Episodes 814 – 859

The revelation that Philip Ragan had been the Footprint Killer continued to send ripple effects through King’s Bay. Tori Gray took a semester off her studies at King’s Bay University to recover from Philip’s brutal assault. She began seeing a therapist but refused to be fully honest about why she’d gone to Philip’s home the night that he attacked her. Philip’s former assistant, Sabrina Gage, planned to leave King’s Bay now that she was out of a job, but Jason Fisher came to her rescue: he arranged for a barista position for her at Thaw Coffee & Tea, the café located inside his ice arena, as a peace offering for the harsh way he’d treated her when she first arrived in town. Sabrina was grateful, and the two began to develop a friendship.

Sarah Fisher Gray was shocked when she received a flash drive containing a video that clearly showed Philip Ragan being shot to death by her mother, Paula. Sarah confided in her sister, Molly, who was claiming that she’d pulled the trigger in order to protect Paula, who had blocked out her memory of the event. Determined to keep their secret, Sarah investigated and zeroed in on a woman named Denise Campbell, who worked as a security guard in the building whose cameras had captured the footage. But when Sarah staged an “accidental” run-in with Campbell, the woman clearly did not recognize her, and Sarah realized that someone else must be the anonymous sender.

Paula’s youngest, Jason, announced that he and his girlfriend, Natalie Bishop, were expecting a baby. Paula was delighted, but Helen Chase — Jason’s former mother-in-law — overheard the news and expressed concerns about Jason tethering himself (and her granddaughter, Sophie) to Natalie forever. Helen chatted with Natalie’s sister, Diane, who encouraged Helen to be wary of the woman carrying Jason’s child.

Jason asked Natalie and her daughter, Bree, to move in with him, and his best friend, Alex Marshall, decided that it was the right time to move out of Jason’s place. He soon bought a house for himself. Meanwhile, Alex continued to think of his ex, Trevor, but was disappointed to learn that Trevor was on a date with someone else. However, Trevor heard from his father that Alex had called and stopped by to see him. The two men finally had an honest conversation about everything that had gone wrong between them over the years, and caught up in emotion, they had sex again. Soon they had officially renewed their relationship, vowing to do things differently this time.

Meanwhile, Spencer Ragan was reeling from the truth about his adoptive brother, Philip. He moved out of Philip’s loft and into a hotel, even though his biological father, Tim, offered him a room at his house. Spencer was rattled to learn of Natalie’s pregnancy, since they had slept together, but she privately assured him that, based on the date of conception, the baby had to be Jason’s. Spencer was eager to believe her and not be responsible for a child, so he took her at her word. Natalie continued to have trouble with Helen, who questioned her parenting methods and her attitude toward Sophie.

Travis Fisher decided that he wanted to follow in his late grandfather’s footsteps and pursue a career in cooking. His uncle, Matt Gray, got him an entry-level job in the kitchen at Harbor Boulevard. A longtime cook named Hansen took it upon himself to make things tough for Travis, who was so discouraged that he wanted to quit until Officer Rosie Jimenez challenged him on his work ethic. He decided to tough it out, and they began to bond.

While Tempest Banks was working alone at the ice arena one day, an armed robber came in and demanded that she lead him to the safe. Though scared, she was clever enough to text Travis an SOS message while the robber was distracted. He alerted Rosie, who called for backup and went in to save Tempest. Afterward, Diane asked Tempest for an interview, and although Tempest’s foster mother, Claire Fisher, was annoyed, Tempest consented. Samantha Fisher consoled her girlfriend as she recovered from the traumatic ordeal, and Tempest was amused when her brash interview went viral. Soon after, however, Tempest’s mother, Yvette, turned up in King’s Bay, having been able to track her down thanks to the viral video. Tempest made it clear that she wanted nothing to do with the woman, who secretly tailed her daughter and Samantha. When she saw where Tempest lived, she presumed that Claire might have money. Yvette went to see Claire and acted devastated about having been unable to find her daughter all those years, but Claire was skeptical. Yvette fainted, and at the hospital, it was revealed that she was pregnant. She claimed that she wanted to make things right with Tempest before bringing another child into the world. Tempest, however, remained resistant to Yvette’s efforts.

Hoping for some answers to as why Philip had gone on the killing spree that led to Bill Fisher’s death, Tim flew to the east coast to visit Philip’s mother, Loretta Ragan, in prison. She regarded with him with disdain and claimed that Bill and Ryan’s deaths were what the Fishers deserved for having torn apart her family all those years ago, when James Robbins was killed. When Tim returned home, he told Paula about the visit, and she grew faint and experienced dull, confusing flashes of the shooting, though not enough to understand what had really happened.

Soon afterward, Molly was arrested for Philip’s death and charged with second-degree murder. She was terrified to be facing real charges but refused to let Paula be punished for shooting Philip, since she blamed herself for having brought him into their family in the first place. Natalie offered to bring her ex-husband, Conrad Halston, a skilled defense attorney, to town to handle Molly’s case. The Fishers were grateful. Conrad came to town; he and Natalie maintained a somewhat adversarial relationship as exes and co-parents.  He immediately clocked that Molly was hiding something and worked with her to get her story straight. Molly was granted bail, but Sarah received an anonymous text demanding $100,000 by the start of Molly’s trial, or the video of the real shooting would go public. Sarah worked to find the blackmailer’s identity and found herself having to lie to Matt about what was going on. Molly was shocked when the board at Objection Designs suspended her, pending the outcome of her trial. During prep for Molly’s trial, Tori panicked while being questioned about Philip. Sarah realized Tori was lying about something and feared that Philip had sexually assaulted her. Tori insisted that wasn’t the case.

Danielle Taylor continued to struggle with her alcohol addiction in private. Claire and Brent decided to test out their budding romance by going on a real date. After their date, they slept together for the first time. Danielle came by Brent’s house and was surprised to see them together. They realized they would have to share the news with Molly and the rest of the family soon. Molly found a half-full bottle of wine in Danielle’s closet. She reached out to Brent, and they planned to talk to Danielle about her drinking, but when Brent did, Danielle blurted out the news of his and Claire’s relationship — in front of Molly and the twins. Thrown, Molly lashed out at Brent and accused him of having been with Claire before their divorce. Danielle tried to go to a meeting to get clean but wound up drinking again. Claire went to Molly to discuss things and make it clear that she never wanted to hurt Molly. She promised to do whatever she could to help Molly be acquitted of Philip’s murder. Danielle finally admitted her problem to Brent and reapplied herself to the program. With Jimmy Trask’s help, she started working more seriously on recording an album. She nearly relapsed on a night when she planned to play at Open Mic Night but couldn’t get on stage, but she stayed strong.

Travis had the idea to promote Harbor Boulevard by having a chili cookoff at the end-of-summer festival. He enlisted Samantha to help with promotion and social media and lined up several judges — including Rosie. Despite Travis’s nerves, the turnout was huge, and the event was a success. Travis’s biological mom, Kathleen Bundy, was eventually named the winner, though Tori’s rival Fee C showed up and caused a scene by picking a fight with Tori and hurling Helen’s chili entry all over Tori and Spencer. Danielle triumphantly took to the stage and performed music for the crowd. Kathleen and Jimmy met and hit it off.

Natalie gave birth to a son, whom she and Jason decided to name Peter (with Bree’s input). She was edgy when Spencer met the baby at the chili cookoff, and later Helen saw Spencer and Natalie having an intense conversation.

Yvette showed up at the chili cookoff, and Samantha realized that she’d once had an encounter with her and that Yvette had been following her and Tempest. Yvette wanted Tempest to leave town with her, fearful of the Fishers’ connections to the serial murders, but Tempest refused. She did finally get to confront Yvette about the abuse that Tempest and her brother suffered at the hands of Yvette’s old boyfriends. Claire shared the story of her own rape as a teenager and enabled Tempest to open up about her abuse.

Sarah told Molly that she set aside $100,000 from the sale of her late husband Graham’s house as part of a plan to nab the blackmailer, who alerted Sarah that the money drop would take place at the end-of-summer festival. Sarah guiltily continued to hide the entire thing from Matt as she made plans. She and Molly left the money in the men’s restroom as instructed, but they left a secret monitoring device — only for Sarah’s young son, Billy, to accidentally mess up their plan. Tori met a guy working as a janitor, and later Sarah realized that person was impersonating a janitor in order to recover the money. She and Molly cornered the guy and recognized him as Zennosuke Tanaka, an I.T. guy from the bank building who had wiped the footage to blackmail them. They managed to record him admitting to the scheme, thereby neutralizing the threat, and forced him to return the money. Not long afterward, though, the blackmailer staged a run-in with Tori. This time, he introduced himself as Zane and told her that being a janitor was only a temporary side gig. Tori was charmed by him, and they exchanged numbers.

Molly’s trial soon got underway. Loretta phoned Spencer from prison, but he refused to buy into her gloating about the Fishers paying for what they’d done. Sarah was nervous when Paula began having confusing memory flashes. The DA, Audrey Tam, tried to make it seem as if Molly’s shooting of Philip had been premeditated. Spencer was called to testify by the prosecution in an attempt to cast doubt upon Philip having been the killer at all. After his appearance in court, Spencer overheard Tim and Claire discussing how they’d once feared he might be the killer and flipped out. He blasted them and took their lack of faith as a sign that they’d never accept him as family. He quit his job at Vision and moved out of the hotel where he’d been staying. Tim asked Tori, who was close to Spencer, for help getting through to his son.

In his rage, Spencer went to Natalie and demanded a paternity test be done on Peter. During a dinner party, Natalie got an idea and swiped Samantha’s fork, which she managed to switch with Spencer’s sample for the DNA test. When the results came in, they concluded that Spencer was not Peter’s father… but seemed to show that he had a chromosomal condition called Male XX Syndrome, making him biologically female. He was so thrown by this strange result that he went to Tim and Loretta for insights into his medical history, but he refused to accept either of their efforts to mend fences. At the end of his rope, Tim chewed out Spencer for his attitude toward the Fishers.

Jimmy and Kathleen went on an official date and were amused to learn that they shared a connection: their children had dated. Danielle successfully performed at Open Mic Night as she continued to succeed in her recovery. She, Jimmy, and Kathleen met Yvette, who was there watching, and urged her to overcome her fear and perform. With Jimmy accompanying her, she did so and became aware of a life that she’d never been able to have, especially as she grew more fed-up with her job at the dollar store and the uncertainty over how she would raise her unborn child.

Travis was thrown when Rosie stopped communicating with him after they went on two dates. But when Rosie was called to testify during the trial, Travis realized that she still blamed herself for Philip having the opportunity to murder Bill. Even when Travis told her that he didn’t blame her, Rosie continued to pull away.

The Fishers, especially Paula, struggled through their first Thanksgiving without Bill and the memory of his murder a year ago. The holiday allowed Travis to finally get through to Rosie, who admitted that she had no plans with her family and accepted his invitation to join the Fishers. They got their budding relationship back on track. Tori went to visit Spencer at the lavish new house he was renting, but he declined to come to the family Thanksgiving celebration.

When the trial resumed, the DA introduced evidence to make it seem as though Tori had gone to Philip’s loft knowing Spencer wouldn’t be there — implying that they were having an affair. A humiliated Tori found solace in hanging out with Zane, unaware that he was using her to remain a thorn in Sarah’s side. Molly began to panic as she realized that her prospects of an acquittal were growing slimmer. After the defense rested, the prosecution called a surprise rebuttal witness: Fee C! She testified that Tori had bragged to her that she was dating an older man, causing everyone to wonder if Tori and Philip really did have an affair. Reeling, Tori admitted to Molly that she’d had a crush on Philip and even made a move on him. Molly was compassionate and agreed that it could stay between them.

The jury went out to deliberate. A frightened Molly came clean with Conrad about how she was covering for Paula. They received word that the verdict was in. Paula hit her head and remembered shooting Philip. Desperate, Sarah locked her in the backyard shed to keep her from confessing. She enlisted Diane to guard the shed. But Paula was determined not to see Molly punished for her crime, and she turned the tables and got Diane to let her out of the shed. She then locked Diane inside and raced to the courthouse, where she burst into the courtroom before the verdict could be read and announced that she had shot Philip!

Paula convinced the judge that she was the shooter, and the murder charges against Molly were dropped. But Paula then realized that in addition to her being punished, Molly and Sarah would both be charged with obstruction of justice and perjury. Matt was chilly toward Sarah after learning that she’d been lying to him for a year.

As the year drew to a close, Paula, Molly, and Sarah all feared what punishments they would face. Conrad resolved to help all three of them receive favorable sentences. On Christmas Eve, Travis cooked a special dinner for Rosie, and they shared their first kiss, while Alex proposed marriage to an elated Trevor, who happily accepted.