SCANDAL Recap: Beltway Unbuckled

And we start with a bang…a very annoyed Mellie wakes up Fitz who is sleeping in the baby’s room. She unleashes a tirade on him before storming out. It seems like a happy healthy marriage to me.

Oh my word, David and Abbey are still in bed together. He is using her to try to get information about the Quinnsay case, which she hasn’t wanted to talk about it yet. I suppose there are worse ways than good sex to be “pumped” for information.

Now that we have checked in with half of the team we get to find out the Scandal of the week. This week it is a case of a missing college student. Her parents, as well as Senator Davis are at Pope & Associates where Olivia takes the case. She takes control with one of her fast talking, I’m in charge, do what I say speeches. It seems to work, the media is all over the story.

Harrison and Quinnsay are looking at a website called Beltway Unbuckled. It’s a girl that blogs anonymously about the politicians she sleeps with. Turns out the blog is written by the missing girl. Olivia is really pissed at Senator Davis for not vetting Jenny (the missing girl) first since they went to all the trouble of portraying her as an innocent college girl to the press.

The team jumps into action, making calls, following leads while the parents watch in horror at the news stories playing on a constant loop.
In the midst of all of this Olivia gets a call, next thing we know she is in the woods where a body was found. It is the body of the missing girl, Jenny.

Back in the office the team is again working leads. Huck finds out where she was the night she died.  Jenny was at none other than a State Department party.
Abbey is going to find out who she went home with that night and Harrison and Quinnsay are going to check in on the autopsy.

Cyrus is called into an office by Mellie, she had a kid puke on her $600.00 skirt and she isn’t happy about it. She wants out of this part of her “job description” she wants to be part of the grown folks business from now on. Cyrus cuts her off telling her she may have run things during the election but this is a Presidency and she doesn’t run things now. Fitz even tells her to suck it up before going about his business.

In autopsy the medical examiner tells Harrison and Quinnsay that Jenny spent five hours bleeding out in a ditch dying. If she had been brought to the hospital after what looks like car accident injuries she would have lived.
This makes Olivia quite mad.

Olivia is actually at the hospital checking in on her friend the Supreme Court Justice who is there for chemo. They seem to have a very close relationship.

The Gladiators are running through the list of guys who were at the State Department party. They narrow in on one named Alexander. They give his name to the police to have him called in for questioning. He was in a car accident 50’ from the ditch Jenny was found in. There is just one catch, he has diplomatic immunity. Something I would dearly love to have some day. I wouldn’t use it to get away with murder or anything but maybe my next speeding ticket.

Olivia heads to The White House because the only person who can revoke diplomatic immunity is The President. Cyrus meets with her but keeps telling her she can’t be there. The President is suffering, struggling and seeing her will make it worse. Before he can get her out of the door Fitz shows up, the tension in the room is so crazy it is making my skin crawl. Fitz says he can’t rescind the immunity (something to do with airspace over the country Alexander is from and the war the US might be starting with East Sudan) and even goes as far as to get a little jab in at Olivia. She is speechless when she grabs her purse and leaves.

There is a media frenzy surrounding Alexander but it doesn’t seem to faze him and why should it, he has diplomatic immunity. Olivia has an idea though, she always does. The media and Jenny’s parents camp out on the White House lawn calling for the immunity to be overturned.
Inside the White House Fitz and Mellie are both watching the news from different rooms. Mellie gets a gleam in her eyes, which should worry just about everyone.

David and his secretary are meeting on a park bench, very secret spy of them. She has every call made to and from Quinnsay’s ex-boyfriend in the three weeks leading up to the explosion.
David’s secretary asks if he has had “the ging” over to his apartment yet to see his conspiracy wall, as she is saying this we see Abbey picking the lock at David’s apartment. Sure enough Abbey gets into the apartment and the look of surprised almost horror on her face is rather amusing.
Poor David, because if Abbey liked him before she might have a harder time believing that now that she has seen the conspiracy wall.
David can’t worry about something he doesn’t know about since he is still on the bench in the park with his secretary. They find a DC phone number Quinnsay’s ex-boyfriend called consistently in the weeks before the explosion. Next thing you know David is at the Doyle Energy office, he is there to talk to that guy that is shady and sleazy and who’s name I can’t remember. I know the whole name thing is a trend with me but I can’t help it. I watch a lot of TV and these are supporting player’s people.
No time is wasted before David asks Shady Energy Man if he has heard of the company Cytron. Shady Man pours on the Southern accent in what I can only assume is a ploy to sound more down home and trustworthy. It doesn’t work on David, he tells Shady Man the calls were to his head of security and doesn’t that seem odd.
Suddenly Shady Energy Man isn’t so friendly. He tells David to get a subpoena and then he can look into/talk to anyone at Doyle Energy he wants.

Olivia is back at the hospital with the Supreme Justice while she does her chemo. The conversation turns to Olivia and Fitz.
“You are trying so hard to get that man to walk away from you have you ever stopped to consider how painful it’s going to be if you succeed?”
Well I have and I have a hard enough time keeping it together during the Liv/Fitz scenes as it is!
The White House calls Olivia, it’s actually Mellie on the line. Olivia sits down with Mellie at the White House to talk about Jenny. Mellie is on Team Olivia at the moment, she is going to take a public stand on the issue.
Why Fitz thinks Mellie will go quietly into this good night I have no idea. He should know better by now and this is what he gets for antagonizing her earlier in the day.

And what do you know; the next morning there is Mellie on the lawn ready to talk to the parents about their great loss and drawing in more press.
Fitz meanwhile is in the Oval Office looking pained. He is lamenting about what political geniuses his wife and his mistress are before dissolving in a fit of giggles, or hysterical laughter, it’s a toss up. Fitz says the women won this round.

Later Olivia is pacing in her office while the team watches her from the hall. Abbey says she is going in. Abbey doesn’t really take a nice tact; instead she goes in and yells at Olivia for being so secretive lately. Olivia tells her she has to move on from not knowing everything.  There are secrets, deal with it.

At that moment Cyrus calls Olivia and tells her to meet him at their old place. She shows up at the restaurant and moments later it is emptied and Fitz walks in. He tells Olivia they are rescinding the immunity of Jenny’s killer. Fitz says he wanted to tell her in person, he wanted to see her.
I need to veer off for a second to mention that these scenes with Olivia and Fitz make me feel like a voyeur watching these people’s private lives, like I’m intruding. It is heartbreaking. I know it’s not right but for one hour a week I put my moral compass away and root for the man and his mistress.

Back to the restaurant, Fitz says something more heartbreaking than last weeks, “I’m not yours!” He says, “We’re done. I’m letting you go.” He ends his “It’s not fair to anyone” with the question “Right?” The look on his face says he badly wants her to argue with him that it isn’t the right thing but she takes a deep breath and says, “Right.”
The sad look on his face is nothing compared to the breakdown Olivia has moments after he leaves. She sobs in the restaurant by herself.

Olivia still in tears is in her office watching Fitz on the news talking about the overturned immunity. Olivia tells the parents, who do not take it well, that the killer is going to get to go back to his country, even if he will never be able to return to the U.S.

Harrison and Quinnsay are having a drink in another part of the office where Quinnsay is wondering why no one but Abbey questions Olivia. Harrison says he doesn’t want to know the how or why of the way Olivia works, he just does what he is told because she saved him and that is all there is to it.

Jenny’s Dad is leaving the hotel with a gun intent on killing the man that killed his daughter when he sees the news. Alexander had a heart attack at his home and was found dead. You can thank Huck for that, something we know because he confesses at AA. Although he calls killing whiskey so as not to completely freak the rest of the addicts out.

David is in the shower at his apartment when Abbey joins him. He is freaked out momentarily since he doesn’t know Abbey broke in earlier, and well because she surprised him naked in his shower, but Abbey doesn’t care. She wants to know if this is just sex or if this is “something”. He assures her it is “something” and Abbey says, “Then we should talk about what is going on with Olivia Pope.”
After the shower David goes over the conspiracy wall with Abbey while we see Shady Energy Man, Supreme Court Justice, Mellie and Cyrus all sit down for a secret meeting.
Abbey is saying she doesn’t believe in conspiracies as Olivia Pope enters the secret meeting room. What on earth are they up to?

We have to wait two weeks for a new episode, but from the look of next week’s episode it will be worth it.

Scandal airs Thursday 10/9c on ABC