Previously…
– At the custody hearing, Elly called Jesse — a former associate of Rosie’s drug-dealing ex — to the stand to testify about the circumstances of Rosie’s father’s death and Rosie’s involvement in the incident.
– Natalie phoned Brent and agreed to give a statement tying Loretta to Rosie and Gabrielle’s kidnapping.
– Travis and Rosie got into a heated argument with Molly and Brent following Elly’s questioning of Jesse — and when an upset Paula tried to intervene, she collapsed in court!

“Grandma!”

Travis Fisher‘s shout rips through the courtroom. The others gathered turn in shock to see Paula Fisher collapsing to the floor like a limp noodle. Her shoulder strikes the bench with a loud thud as she goes down, and almost as instantly as she hits the floor, she is surrounded.

“Mom,” Molly Taylor gasps, bending over the railing to assess Paula’s condition. Her eyes are closed, and it is clear that is unresponsive.

“I’m calling 911,” Brent Taylor declares as he pulls his phone from his pants pocket.

“Already on it,” Rosie Jimenez calls out in an authoritative, professional tone, a far cry from her emotional outburst of mere moments before. With her iPhone pressed to her face, she steps to the side and begins talking to the dispatcher.

“She was fine one minute,” Molly says, racked with disbelief, “and then…”

“She’s going to be okay,” Brent tells his wife, before stooping down as best he can to begin CPR on Paula.

On the other side of the courtroom, Juanita Jimenez makes the sign of the cross and bows her head in silent prayer.

“Come on, Grandma,” Travis mutters as he watches Brent begin to administer CPR on Paula. “Wake up. Please wake up.”

Some time later, a pair of silver-fronted elevator doors open onto the emergency floor inside King’s Bay Memorial Hospital. Jason Fisher hurries out of the elevator and rushes toward the nurses’ station, where he finds his sister pacing uneasily.

“What happened?” Jason asks breathlessly.

Sarah stops in her tracks. “I don’t know yet. Travis called the house and said Mom collapsed in court. They didn’t know if it was a heart attack or a stroke or…” She shakes her head as she trails off.

Jason casts a helpless look around. A nurse pushes a stretcher with a middle-aged male patient on it past them.

“She seemed okay this morning?” he asks Sarah.

“She was fine, yeah. I mean, she’s been stressed about the custody case…”

“Yeah. I talked to her yesterday and I could tell how much it’s weighing on her.”

The slight ding of the elevator grabs their attention, and this time, it is Molly who emerges. She is ghostly white as she approaches them.

“What’s going on?” Jason asks his other sister, before she even reaches them. “How’s Mom?”

“I rode here in the ambulance with her,” Molly says. “Everyone else should be here in a few minutes, I guess.”

“How is she?” Sarah presses.

“She’s alive. I know that much. The medics wouldn’t — or couldn’t — tell me much else.”

“What even happened?” Sarah asks. “What was going on in court?”

Molly sucks in a steadying breath before answering, “We were on a recess.”

“And she just, what, collapsed?” Jason queries.

“That’s how it seemed, yeah.” Molly glances nervously back toward the elevators. “Brent jumped right in to do CPR, and the ambulance was there within a few minutes.”

The three siblings fall into a tense silence, each aware that there is no magical thing they can say that will make this suddenly better.

—–

The expansive hospital lobby is abuzz with activity as Travis ends a call on his cell phone and waits for his wife to do the same.

“Thanks, Mama,” Rosie says. “Give her a kiss for us, okay? We’ll let you know as soon as they’re news.” With the press of a button and a sigh, she ends her call, as well, and turns toward Travis.

“Did you get a hold of Samantha?” she asks.

“Yeah. She’s leaving work as soon as possible to come here. How’s Gabrielle?”

“She’s fine. My mom just got her home and is giving her a snack.” Rosie hangs her head. “I still can’t believe she had to watch all that happen in court. The stuff with my dad–” She stops herself, looking up abruptly. “Sorry. I know the focus is on your grandma right now.”

“You don’t have to apologize,” Travis says, opening his arms so that she can step into his embrace. “This has been a shitty day all around. And if my aunt and uncle hadn’t sunk to digging up your dad’s death…”

His words fade off into nothingness when he spots Elly Vanderbilt crossing the lobby.

“What’s wrong?” Rosie asks, lifting her head from Travis’s shoulder. Her focus goes straight to Elly, too. The redheaded attorney freezes when she notices the couple.

After a tense few seconds, Elly asks, “Is there any word on your grandma yet?”

“Nothing so far,” Travis replies curtly.

“You have some nerve showing up here after what you did,” Rosie snaps.

“Rosie,” Travis says, keeping one hand on her arm and the other on her back.

“I was doing my job,” Elly fires back, undaunted. “My clients asked me to do whatever I could to get their daughter back. And after you had your attorney throw out the absolutely baseless theory that Molly hired that scumbag Eric Westin–“

“All she did was bring up Molly’s incredibly questionable history with men,” Rosie says. “Including a serial killer and two other criminals.”

“And what part of that makes you think that your own history should be off-limits?” Elly asks.

“That was Rosie’s father,” Travis interjects. “Her poor mother was sitting right there. To dredge that up–” He stops, shaking his head in disgust. “I thought I knew you, Elly. But you changed while you were away. You became this– this nasty, vengeful person–“

“Leave her alone,” another voice cuts into the fray. All three of them stop and turn to see Spencer Ragan standing nearby, his eyes firing daggers at Travis and Rosie.

—–

“Natalie!”

Loretta Ragan bellows her daughter-in-law’s name from the top of the staircase in the contemporary home, decorated mostly in muted tones of white, black, and grey, that the two women share with Natalie’s husband and young son. After several seconds without a response, Loretta begins to descend the open staircase, over which hangs an impressive vaulted ceiling that adds to grand quality of the home’s entry.

“Where have you gotten to, you stupid woman?” she murmurs as she reaches the foot of the stairs. “If you think I’ll let you stop me from taking my grandson to Paris–”

Her uttering is interrupted by the chime of the doorbell. Loretta turns, slightly annoyed, and goes to the door. She flips the lock and then pulls the door open. In that instant, she sees a flash of navy blue that makes her want to shove the door closed again – but an arm juts out, making that impossible.

“Loretta Ragan?” one of the two uniformed police officers asks.

Beyond them, Loretta sees a pair of squad cars, their red lights spinning and flashing with urgency.

Loretta tightens her lips into a tight line but does not respond.

“You’re under arrest,” the same officer declares, as the second cop deftly turns Loretta around and affixes handcuffs to one of her wrists. Her mind races, but she refuses to give them the satisfaction of struggling or becoming hysterical.

“I want my attorney,” she simply states as the cuffs close around her other wrist.

“You have the right to remain silent,” the officer drones. “Anything you say or do…”

—–

On the ground floor of the hospital, Spencer moves to Elly’s side.

“I know everyone’s on edge,” Spencer says to Travis and Rosie, “but attacking Elly isn’t going to help Paula recover.”

“Grandma wouldn’t even be here if Elly hadn’t pulled what she did today,” Travis responds.

The darker-haired man rolls his eyes. “Elly didn’t put Paula in the hospital.”

“You weren’t in court,” Rosie says, “so stop speaking on things you don’t know about.”

Spencer’s mouth flaps open but then closes again without emitting any words. He looks to Elly. “What the hell happened in court?”

“I was doing my job,” she says, folding her arms. “Doing it very well, actually. These two are salty because we dared to dig into Rosie’s family history after they tried to drag Molly through the mud.”

After taking this in, Spencer asks, “How’s Paula? Do we know anything yet?”

Travis sets his jaw but then simply says, “Not yet.” He is grateful when he spots his father and mother entering the lobby. Upon seeing the four younger individuals, Tim and Claire rush over.

“Hey,” Travis says, moving quickly to hug them both. He notices how tightly Tim clasps him and realizes how heavily this emergency must be weighing on his father.

“We haven’t heard anything yet,” Rosie says from behind Travis.

“I’m going to go upstairs and see what I can find out,” Claire says. “I’ll see who’s assigned to Paula’s case.”

“We were at lunch when you called,” Tim explains.

“We’ll come upstairs with you,” Travis tells them, taking Rosie’s hand and casting one last, dismayed look at Elly and Spencer.

“I’ll be up in a minute,” Spencer says, as Claire gives him a quick hug, as well.

Claire leads the way as Tim, Travis, and Rosie move behind her toward the elevator bank.

Spencer pivots to face Elly. “Sorry they jumped down your throat like that. It isn’t cool.”

“Look, Spencer,” she says, cocking her head to the side. “I know your grandmother is having a medical emergency — but I don’t need you sticking up for me. Okay?”

“What?”

“I’m a grown woman. I can handle my shit,” she tells him. “I’m going to get a coffee. I hope your grandmother is okay.” With that, she brushes past him, moving toward the café at one end of the lobby. Thrown, Spencer watches her walk off.

“You are something else,” he mutters, a half-smirk twisting up one side of his mouth despite the circumstances.

—–

After leaving Tim to locate his siblings, Claire moves into the patient care area of the emergency wing. She quickly locates Dr. Artesano, a 50-something man with a close-cropped, salt-and-pepper beard and a blue surgical cap over his bald head.

“Claire,” he says. “I didn’t realize you were working today.”

“I’m not.” She reflexively steps to the side of the corridor as she sees two nurses hurrying toward them. As the nurses pass, Claire explains, “I need to check on a patient of yours. Paula Fisher. She’s my– well, my children’s grandmother. She was just brought in.”

“I should’ve known when I saw the name. I actually just left her surgery a minute ago.”

“And?” Claire presses. “How is she?”

A grave look settles over the doctor’s face.

“How’s Paula?” Claire asks again, her heart rate spiking. “Is she going to be okay?”

Artesano blinks.

—–

After receiving a text from Jason, Tim hurries to the hospital’s small chapel, where he finds all three of his siblings gathered. The windowless space is softly lit, with a few battery-operated, flameless candles lined up at the altar.

“What happened?” he asks as he moves toward the trio.

“One minute, she was talking,” Molly explains, “and the next she was grabbing her chest and passing out.”

“I knew the stress of all this was getting to her,” Jason says, a nervous, chattering edge to his words.

“It never should’ve gotten this dirty,” Sarah says, as she casts an accusatory look in Molly’s direction.

“You can’t blame me for this,” Molly snaps. “Brent and I are fighting for our daughter–“

“Not now,” Tim declares in a firm tone of voice, silencing his sisters. “We’re not doing this now. We’re not pointing fingers or bickering or anything else. And we are not losing Mom, not today and not any time soon. Okay?”

Wordlessly, Sarah exhales through her nostrils and then takes Jason’s hand. In turn, Jason takes Molly’s, and soon the four of them have formed a circle, their heads bowed reverently.

“God,” Tim says, “please carry our mother through this safely. Please bring her back to us. We all need her.”

“We do,” Molly says, and the four siblings stand together, each offering up their silent prayers for Paula’s recovery.

END OF EPISODE 1200

What news does the doctor have for Claire?
Will Paula pull through this crisis?
Was Elly wrong to snap at Spencer?
Discuss all this and more in the comments below!

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