Previously…
– Diane was suspicious after she overheard Brian on the phone, saying that he was hiding something from her. She confided in Sarah, who advised her to sneak a look at Brian’s phone.
– Travis tipped off Brent that Rosie’s card for their joint account had been used. Both gathered it was Rosie trying to send them a signal she’d been kidnapped.
– Afraid that she had inadvertently played a role in Loretta’s kidnapping of Rosie and Gabrielle, Natalie decided to tail her mother-in-law in hopes of finding the kidnapped mother and daughter. 

Brent Taylor uses two fingers to pinch and press outward on the iPad’s touchscreen. As he zooms in on the image, however, the already-grain, black-and-white pixels grow larger, distorting it even further.

“That isn’t Rosie,” Molly Taylor comments from the seat at the kitchen table beside him. The two of them are huddled over the tablet, reviewing the security footage from the ATM in Bremerton where Rosie’s debit card was used. 

“It’s a man, definitely,” Brent agrees. “I can’t tell much more than that.”

“Not with that stupid hat pulled over his face. He’s… kind of tall?”

“Yeah.” Brent removes his fingers from the screen, and the footage bounces back to its usual size. They watch in silence for several seconds.

“Wait,” Brent says, immediately pausing it. He uses the scrolling bar at the bottom of the video to scrub backward. 

Molly furrows her brow. “What?”

“That car. The way the angle of the camera is, you can’t see him get into it, but it pulls out. Look at the wheels.”

She watches the video carefully as the vehicle backs out of the parking space, its wheels and front bumper disappearing from view. 

“Can you see the license plate?” she asks excitedly. 

Brent again uses his thumb and index finger to zoom in. “I think so. H-F…”

Molly grabs a paper napkin from the holder sitting in the center of the table. Then she looks around.

“Here,” Brent says, pulling a pen from the inside pocket of his jacket. He recites the license plate as best he can decipher it, and Molly notes it on the napkin.

He takes the napkin from her. “Let me call this in.”

As he reaches for his phone, which is resting on the table, the screen lights up to announce an incoming call. 

Molly immediately perks up. “Is it…?”

With the most efficient of nods, he answers the call. “Rivera. Hey. What do you got?”

With Molly watching him intently, as if she might somehow be able to hear the voice on the other end if she focuses hard enough, Brent listens to the officer’s explanation. 

“An office building?” he says. “Does she have any known association with any of the businesses there?” To Molly, he mouths, “Loretta.” He listens to Officer Rivera for another few seconds and then says, “Thanks for the update. Keep me posted.”

He hangs up and sets the phone back down on the table. 

“What’s Loretta doing?” Molly asks.

“Nothing. She’s been doing all these errands, so unless she knows she’s being tailed–” Brent stops himself mid-thought. “Wait.”

Molly’s eyes flare wide. “What?”

“I know what she’s doing,” he says as he scrambles for his phone.

—–

On the second floor down in the parking garage in downtown King’s Bay, Natalie Bishop sits in her car. It is growing stuffy inside the vehicle since she switched off the engine as soon as she pulled into the spot, so as not to attract attention, and since she attempted to park as far away from Loretta‘s Mercedes as possible, she has to crane her neck at an unnatural angle to keep an eye on her mother-in-law.

Loretta emerges from her champagne-colored sedan, then ducks back into the car to retrieve her designer purse. She hangs it over her shoulder, then stops and glances around.

Natalie sucks in a breath and shifts so that she is hidden by her own headrest. She doesn’t move, barely even breathes, fearful that Loretta has somehow spotted her.

But then Loretta walks around the  black two-door coupe parked in the spot beside her own vehicle, opens the passenger-side door, and climbs in.

“What the hell are you doing, Loretta?” Natalie asks as she watches with one eye, the other still blocked by the headrest.

The black coupe starts its engine, and its automatic lights come to life. Moments later, it is ascending the ramp back to the first floor and, presumably, the exit. 

As soon as the coupe is out of sight, Natalie starts her own car again. She backs out of the space and heads for the exit, as well, praying that she has not already lost the black car.

—–

“You’re sure you don’t mind going over to Tim‘s with me tonight?” Diane Bishop asks.

Her houseguest stands across from her, at the kitchen peninsula in her condominium, and shakes his head. “Not at all. I’d like to see Samantha some more before I leave town.”

“Then go ahead and get in the shower,” she tells him. “We need to get moving soon.”

Brian‘s mouth twists up with thought for a moment. “I don’t know if I need to.”

A sense of panic spikes within Diane, and she uses every ounce of willpower she possesses to show absolutely none of that as she replies to him, “Yes, you do. I promise.”

“Really?”

“Really. Does Diane Bishop lie–“

“Yes.”

“–about personal hygiene?” She takes in his pause and then continues, “No? No. So hit the showers, mister.”

Brian sniffs himself and then shrugs. “You’re brutally honest. And I respect it. Give me fifteen and I’ll be ready.”

“Great.” She forces herself to take a breath, as if she has nothing at all on her mind, and only once he turns toward the hallway does she say, “Do you want to charge your phone before we go?”

“Uh…” He takes it out of the pocket of his jeans and checks the battery level. “Maybe?”

“The answer is yes.” She picks up a cord, sticking out of a charging brick plugged into an outlet in the kitchen. “I got one of those new super-fast ones. I just don’t want to bother Tim for trivial stuff while we’re there. Between caring for Sam and what’s going on with Travis…” Her highlighted brown hair shakes side-to-side as she wags her head. “I don’t want to impose at all.”

“Then sure. Yeah.” Brian walks over, plugs in his phone, and sets it on the countertop. “Fifteen minutes, I swear.”

“I’m gonna be counting,” Diane tells him in a fake-stern voice. She picks up her own phone and pretends to be occupied by it until he goes into the bathroom off the hallway and closes the door. Once she hears the shower start up, she puts down her own phone.

“If you can be sneaky while I’m in the shower,” she says under her breath, “then turnabout is fair play.”

The bell on the door jingles as Travis Fisher steps inside Thaw Coffee & Tea. Over the sound system, “About Damn Time” by Lizzo is playing at a reasonable volume. 

“Travis!” a voice shouts before he has even had a chance to appraise the space or size up the line at the counter. He looks over to see his uncle standing on the customer side of the counter, with Sabrina Gage on the other side of it in her ice-blue employee apron. 

He hurries toward them as he takes in the smattering of patrons sitting at tables and the window bar, enjoying their hot drinks on this cool fall day.

“How are you doing?” Jason asks as he offers Travis a handshake and then pulls him in for a one-armed hug.

“I don’t know,” Travis admits. “I was at the police station, and then Uncle Brent had to split, and I’m supposed to go back to my dad’s, but I’m so tired…” He gestures at the espresso machines and other accoutrement behind the counter. “I thought a little caffeine might help.”

“I’m so sorry for what you’re going through,” Sabrina says from behind the register. 

“Thanks, Sabrina. Can I get a… um… an American with steamed milk?”

She smiles sweetly. “Coming right up.”

“This is on me, by the way,” Jason tells his nephew.

Travis holds up a hand. “You don’t have to–“

“Trav. It’s the least I can do. There’s no news or anything?”

“No but yes,” Travis says, and he launches into a brief but garbled explanation of the notification he received on his phone about Rosie‘s card for their joint bank account having been used at an ATM a few hours away.

“That tells us something,” Jason says once he has finished. “If she’s sending you a signal, Rosie didn’t take Gabrielle and run on her own.”

“I knew she didn’t. She wouldn’t do that.” Travis sets his jaw as his gaze cuts to the right, watching Sabrina make his beverage. “But that means someone has them.”

“It has to be Loretta, yeah?” Jason asks, lifting his eyebrows as if to add, It’s the most obvious thing in the world.

Travis folds his arms. “That lady has been screwing with us for so long. I mean, she literally was a part of switching Spencer and me when we were, like, three days old. But somehow I never imagined she would go after my wife or our baby.”

“She’s sick,” Jason says. “And she hates our family. I don’t put anything past her. I just hope that message Rosie sent you helps them find her and Gabrielle ASAP.”

“Me, too.” Travis looks at the back door of the shop, where the glass door reveals that there is a hockey practice going on in the adjoining arena. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

—–

“This routine is already growing tiresome,” Loretta says from the passenger seat of Eric Westin‘s coupe. “But I suppose it’s necessary.”

Eric takes his eyes off the road briefly to turn his head toward her. “You’re the one who wanted to take precautions.”

Loretta waves her hand through the air, as if dismissing the entire line of thought. “It’s necessary. I’m only speaking out of frustration.”

“Frustration?” Eric asks as he passes through a yellow light before it turns red.

“I’ve had to think on my feet more than I’m accustomed to doing,” she admits as she adjusts the purse held in her lap. “If everything had gone according to plan, that DNA test would have been switched, and Molly Taylor never would have known this baby was hers at all.”

Eric looks at her and winks, and for a moment, Loretta can see how he swindled so many women into falling for his nonsense. “You mean working with me wasn’t your first choice?”

“I knew I’d find a suitable use for you eventually. That, my dear, is the value of doing your research. When I discovered you’d gone to prison over your conspiring with Helen Chase, I suspected you might be in need of gainful employment upon your release.”

“This isn’t exactly the hourly rate I was billing when I was practicing,” he says, “but it’s a step toward getting my ducks in order.”

“Mm-hmm,” Loretta hums. “And as for our other ducks… I’ll have to figure out how to dispose of them before it’s too late.”

Eric nods as he uses the remote control to open the garage door of the unremarkable beige house that they have pulled up to.

——

Natalie watches from a safe distance — or so she hopes — as the black coupe rounds a corner. She lingers for a few seconds than would normally be necessary at a stop sign before proceeding, taking in the suburban-type homes around her.

“Where the hell are we going?” she wonders aloud before stepping on the gas again.

—–

Once the shower has been running for a minute or so and Brian hasn’t returned, Diane pulls a small flash-drive-type device from her pocket.

“Thank you, Sarah,” she says quietly. “Perks of having a P.I. for a best friend.”

She unplugs Brian’s phone from the charger and inserts the device into the same opening. She waits for the screen to register it, as Sarah told her it would, but before anything that she is expecting loads, the screen lights up. She sees the letters “KH” and a FaceTime request.

“No, no,” she says, as she jabs a finger at the screen. Rather than silence the call, however, she hears the familiar sound of it picking up. Quickly she ducks down behind the cabinet.

A few seconds of shockingly loud dead air — maybe outdoor background noise — sound as she hopes the caller will hang up. She doesn’t dare reach a blind finger up and try to end it, since there are no physical buttons, only a touchscreen.

“Brian?” a female voice says. When it receives no response, instead of hanging up, the voice continues, “Who’s there? And why are you answering my husband’s phone?”

Something from deep within Diane’s memory rises to the surface. Slowly she stands, aligning herself with the phone’s screen.

“Kelsey?” she says in shock. “Husband?!”

END OF EPISODE 1152

How will Diane react to Brian’s secret?
What are Loretta and Eric going to do?
Will Brent be able to save Rosie and Gabrielle?
Talk about it all in the comments below!

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