Episodes 755 – 813
All of King’s Bay gathered at the Edge of Winter Arena to ring in 2015 at a fundraiser gala. Jason Fisher brought Natalie Bishop as his date, and Helen Chase was visibly irked to see that her former son-in-law was in a new relationship. Danielle Taylor told Jimmy Trask that she didn’t think they should get back together, and she surprised Ryan Moriani by joining him at the party. Travis Fisher caught his cousin, Tori Gray, outside smoking pot with her friends and warned her to be careful not to get caught. And Diane Bishop received a shock when she saw her daughter, Samantha Fisher, kissing Tempest Banks.
The night took a horrific turn when Jason’s longtime coach, Sandy James, was found dead in the arena’s A/V booth. Her throat had been slit with an ice skate’s blade, and there was a pair of bloody footprints — made with a men’s shoe — near the body. Police commander Brent Taylor suspected that Jason might have been the intended victim, since Sandy had gone to the booth in his place and had been wearing his staff jacket.
Alex Marshall and Liam Cassel were excited when the film studio reacted positively to their screenplay adaptation of Alex’s novel and wanted to move forward with the project. Alex invited Liam to join him, Cameron, and some of Cameron’s friends for a night out at The Lookout’s LGBT night. Meanwhile, Samantha admitted to Tempest that she was attracted to her, and Tempest convinced her to come to The Lookout, as well. Samantha was uncomfortable when they ran into Alex, but he promised that the encounter would stay between them and offered a listening ear if she ever wanted to talk. Samantha tried to relax and enjoy her night with Tempest.
Alex was also thrown when his and Liam’s mutual ex, Trevor Brooks, showed up. When they were alone, Trevor insisted that he still had feelings for Alex and kissed him. One of Cameron’s friends saw and told Cameron, not realizing that Liam would overhear. Liam confronted Alex and demanded to know what was really going on between him and Trevor; in the fray, Trevor misunderstood what Liam knew and admitted that he had slept with Alex while engaged to Liam.
With the truth out, Liam took swift action. Alex learned that Liam had gone to the film studio and demanded to have Alex thrown off the project. Both Alex and Trevor attempted to reason with Liam, who refused to listen and departed King’s Bay for Los Angeles.
After spending the holidays away from King’s Bay, Philip Ragan returned and attempted to repair his relationship with Molly Taylor, but she remained steadfast in her stance that she could no longer trust him.
Brent feared that, if Jason had been the intended victim, the murder might have been connected to Shannon Parish, so he arranged to have her body exhumed to be certain she hadn’t once again pulled a fast one. He discovered that Shannon’s body had been cremated and that DNA testing would not be effective on ashes. Jason was stunned when a woman calling herself Sabrina Gage (the identity Shannon had used during her return to King’s Bay) showed up at the arena to see him. He did not recognize her, but she claimed to be the person whose identity Shannon had stolen. “Sabrina” insisted that she had awoken from her coma over two years earlier and learned that someone using her name had committed a murder, and the recent order to exhume Shannon’s body had once again brought up Sabrina’s name and cost her a job opportunity.
New police officer Rosie Jimenez hauled Sabrina down to the station, where Brent questioned her and felt sure that she was not connected to Sandy’s murder. Sabrina wanted someone in King’s Bay to give a statement that she was not the person who had wreaked havoc and murdered Courtney Chase. Jason remained suspicious and told her to get lost. On her way home to Iowa, Sabrina got into a minor car accident with Philip Ragan, and their conversation afterward turned to photography. Philip offered her a job as his assistant. When Spencer Ragan met Sabrina, he thought her unbelievably naive and questioned Philip’s choice.
When Tempest told Claire Fisher that she had a date, Claire put together the pieces and realized that Tempest and Samantha were more than just friends. Though she didn’t acknowledge this explicitly, Claire encouraged Tempest to invite Samantha along on a weekend trip they were planning. Diane bristled at the invitation and tried to make alternate plans to take Samantha to visit graduate schools, but Claire confronted her and warned her not to come between the two young women. Diane turned to Alex for advice, and though he felt torn because Sam had also confided in him, he urged her simply to be supportive of her daughter. Separately, Alex encouraged Samantha to open to her mother and have faith in Diane’s love for her.
As Sarah and Matt’s remarriage, to be held at Bill’s restaurant, approached, both the bride and groom were superstitious about this marriage ending the same way their first had. Matt panicked when Bill’s sous chef for the day fell ill, but Travis jumped in and demonstrated a flair for cooking as he helped Bill prepare dinner for the reception. Sarah was accidentally locked in the walk-in freezer with Tori — just as she had been before her first wedding to Matt! — and after a mysterious figure lurking around unlocked the door, Sarah accused Molly of having locked her in there. Ryan encouraged the sisters to make peace, and family and friends watched as Sarah and Matt once again became husband and wife. After the wedding, Ryan proposed to Danielle, and she happily accepted.
Helen was irritated to see Jason and Natalie together and scolded Jason for bringing someone new and possibly untrustworthy into his young daughter’s life. Ryan overheard the confrontation and pulled Helen aside. He warned Helen to leave Jason and Natalie alone. The discussion turned heated, and Helen was offended by Ryan’s intrusion.
Ryan and Danielle wasted no time procuring their marriage license. When Ryan was alone in his home, he heard glass break and went to investigate. Not long afterward, Danielle came over and found Ryan sprawled on the floor of his study, bleeding from a gunshot wound — with another pair of bloody footprints near him. He was rushed to the hospital and into surgery. When he awoke, he told Danielle that he wanted to marry her immediately. The Fishers gathered in Ryan’s hospital room and looked on as he and Danielle were married. Shortly thereafter, Ryan took a turn for the worse and passed away.
Paula and Danielle were among the most devastated as Ryan was laid to rest. A host of former King’s Bay residents — such as Danielle’s brother, Josh, and his wife, Lauren, as well as Ryan’s former stepmother, Katherine Fitch, and her son, Andy — returned for the funeral. Travis shared a warm moment with his ex, Elly Vanderbilt, at the wake, and she urged him to forgive himself for their breakup and move forward with his life. Philip attended, and Molly was grateful for his support, while Paula in particular was thrilled when her and Bill’s grandson, Spencer, joined them for the graveside service.
Brent noted that the crime scene bore a startling resemblance to that of Nick Moriani’s shooting from several years prior — a crime to which Ryan had later admitted. Officer Rosie Jimenez recalled a strange run-in she’d had with Sabrina Gage shortly after the time of the shooting, in which she noted Sabrina’s jumpy behavior and a tear in her pants. Rosie came to see Brent to tell him about the encounter, and she sparred with Travis in the process. Brent suggested to Sarah that, as an independent P.I. not associated with the KBPD, she head to Iowa to investigate Sabrina Gage. Tori confided in Brent that she had seen a harried Helen Chase outside the arena — and not at her spot at the dinner table — not long before Sandy had been killed.
Still reeling from Ryan’s death, Jason pushed Natalie away. Hurt, she had another hook-up with Spencer, though they remained unaware of their mutual connection to Jason. In the morning, after receiving guidance from Tim, Jason went to apologize to Natalie, and she managed to hide from him the fact that another man had spent the night. They reunited. Later, Jason and Spencer bonded when they both turned up at Bill and Paula’s, but neither was aware of their other common interest.
Tori Gray was devastated to discover that Ian, the older guy from KBU whom she’d been seeing, was also hooking up with her friend, Fee. Tori told them both off but was privately very upset, especially when Fee and the rest of their mutual friends shunned her. Philip Ragan came upon her near tears and offered words of encouragement, and after another run-in, Tori began to develop a crush on the sophisticated older man. Philip remained seemingly unaware of her crush but was hopeful that he and Tori’s aunt, Molly, were inching toward closeness again.
Brent interviewed the Chases and learned that Don had been at a painting class at King’s Bay University on the night Ryan was killed, meaning that Helen had no alibi. In Iowa, Sarah assumed a false identity and met with Sabrina Gage’s mother. Though Mrs. Gage saw through the act — because someone else from King’s Bay had also been there recently, asking questions — Sarah ultimately felt certain that the Sabrina residing in King’s Bay was on the level. Brent realized that the other visitor to Iowa had been Rosie and warned her not to overstep her bounds as an officer. He also felt that he had enough of a case and placed Helen under arrest for the two murders.
News of the arrest shocked King’s Bay. Helen was arraigned, and Don stood by her, though he questioned what lengths Helen’s grief over their daughter might have driven her to. Alex felt torn between the Fishers, who had lost Ryan to the killer, and the Chases, who had been surrogate parents to him. The prosecution had a witness who claimed to have seen Helen making a purchase just before New Year’s Eve at a shoe store that sold the same men’s shoes that had been used to leave the bloody prints at both crime scenes; Helen claimed to have bought shoes for herself, but since the transaction was made with cash, she had no record to aid her case. Nevertheless, the judge released her on bail.
Grief-stricken over Ryan’s death, Danielle struggled to push forward with her life, but she was constantly distracted and even snapped at her nephew, Christian, during a piano lesson. While grocery shopping, she was drawn to the wine aisle, but Paula interrupted before she could compromise her sobriety. Not long afterward, however, Cameron came to the house to drop off a gift basket that had been delivered for Molly at the office. Alone, Danielle opened the basket, removed the bottle of wine, and drank it. She passed out, and when she awoke, she scrambled to pick up dinner and cover her tracks before Molly arrived home. She succeeded, and Molly was none the wiser.
Sarah’s visit also alerted her to the nature of Sabrina’s job in King’s Bay, and Brent angrily accused Philip of being up to something. Claire intervened between her brother and her friend, talking Brent down as best she could, when Philip insisted that he’d met Sabrina by chance and had no idea who she was. Claire and Brent agreed to have dinner to catch up, which they had been trying to plan for some time. When they got together, Brent apologized to Claire for having pushed her away some time before. Claire blamed herself and her drunken advance toward him, but Brent explained that he’d gotten nervous about being intimate with her, because he hadn’t been with anyone besides Molly since their divorce — or since he got his prosthetic leg. Claire tried to assure him that wouldn’t have mattered to her, and they wound up kissing.
Trevor had to travel to Portland, Oregon, for an Objection store visit, causing him to miss a crucial meeting in King’s Bay. Molly asked her assistant, Cameron, to record the meeting so that Trevor could listen later. Cameron, still angry at Trevor for his fling with Alex, told Trevor that he’d record the meeting — on a digital recorder that Alex had left at his place while they were dating. That night, after the meeting, Cameron returned to the office to leave the recorder for Trevor on his desk. He heard something in Molly’s office and went to check. Later, when Trevor came by, he picked up the recorder, but there was no sign of Cameron — and Trevor was not aware of someone lurking inside Molly’s office. Later, Brent’s time with Claire was interrupted by news that a custodian had found a dead body in Molly’s office.
The victim was Cameron, but one aspect of the crime scene struck Brent as being off: the footprints had been made with red paint rather than the victim’s blood. The police arrested Helen for this murder, as well, but she was released when Danielle came forward and revealed that she had seen Helen at the liquor store at the same time Cameron was killed. In her grief, Molly turned to Philip.
Meanwhile, Trevor tried to listen to the recording of the meeting, but he was too rattled by the news of Cameron’s murder. A grieving Alex came to see him, and Trevor left the recorder playing in his room — unaware that it had captured an exchange between Cameron and the killer! Trevor’s parents, Roz and Patrick, returned home from a cruise, and Trevor and Alex went out to get them lunch while they napped. Unbeknownst to them, the killer lurked outside the house, recalling how Cameron had said something about a recorder having been on his desk. After Trevor and Alex left, the killer assumed the house was empty and broke in to retrieve the device. Roz awoke from her nap and was stunned to find a man — someone she recognized — in Trevor’s room. They struggled, and when Trevor and Alex returned, they found Roz dangling from a second-story window. The killer pushed her, and she fell to the driveway. Trevor tried to chase the killer, but he escaped and was able to destroy the recorder. Roz was rushed to the hospital but succumbed to her injuries and died before she could give the killer’s name.
The Brooks family and their friends mourned Roz. Natalie chided Helen for daring to show her face at Roz’s funeral. Trevor shut down in the wake of his mother’s death, but Alex offered his friendship and was able to get through to him. The burial brought Danielle back to Ryan’s not so long ago, and afterward, she again bought wine and covertly drank. Molly and the twins returned home to find her playing the piano, and Danielle did her best to cover that she was drunk. Feeling uncomfortable after her confrontation with Natalie, Helen bypassed the cemetery portion of the services and went for a walk on the beach, where she came upon a kegger being attended by cousins Tori and Spencer. Helen earned points with Tori after she helped her stand up to Ian and Fee C.
Samantha opened up to Tim about her sexuality, and he was supportive. He reassured her that Diane would take the news just fine, and Samantha steeled herself to tell Diane. But before she could, Diane walked in on another intimate moment between Sam and Tempest. Diane promised Samantha that her sexuality was not at all an issue but urged her not to rush into anything with Tempest.
Tim rallied his siblings to try and keep their family safe from the Footprint Killer. He believed that Molly had been the real target the night Cameron was killed, meaning that Jason, Ryan, and Molly had all been in the killer’s crosshairs. He and Sarah went to Brent and asked him to investigate Loretta Ragan, the person most likely to have a vendetta against their family, even though she was in federal prison. Tim was alarmed when he found a tube of red paint in Spencer’s car and feared that he could be the killer. He confided in Claire but made her promise not to tell anyone until they could figure out whether the theory had legs. Feeling conflicted, Claire cancelled her planned romantic dinner with Brent by telling him that she had been scheduled to work at the hospital.
Jason ran into Sabrina and angrily told her that he wants nothing to do with her. Sabrina swore that she has nothing against him or his family and once again vowed her innocence. She promised to stay away. But no one was privy to the disturbing headaches she sometimes experienced while on her own.
Tori was elated when Philip agreed to help her pick out art classes for the next semester. She made Samantha promise to cover for her by saying they had plans together and then showed up at Philip’s with a superb bottle of champagne (which she’d taken from her late stepfather Graham’s wine cellar) on the pretense of visiting Spencer, even though she knew he was at a concert in Seattle. That same day, Travis’s biological mother, Kathleen Bundy, came to King’s Bay for one of their get-togethers, but she declined Bill’s dinner invitation by saying she had something else to do that night. Tim was surprised to run into Liam at the Vision Publishing offices; Liam claimed that he’d only come to town to handle some paperwork and didn’t want anyone to know he was there. Tim felt Liam’s presence was suspicious, especially after Sarah was able to confirm that the paint found in Spencer’s car didn’t match the paint used to make the prints left at Cameron’s murder scene.
Danielle had an uncomfortable run-in with her ex, Matt, and took shots of tequila with her dinner at 322 Bar & Grill. Jimmy entered, and he found Danielle’s touchy-feely behavior strange. When he asked if she’d been drinking, she blew up at him and left in a rage. She called a car to take her home, planning to tell Molly that her own car hadn’t started and she had left it at the restaurant. When she got home, she was nearly bowled over by a masked figure running away from the house. She was unharmed, but she and Molly found that the person had left a delivery on the doorstep: a bag containing a black rose and a dead bird — just like Molly’s stalker, her former fiancé Craig Simmons, had left for her many years ago.
Tori kissed Philip, and he realized her true intentions. He told her that he was in love with her aunt. Humiliated, Tori locked herself in his bedroom. Tori became angry when she realized that Philip didn’t care about her feelings — he just didn’t want Molly to think there was anything inappropriate going on between them. An irate Philip stormed into the bedroom just as Tori dropped something under the bed… where she found a bag containing shoes matching those used at the Footprint Killer’s crime scenes. Tori realized that Philip was the killer and attempted to escape, but he shoved her down the stairs, knocking her unconscious. Desperate to distance himself from her, he threw her into her car and drove it to a remote part of town, where he was about to kill her — when Samantha called and was shocked to hear her call coming through on the Bluetooth speakers in Tori’s car. Samantha and Tempest, who were around the corner leaving a restaurant, rushed to find the car, and Philip fled without being detected.
Tori was raced to the hospital but landed in a coma. The shoes were in her car, so the authorities realized that this was once again the work of the Footprint Killer. Philip hurried home to clean up before Spencer arrived home. Sarah was furious that Samantha had lied about having been with Tori, but when Tempest stood up for Sam, Diane was impressed and grateful. In the frenzy, Brent learned that Claire wasn’t working that night and had lied to get out of their plans. Molly called Philip to keep her and Danielle company after the strange gift was left at the house, and he spent the night on their couch. Philip, who had secretly hired one of Loretta’s goons to deliver the “present” to terrify Molly, was pleased that his plan had worked. Jimmy came to speak with Molly about his suspicions regarding Danielle, and she confided in Philip about how to proceed. Molly admitted that the events of the past year had caused her to reconsider how things had ended with Philip, and they slept together. He feared that Tori would come out of her coma and expose him, and he knew he had to take action to eliminate that threat.
Natalie was alarmed when she became ill. She took a pregnancy test, which gave her a positive result. Based upon the timing, she was worried that Spencer, not Jason, might be the father. As she struggled to decide what to do about the pregnancy, she found herself pushing Jason away. He questioned her about her strange behavior, but she was too nervous to come clean with him.
While Tori lingered in her coma, Sarah persisted in holding vigil at her daughter’s bedside. Paula and Bill decided to shift their family Thanksgiving celebration to the hospital so everyone could be near Tori. Travis helped Bill prepare the to-go meal, and Natalie was thrown for a loop when she spotted Spencer there and learned that he was Jason’s nephew. She realized that she couldn’t tell Jason about the baby then, but she and Spencer vowed not to let anyone find out about their fling. Philip joined Molly but had an ulterior motive: in his pocket, he had a syringe full of a solution that he planned to use to poison Tori. With the entire family present, however, he was unable to bring himself to do it, so he “accidentally” left his scarf behind and went back to Molly’s to spend the night.
The next morning, Philip told Molly that he was going to drop off some flowers for Tori’s room when he went to pick up his scarf. She offered to come along. Bill and Paula also went to the hospital to try and relieve Sarah and Matt, who had been there all night with their daughter. Rosie was stationed outside the room, and since Philip was on the list of approved visitors, she let him in. Philip offered to watch the room if she needed to take a break, and a grateful Rosie headed to the restroom. Philip began injecting the poison into Tori’s IV, but Bill walked in and questioned what he was doing. When Philip dropped the syringe, he realized that Bill knew too much, and he bashed him over the head with a vase and then strangled him with the scarf before Rosie returned.
Philip slipped out and closed the door, and then he took Molly out on the balcony outside the ICU. Minutes later, Paula found Bill on the floor and called for help. Sarah realized what Philip must have done and raced to get Molly away from him. But Philip, knowing he’d been caught, pulled a gun on them out on the balcony and tried to engineer a way to escape with Molly. While Sarah bided her time and attempted to figure out a way to outsmart him, the doctors came and told Paula that although they had done everything possible, Bill had passed away. An anguished Paula went to the balcony to tell her daughters, and the distraction gave Sarah the chance to knock the gun out of Philip’s hands. Paula picked it up and, upon hearing that Philip had killed both her husband and son, shot him. Then she fainted.
Sarah went for help, and in the fray, Molly wiped off the gun, picked it up, and claimed that she had shot Philip when he threatened to throw Sarah off the balcony. When Paula awoke, she had no memory of the shooting. Molly tried to convince Sarah that it was for the best that they cover for their mother, but Brent revealed that a nearby building had a security camera that might have captured the incident. Sarah advised Molly to come clean before the lie went on for too long, but when they learned that the camera had seemingly failed and not recorded the shooting, Molly stuck to her story. Left with no choice, Sarah backed up her sister’s account. Philip was pronounced dead.
The Fishers held Bill’s funeral and rallied around Paula, who struggled to imagine life without her beloved husband. Tori awoke from her coma and attended the funeral in a wheelchair. She embarked upon physical therapy to recover from the effects of the coma. Paula and Helen made amends. Spencer was rocked by the discovery that his brother and roommate had been the Footprint Killer. Travis lashed out at Rosie, blaming her for having left Philip alone in Tori’s room, giving him the chance to kill Bill. Molly struggled with her guilt over having trusted Philip and the knowledge that his spree had been a twisted effort to scare her back into his arms.
As Christmas approached, Sarah and Matt announced their intention to move in with Paula so that she would be surrounded by family. Jason discovered Natalie’s prenatal vitamins, and though she was terrified he would be angry about the pregnancy, he was optimistic about their future and promised they would navigate it together. Claire picked up Philip’s ashes from the morgue, and she and Spencer scattered them over the bay as they dealt with their grief for their brother and who he had turned out to be. She also apologized to Brent for lying about why she couldn’t make their date, but he was willing to forgive and forget. Molly revealed to Brent what Jimmy had told her about Danielle’s possible drinking, and they agreed to keep an eye on her. On Christmas Day, everyone gathered at the Fishers’ to be together and pay tribute to their departed loved ones. While helping Matt prepare the holiday feast, Travis announced that he would like to work in the kitchen at his late grandfather’s restaurant. As Danielle and Christian played a somber rendition of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” the family lit candles for those who had passed and vowed to be there for one another as they moved forward. Meanwhile, Sarah received a mysterious gift box containing an unmarked flash drive…