out all our television recaps, news, spoilers & more, right here!
Tonight’s Tracker recap begins now – Refresh Page often to get the most current updates!
There’s an escape patient tonight. It happened during a blackout. The lights went out at a psychiatric hospital and a certain someone used that time to escape. His name is Heston Koontz. Heston was twenty-nine. He was convicted of burning a family alive over ten years ago. He was moved to a low-level facility because he wasn’t considered a threat. Only his parents had disagreed with that decision. They knew their son. They knew he was dangerous and he even proved that by killing a nurse on the night of his escape.
Lawrence and Molly Koontz said their son was normal all way up to high school. Suddenly, he began acting out. He suffered from parasomnia. It was called waking nightmares and he often got violent after those nightmares. He killed the family dog. His parents took him to therapy afterwards. They said the therapist told them that their son wasn’t dangerous as long as he was medicated. They didn’t believe the professional. They knew something was off with Heston. They searched his room. They found his journals.
Heston was obsessed with a girl a year younger than him named Emily Collins. His parents became worried for the girl after they saw his journals. They tried to take it to the cops. The cops didn’t see the threat. It took Heston killing off Emily’s family and trying to abduct her for the cops to take the matter seriously. Heston was considered too mentally unfit to stand trial. He was sent to a maximum facility. He played nice until he got sent to somewhere less secure. Now, his parents are worried more people are going to get hurt. They’ve hired Colter Shaw to find their son before that happens.
Colter met the detective on the case. Detective Dundee was condescending as well as dismissive. He didn’t think Colter could offer up anything new to the investigation and that’s where he was wrong. Colter quickly realized that Heston didn’t just break out of the facility. He had help. His accomplice waited for the night of that storm to cut the electricity to the facility. They also gave Heston a keycard to get out. Heston had help the whole way. He was assisted by Bill Prugalildad. It was Bill’s keycard that Heston used that night.
Bill has a history of helping people he shouldn’t be helping. Well, his “help” also worked against him. Bill was found dead in his workshop. Colter was trying to figure out the dead man’s motive as Reenie was interviewing candidates for a job at her law firm. She ended up hiring Melanie Day. She goes by Mel. She could have worked anywhere and she chose to work for Reenie because Reenie delivered justice without all the bureaucracy. Mel’s mom was killed. Her mom was in the military only to die at a rest stop back stateside. They never found who did it. Mel no longer believes in bureaucracy because of it.
It resonated with Reenie. She hired her right on the spot. Colter and Detective Dundee were caught on the backfoot. They were trying to figure out Bill’s motive when they should have realized Bill’s missing car. Heston took the car and it was last seen heading to Emily’s home. Heston’s obsession. Dundee tried calling his people that were sitting on the house. He got no response. By time they showed up at the scene, a cop was dead and Emily was missing. They found the abandoned car at the scene. The cars all had a fire sticker on them. Colter checked. It was the sticker for the Sisters of the Sacred Fire.
The Sisters of the Sacred Fire were a bunch of nuns. They were in charge of the outreach program. Sister Carlotta visited Heston frequently at the first facility. She was the one that kept pushing for a low security facility. She wrote countless letters claiming that Heston wasn’t a danger. The sad part was that she might be right about the last one because Colter was wrong about his theory. Heston never escaped. He was abducted from the facility. Sister Carlotta grabbed him and she grabbed Emily with the help of her friend, Jared.
Jared was the gardener at the convent. He was someone that Sister Carlotta once helped through the community outreach program. Whatever she did for him, she was now trying to do for Heston. It was her help that was unhinged. She was the one that got Bill to assist. She was the one that got Jared to assist. She wrote in a hidden journal that God forgive her for what she was about to do for she was only his servant. Jared lived at the convent. He had a hidden altar in his room. Mother Superior recognized it.
It was from the Fideles sect.
There used to be a sect of the Sacred Fires Church. They were stomped out. Only Sister Carlotta kept it alive. This sect believed they were hunting evil. They thought that Heston had been possessed by a demon. The only way to release the demon was to untether him from his host. She planned on killing both Heston and Emily. Emily was the tether. The poor woman was innocent in all of this. She was just trying to move on from the tragedy of losing her whole family when that crazy nun abducted her to supposedly free Heston’s soul.
Detective Dundee thought they might be heading to the old Sacred Fires Church. It was considered to be haunted. It just wasn’t the place of the ritual. Sister Carlotta took her victims to Emily’s old house. It was still a burnt up husk. No one had wanted to tear it down or rebuild there. Sister Carlotta has recruited quite a few people from that outreach program to assist her. It wasn’t just Jared the same way it wasn’t just Bill. Colter and the Detective went in without waiting for backup. The detective got stabbed. He survived and one person got arrested after Colter killed off two. And Heston put an end to the nun.
Heston wasn’t going to let anyone live for hurting Emily. He died from his injuries, but Emily and the detective survived the Fideles and Colter didn’t take the money from the Koontzs. He’s a firm believer on only collecting as long as he was successful. He told them to give the money to Emily instead. Maybe she could do some good with it.
THE END
