Too Unethical For You? - Scandal - Season 4, Episode 3

It's a beautiful day in DC.  The kind when Lizzy Bear, RNC Chair, wears a light jacket and jaunty scarf to drop her kid off at school. Her daughter goes off to have a nice day.  Lizzy Bear turns to see Dale, who she doesn't believe for a moment when he says this is a coincidence.  But while he's here, he may as well remind her that Fitzgerald Grant made it to the White House with his organization's money.  And they're not getting what they paid for.  He demands that Fitz's recent gun control law has to fail at the Fourth Circuit Appeals Court.  Lizzy Bear tells him to trust the backup plans of her backup plans. 

Jake, now looking for Charlie after seeing him on a video that should have had Harrison on it, actually manages to sneak up on Charlie.  In Charlie's defense, that vending machine was a bitch.  Jake solves the problem of stuck candy by bashing Charlie's head into the glass.  This knocks Charlie out, and Jake takes the free candy bar from the machine as a good sign from the universe.

What seems like a commercial break for Google's voice app turns out to be footage of a man falling to his death at Yosemite National Park in full view of the nation.  The Press Room at the White House gathers 'round to watch, with people horrified.  A newlywed couple either had the worst accident ever, or the recent widow will be facing charges for murder.  Abby's not the only one watching; she turns around to see that Mellie has actually raised her head from her snack bag.  Mellie keeps watching as Abby has to tear herself away.

Olivia is trying to have a good morning.  But that's so unusual, her father is stunned, and then incredulous.  Olivia has dropped by just to say Hi.  Since this would indicate that Olivia would like to be friendly, Rowan immediately figures out the real reason she's so unlike her normal self.  On his doorstep, he takes her aside to remind her that she's just disoriented from realizing that DC kept going without her.  When your work is your life, it's easy to forget that you're not really indispensable.  Although, we're going to find out that Fitz limped along without her.

I'm trained to know when coffee isn't just coffee

Before Olivia can leave, Rowan manages to wheedle an acceptance for dinner out of her.  And that she'll bring Jake.  Olivia asks if he's over the whole he-took-your-job-and-tried-to-kill-you thing.  Rowan says he is for her sake, and that the three of them can now be best friends.  She agrees to at least ask him to come as her phone rings, and now Rowan has to let her go.  So she can speak with Abby, who has only a message for Olivia.  A mutual acquaintance from law school called her, looking for Olivia.  Olivia makes it clear that the message is received, and now Abby can just butt out.

Cy enjoys a moment in a fancy breakfast spot, and notices Michael.  Which is too much for him, so he lightly asks if Michael is stalking him.  Michael is very convincing as he breezily squashes Cy's joke with his own:  he's whoring to afford business school, and those people who just strolled in are his classmates.  So, Cy will have to go because he's Michael's dirty secret.  Cy, looks sheepish as he bows out gracefully.  Is he really in business school and only does side jobs for Lizzy Bear?  Or is this part of the con?

Duh, part of the con

Fitz's big project this week is to make sure David Rosen knows that he's got to win the Fourth Circuit Court challenge to his gun control law.  They go through the three judges involved, with a Judge Sparks determined to be the swing vote they really need to work for.  Sparks is impressed with David's arguments, which boil down to "It's been two hundred years, and our Founders had no idea what a fucking Uzi is."   Impressed, but not convinced.  He announces he will throw the law out on Second Amendment grounds.  Rosen looks like a puppy just died.  Lizzy Bear won't need her backup plans after all.

Olivia's old friend from law school turns out to be Kathryn Winslow, who became a homemaker after not even taking her bar exams.  Her lawyer husband represents the elite of the world.  Her daughter, Catelyn, is seventeen and missing.  For a couple of days.  Instead of involving the police. Kathryn would like Olivia, Huck, and Quinn to find her quickly and quietly.  Kathryn doesn't seem as afraid as The Gladiators would like, and Kathryn admits that Catelyn has disappeared before, but not for this long.  And Kathryn is sure that Catelyn is okay.  She'd just rather Catelyn be okay at home.  Looks like The Gladiators caught an easy job this time.

Charlie wakes up in a windowless concrete room.  Jake has created his very own spy headquarters somewhere, and he's ready to do his old job.  Charlie, waking naked on a plastic sheet, demands to be reimbursed for his candy bar.  Which I can respect.  Jake should at least leave the guy even.  Jake wants Charlie to spill all the beans, and Charlie, knowing that the info will come out with a lot or no pain, chooses no pain.  He just wants one thing.  One thing that Jake should be able to handle.

Mellie's got her own job to do.  At least, the job she's given herself.  The video of the newlywed disaster has had her furiously scribbling stuff all day.  Fitz appears in the lounge where she is brainstorming the widow's defense.  And Fitz is blown away by the difference one terrible new story can make. Mellie doesn't even have time for Jerry Jr.'s grave today.  Fitz dares to hope that the worst of Mellie's grief is passing.

Catelyn's boyfriend hasn't talked to her in about a week.  Catelyn's bestie talked to her yesterday, but doesn't know where Catelyn is and seems not to care.  Olivia, Hick and Quinn are immediately suspicious of the bestie.  Huck hacks into the bestie's cell phone and credit card account.  And there she is- the bestie's credit card was used to check into a local hotel. 

Back at the Oval Office, Rosen must appear before Fitz with defeat written all over his face.  Fitz must whine, loudly, about it.  He's even more crushed than Rosen, who probably never thought they'd win anyway.  Fitz, however, was counting on this.  Without his dream of marrying Olivia, he's latched on to the dream of landmark legislation.  Pay equity has happened, and now Fitz would like his legacy to be a nation free of school shootings.  To be fair to Fitz, he really did seem committed to the law's benefits to the nation, not himself.  Rosen has nothing to say.  He's lost his first case as Attorney General, and he's wondering if the job's always going to suck like this.

Fitz is in such a terrible, disappointed mood that he's back to drinking with that ugly frown he does.  Abby, whose name he can't be bothered to remember, appears in the doorway, too afraid to even fully open the door.  Which Fitz sees as a weakness.  We know, because Abby mousily explains to the Pres that Mellie has a new fixation:  she wants to solve the Caper of the Killer Cliff Video.  And she wants to fly in whoever from the US Parks Department is investigating to air her theory and hopefully clear the widow.  Abby knows this is ridiculous and not the First Lady's job.  But, it's the first project she's been interested in at all that doesn't involve bowling, and Fitz attacks Abby without even knowing her name.  He yells at her to give Mellie whatever she wants so badly, that Abby retreats into sure-I'll-give-you-want-even-if-it's-stupid mode.  Notice, how even though Rosen failed he's thanked for trying, while Abby gets sent away with abuse.

Huck and Quinn manage to quickly track Catelyn down to a local hotel.  She's fine, and Quinn even has the room number as she meanders around the lobby.  Olivia is happy to inform Kathryn of the good news, and Kathryn thanks them all profusely, certainly looking relieved.  Kathryn dismisses them all from Catelyn duty, saying she'll take it from there, and Olivia sends Quinn home for the night.

Quinn's DVR plans are foiled by Jake, who calls just as she's leaving the hotel to ask a favor.  He's cagey about the specifics, only telling her to show up at his undisclosed amateur spy location, where he quickly abandons her to Charlie for the night. Quinn is, rightly, furious at being treated as a pawn in whatever game they're playing.  With Jake gone, she mercilessly scolds Charlie for his captive-girl porn fantasy. It doesn't help Quinn's mood when Charlie calls her Robin - her real name?  A Batman joke?

Charlie gets Quinn back by reminding her that her fling with Huck flamed out.  He taunts her with a woman's worst fear after a bad break-up:  that no one else will want her.  When Charlie tries to get the nookie he bargained for, Quinn puts him right in his place- on the floor, in a choke hold.  Go ahead, Quinn.  No one will miss him.

Abby tries one last thing to prevent Mellie from totally embarrassing herself:  she goes to Cy.  Unfortunately for her, she does it at the same time that poor, beleaguered Ethan (seriously, why does he still work there?) appears to tell Cy that Michael is calling him.  Cy dismisses Abby's concerns, no matter how right she is, and quickly tosses her and Ethan out.  Abby can't tell what's worse; that Olivia abandoned her, or that her current employer won't listen to her.

Cy wants to apologize for his mild, but still rude, attempted slut-shaming that morning, but Michael blows it off.  Not only is it an occupational given, but his b-school friends were very impressed that he knows the White House Chief of Staff.  So, Cy just helped him.  Michael wants to return the favor by blowing smoke up Cy's ass.  He uses flattery, implying that someone as awesome as Cy shouldn't be single.  Every straight woman in America knows this trick, and every Scandal fan knows perfectly well why Cyrus should never be in a relationship ever again.  Cy, for all his street smarts, falls for this easily.

If Quinn is hoping Olivia or Huck is coming to save her from Charlie's awful fantasy, she's wrong.  Huck has decided, instead, to do some more digging through Catelyn's phone, and he calls Olivia at home to report the worst thing a teenager could ever see:  a sex video.  But not with underaged Catelyn.  With Catelyn's underraged boyfriend and... Catelyn's mom Kathryn.  Olivia's old buddy.  Mother to Catelyn.  And a recorded argument between mother and daughter over the affair, complete with threats to tell Dad.  Even Olivia has to be shocked, and she is.  Enough to immediately worry what Kathryn really intends at that hotel.  She rushes out, but she's too late.  She ends up having to track Kathryn down at the morgue.  Kathryn cries as she identifies the body of her gun-shot daughter.  Olivia appears in full-fancy-coat, which means that someone's going to get the business end tonight.  And that someone is Kathryn, who Olivia literally gets to herself so she can shove Kathryn into a wall and explain what accessory to murder means.  Kathryn, scared and in shock at Catelyn's dead body next to them, can only whine her innocence to Olivia.  Olivia's moment is over when Kathryn's husband enters to find his daughter's body in front of him.  Kathryn immediately runs to him, and Olivia, despite her suspicions, has to leave them to their grief.

Olivia goes home, but the murder investigation follows her home in the form of Abby, who has come to ask about their mutual friend.  As Kathryn is a client implicated in her own daughter's murder, Olivia refuses to discuss it.  Abby's had enough.  Between current bosses who don't care about her, and her old boss who's decided Abby betrayed her, she lets loose.  On Olivia, telling her she'll just go to Kathryn anyway.  Maybe somebody will want her around today.  Who knows.

Can the world just stop being dicks to me?

Olivia tries to get a little company with Jake, thinking that since he's said he's available for booty calls, that he will be.  Instead, a very stand-offish Jake will only hold the door open enough for Olivia to see he's not in the mood. So, Olivia resorts to just asking Jake if he'll come to dinner tomorrow night.  With her father.  Jake flat out refuses.  Since they stepped out of the light, he's decided they're not an item anymore.  That means no dates, especially not with the guy who dropped him in The Hole.  Reminding her that she's still in love with Fitz, even if she will deny it, he decides to set a new boundary.  No dinner dates with dad.

Charlie and Quinn, done fighting, have decided to just hunker down for the night, backs to each other for safety.  And we find that in addition to nookie, Charlie wanted a little pillow talk, without physical pillows.  He wants to give Quinn the additional burden of his loneliness.  Torture, while fun, precludes any sort of long-term emotional intimacy.  For a while, Charlie thought he had the perfect mate:  someone with the same job, who cared for him back.  Someone who he could either work with or who would understand if there were things he couldn't share.  Someone who only lost like, two molars.  And then he lost her to Huck.  He just wants her to know that he misses her.

Quinn decides to shoot him down again, pointing out that she, unlike Charlie, has peeps, and then recites the list of people not even aware that she's missing.  After calling her "Robin" again, Charlie manages to get in a surprise kiss, and the two barely manage to unlock lips before Jake re-appears.  He barely thanks Quinn for being his prostitute for the night as she stalks out.  No more favors for you, Jake.  Will Quinn tell Olivia what her non-boyfriend was up to?  Jake seems indifferent as he reminds Charlie that it's time to spill the beans.  Which Charlie is happy to do.

Obligatory unwilling Quinn makeout scene

David Rosen has decided not to lose again.  While oral arguments are over, the Fourth Circuit hasn't actually released their decision, and David still has time to raid his B-613 files, which he must have completely memorized, and find another juicy tidbit.  This one's about Judge Sparks, and David finds the Judge enjoying a quick lunch to give him just enough detail to convince the guy that David really does have the goods on a long-ago hit and run.  Sparks is bitterly angry at David, but also married to his job and the importance that comes with it.  We find out a minute later that the Fourth Circuit has approved of the gun control law.  Fitz celebrates. With the Fourth Circuit approving the law, no other court is conservative enough to pose any other challenge (that's not really true, but whatever).  Fitz acts as if Dale's gun rights group won't go to the Supreme Court either, as he toasts David for his excellent blackmail.  I mean work.

Abby tries to interrupt to let the President know that the super-important meeting his wife wanted is about to start.  Fitz dismisses her, then shows up late for Mellie's big meeting.  And what a crowd Abby has assembled for the show:  Jeff, the local Parks Department Investigator, is flabbergasted at the First Lady's attention, and blown away when he sees the head of Interior and NASA, for a start. Note, Mellie introduces all the others by name, but can only call Abby, who organized the meeting and is standing right next to her, the Press Secretary.  Another snub.

Mellie has outdone herself, totally dressed for success and with a presentation literally put together for her by NASA on all the physical reasons why that video shows an accident, not a murder.  It's a great presentation that Mellie is wonderfully proud of, while the cabinet secretaries look on in cautious reserve.  Fitz shows up and seems slightly happy that Mellie has found her groove.  Until, that is, Jeff finally gets a word in edgewise.  He's extremely deferential, thanking the First Lady profusely for her help, but he has to inform her that he's already got eyewitnesses who back up the widow's claims.  Regardless of Mellie's work and enthusiasm, the widow will be free to get on with her grieving in peace.  The light in Mellie's eyes goes out and Fitz is visibly deflating at the other end of the table,  And in the end, it's snubbed and bullied Abby who saves the First Lady from a meltdown in front of her husband's Cabinet.  She hustles Mellie out with an excuse for the rest.  Jeff can go home; Fitz can go drink, and Mellie can go crash on the couch, back in her pajamas where she knows she belongs.  Mellie's quest to find some meaning in the First Lady's job fails again.  Someone bring that woman some chips.

David, now a successful Attorney General, reviews the next day's activities with his assistant.  He's a pretty decent boss, treating her with respect, but she throws him off when she notes that it's so sad, what happened to Judge Sparks.  She clues him in: shortly after approving the gun control law, Sparks killed himself.  With a gun. The assistant notes the irony.  David secretly dies inside.  Sparks very likely could not live with himself and his giving in to David's blackmail.  A lifetime of good behavior and upholding the Constitution just didn't overcome paying for one horrible crime years ago with a fake opinion.  Last episodes's big speech gave the gun control folks something to cheer for.  This episode gives the gun rights crowd something to gloat over.

Back at Gladiator HQ, Huck and Olivia are trying to go through possible murder suspects that don't include Kathryn when Quinn finally appears.  Huck and Olivia update her, but she's much less interested in Catelyn than in finding out if anybody bothered looking for her.  When neither can even answer the question, she explodes at them both.  She was missing for a whole day!  Nobody noticed?  She reminds them both of her efforts keeping tabs on people when Olivia left.  She tracked Olivia through her wine purchases.  She went to see Huck every fucking day. And all she'd like is to be noticed when she's missing.  Because she does not want to end up like Harrison.  And she will, and they all will, if they keep not keeping tabs on each other.  Quinn storms off.

It's night.  Olivia is finally alone in her office.  Kathryn comes in.  Olivia, mistress to a President, first looks like she'll dismiss Kathryn, but the woman wants to declare her innocence again, and explain that she regretted having sex with Catelyn's boyfriend the minute it was over.  She's felt awful, or so she says, but Olivia doesn't have much for her.  She informs Kathryn to go to the police now, before they find the sex video.

Jake calls Olivia with her first good news of the day: sure, he'll come to dinner.  He's definitely okay with seeing her dad again, declaring it "good".  I guess he's really curious how Rowan got a Secret Service member to kill Jerry.  Jake can see it on the computer screen in his room, but there are some details he still hasn't figured out.  So he'll just need Rowan to answer a couple of questions.

Michael ends up finding Cy at a bar in the evening, and now Cy is right that the man is stalking him.  Michael's going for the soft sell, telling Cy that he offers privacy and discretion as well as sex.  Well, he'll discretely tell Lizzy Bear.  But she was his client first, after all.  Cy awkwardly pays Michael afterward, and Michael keeps it professional as Cy leaves.

Quinn is typing away when Huck stands at the door of her office.  She doesn't want to talk, but Huck is coming as close to admitting he's wrong as he'll ever come.  He assures her that he'll look for her next time.  It's all she's going to get, and she looks relieved.

Fitz calls a confused Abby into his office.  Realizing that Abby tried to prevent his wife's humiliation, then minimized it, he offers her Scotch.  Which she thinks is good, but not as good as the one the fucking Queen of England gave her once.  She kind of offers to hook Fitz up with it, then tells him you can't out-Scotch a Scotswoman.  When Fitz apologizes for yelling at her, Abby reminds him the rules of employing people.  You can, occasionally, yell at people who work for you.  But, at least remember their fucking names.

Jake and Olivia and Rowan look like they're having a little fun.  They probably reminisced about the island, as if it was a vacation and not fleeing the messes they made.  They definitely praise the food for an anxious Rowan.  When Olivia excuses herself for a call, Rowan tries to make chitchat but Jake gets right into it, asking Rowan to admit to ordering Tom the Secret Service Mole to kill Jerry Jr.  He then does his worst by warning Rowan that he's going to tell Olivia.  But wait, Jake's a good guy; he offers Rowan a way out.  Rowan just has to abandon his career and life and house and go away.  Far away.  Permanently. And never hurt - I mean contact- Olivia again.

No, really, it's been a lovely evening

Rowan's not having it.  Jake, who is fucking his daughter, is now threatening to take his job and alienate Olivia from him permanently.  Rowan has a knife in his hand and slams it into the table between Jake's perfectly calm fingers.  Jake only looks up as he tells Rowan that he knows a great island off the coast of Zanzibar.  The mosquitoes and lack of real beer seem to be the only downsides. Jake is cool, but angry that Rowan would kill a kid of Olivia's lover;  Rowan is exuberantly furious.  They promise to kill each other. They barely manage to disguise the whole thing from Olivia when she returns.  In fact, Rowan lets Olivia know he'd love to do this again.  He makes a point of telling both Olivia and Jake that he's not going anywhere.  He's definitely staying so he can host them both at his house again.  Is he really not afraid of Jake's threats?  Probably, as Jake will see him the next morning proceeding to work as usual.

Olivia, back at work too, is reviewing footage from the hotel's security cameras, hacked into by her team.  They've got a doozy- Catelyn is seen getting into an elevator, hands around a file folder.  But an unidentified man quick runs into the elevator, and tries to get them from her.  Catelyn fights him off in the footage.  The Gladiators have a new suspect.  They just have to figure out who he is and what happened to that folder.  This looks like the unfolding mystery of the first half of the season.

The other mystery is what, exactly, does Lizzy Bear think Cy is going to dish out to Michael, the double-dealing prostitute?  I don't know, but she certainly seems happy when Michael gives her yet another surprise meeting at her daughter's school.  Let's hope Cy doesn't mix business with pleasure.