Episode 29, originally published 20-Mar-97

Skirting the Law

Jack enters the police station and sits down on a chair beside Salena Wiley. "Jack Abbott," she says. "You have a very good memory, Detective," he replies. "Thank you--now what can I do for you, Mr. Abbott? I assume you didn't come by to complement me on my brainpower." "Nope," Jack replies, "you're right about that. I came by to save you some." "Some...? Some what--complements?" "No, brain power. I came by to turn myself in." "Okaayy..." she says, leafing through a book labeled `Most Wanted' that is conveniently lying on her desk. "And which of these fine unexplained crimes would you like to relieve me of worrying about?" "Well, it's probably not in there yet..." "Ok, so it happened recently--?" "Can we come back to that?" Jack asks. He continues: "The timing is a little hard to explain if you don't understand the whole story." "Ok, she says, "well, can you tell me what TYPE of crime we're talking about?" "Murder." "Murder! You mean like pre-meditated murder? The kind you plan and do intentionally, murder?" "Yes, I think that's the one." "That's a capital crime, Jack. I think you should get a lawyer," says Salena in a tone indicates she's more worried Jack's gone off the deep end than that he's shot someone. "No, no, I waive all of that. I'm beyond lawyers now. I knew what I was doing and what the price was--but it was worth it." "Uh, ok, well, ... who'd you murder?" she asks very curiously. "The Black Knight himself..." She looks at him blankly, so he elaborates for her: "Victor Newman."

Grace walks out of the prison to where Tony is waiting in the car. "Did you find out what you wanted to know?" "You bet I did. I mean, at first he didn't want to talk, but I kissed him for a while and he softened right up." "You really gotta go easy on that kissing stuff, Gracie; it seems to work great, but you could be spreading some major diseases, you know what I mean?" She glares at him, as if this will somehow nullify the truth of what he's said. "Anyway, he apparently used to have a law partner named Morgan. To hear this guy I just talked to tell it, the wrong guy got sent to jail. He says when he found out Morgan was up to no good, he tried to turn him in but when the dust had settled, Morgan was free and he was in prison. Anyway, I have an address and we can go see for ourselves."

Nina sits down at the bar next to Les. "Hey, barkeep, this fox been in here before?" The bartender nods. "Yeah, I saw her the other day." He looks to Nina and says, "Welcome back, Ma'am." Then Les says, "Well, aren't ya going to introduce us?" The bartender shrugs. "Les, this is ..." his eyes look to Nina, whose womanly abundance is on display in her black leather outfit. She doesn't volunteer her name, but watches interestedly as the men discuss her. "Les," he repeats, "this is More." Nina giggles. Les smiles and says, "Ok, More, how about we get a table?" "Sure!" says Nina eagerly. They move to the table and the bartender brings over some beers. "Uh, I'll be back in a minute," says Nina, as she heads off suddenly toward the Ladies Room. Les looks around and seeing that no one is looking, pours something into her drink.

"Victor Newman! Are you on the level? You killed Victor Newman? You better back up and tell me the whole story," Salena says. Jack nods. "Well, I was away on a trip and I was lonely. My fiance Diane had too much work piled up to go along, and I was there by myself. So I went down to a bar and I met this woman--a hooker, as it turned out." "Jack Abbott, shame on you. With a fiance at home?" "No, no, it's not like that. She hit on me, but I declined. I told her I was happily engaged, but I asked her how she could stay in the business with all the diseases around. She told me it was true, that she'd contracted a fatal disease, but that she practiced safe sex and anyway she needed the money she was making to buy medication to keep her alive." "Jack, this is really awful and very sad, but I don't see what it has to do with Victor Newman." "I'm coming to that," Jack says. "So I called home to talk to my fiance. But she wasn't home. Then I called Gina Roma." "The restaurant owner?" "Yep." "Why did you do that?" "Well, I thought maybe Diane would have gone to Gina's for something to eat--in Genoa City, everyone goes to Gina's." "Right. So was she there?" "She was, but she was eating dinner with Victor Newman!"

Grace and Tony arrive park their car near an alley and proceed in. "It doesn't look very safe," Tony mutters. "Oh, Tony, there you go again being so cautious. Did you ever take a risk in your life?" "I had sex with you, didn't I?" "That was a long time ago, Tony." "The more I see of the way you run your life, the more I'm thinking that's a good thing," Tony responds. Taking their verbal impasse as a cue, the two proceed into the alley. Grace holds a small slip of paper which she matches against an address on a door. "This looks like it." She takes a deep breath and knocks. A thin man with greasy black hair and a dirty blue button-down shirt opens the door. He looks at the two and then looks both ways up and down the alley. "Yeah?" he asks in a manner that while gruff, we imagine to be his most cordial tone. "Mr. Morgan?" Grace asks. "Who's askin'?" "We're friends of--that is,--well, we're looking for a baby." "To adopt? You don't look like no husband and wife." "We're not. It's not that." "Kiddie porn, then? I don't do nonna that."

The Genoa City Bar. Les is with Nina and she's looking pretty woozy. "Come on, More," he says. "Izzz Nina," she replies groggily. "I don't feel so good." Then she almost passes out and puts her head on the table to rest. Les comes over and scoops her up and starts to take her out of the bar, but he is stopped by a man with a badge. "All right, bud. Nice try with the drug act but we're not going to have any of this tonight." "Oh, but I'm just taking her home--she's a friend of mine." "Look, creep, get while the going is good. You're lucky I'm not arresting you." Les slinks away and the man with the badge takes Nina's limp body. "Come on, Miss, let's get you home." He fishes at her purse to see her driver's license. "Nina McNiel," he reads aloud. And he walks out of the bar.

"Mr. Morgan, I'm told by your former law partner that you handled an adoption case for a Sharon Newman? Her son, I believe?" The man shakes his head. "Never heard of 'em." "She was Sharon Collins then," Tony volunteers. "Nope, never heard of him." Grace sighs. "Could I kiss you, Mr. Morgan?" "Sure," he says, brightening up. He takes her into his arms and they kiss for a while. After a while, she pries herself free. "That's enough for now I think, Mr. Morgan." "Hey, that wasn't bad. I got a call from that friend o' mine you mentioned and he said I should hold out for the kiss--he was right. Not bad. So you're looking for old Adam Collins, huh?" "Adam? I don't know his first name, actually. But I do know it was to be a biblical name." "Yeah, that's him--she was very specific about the biblical name thing. Adam died though--I suppose you know that."

Salena looks at Jack. "So you found Victor was with your fiance and you came back and what--shot him? Sounds like you might have a case for temporary insanity--you really should get a lawyer." "No, no. It's much more subtle than that. I planned it much better. No one could possibly see it as that. So I went back down to the bar and I hired the woman I'd met to come with me to Genoa City on a little job. I promised to pay her big time." "Jack, I am really not following your obsession with this woman." "Patience, Salena. I never told Diane that I knew about Victor--she had to go out of town herself on business. And then I lied to Victor--I told him Diane and I had broken up. It probably made him mad because he had no reason to gloat about whatever progress he'd made invading my turf, but I could see the twinkle in his eye when I told him I had this new woman--Tess. She was the one from the bar, but Victor didn't know. And tonight I created a situation where Tess was left alone and made sure Victor knew." "And you stalked them?" Jack pauses for a commercial before answering.

Outside the Bar, Les sees the man with the badge putting Nina in the back of an old station wagon. "Hey!" says Les, "That's no police car." "I'm working undercover." "Oh, yeah, right. I'll bet there are gonna be covers involved. How about we call the police department and confirm that, huh?" "Ok, you're right, I'm no saint, but neither are you. And my badge WAS a better ploy than your drug thing, so I deserve the spoils. Bug off!" "Oh come on--there's plenty there for both of us." "Oh, I guess you're right. Hop in. We better get out of here before a real cop comes along."

Grace is still in the alley with Morgan and Tony. "Ohh, I can't believe this. We came all this way for nothing." "I could sell you one of the others," Morgan volunteers. "You did a lot of this, huh?" "Sure. We got your basic Abraham, Isaac, Moses, Joshua, David, Peter, ...." "But don't you see--it had to be Sharon's kid." "But these are all just as good, I promise. We're a cloning lab--they didn't tell youse? Our motto is ``If it's worth havin' a kid, it's worth makin' backups.'' Catchy, huh?" Grace stares in disbelief. "Catchy? It's stupid. What would drive a person to do something as weird as cloning?" "Hey, it's a very up and comin' thing!" the man says, insulted. Grace looks unsure. "Well, if you're sure it's an EXACT duplicate, I'll take one." "You sure you don't want two? We got a special on this week, and--you're from outa town, right?--ya never know what might happen on the trip back." "Just the one," Grace says. "What size?" "Size?" "Well, we can start a new one any time, so we have them in varying ages." "I don't suppose you have something close to `newborn'." "Well, they're not bor--" "Spare me. I don't care if they're hatched. Just something small." "Gotcha." Then she asks "How much?" He eyes her all over. "Given it's for Sharon 'n' all--how about another of those kisses?" She glares at him and hands him a credit card. "Suit yourself," he says, and heads off to charge the card. He returns with kid and card. "Good luck!"

Jack laughs at Salena's question. "Stalk them? No, not quite. Nothing like that, in fact. I've left them alone all evening." "So...?" "So, what do you mean so? So I'm sure the Great Man is making moves on her right now... probably sleeping with her. And he's not going to do protected sex--I have it on good authority that he's never been one for that. So, when he tries to steal the woman he thinks is mine, ... well, ... bye, bye, Victor." Salena looks incredulous. "You're sure he's moving on your woman and so you think you've committed murder? Jack, that's the lamest story I've ever heard. No one could be either so predictable or so stupid as you're making out Victor to be. He's been around the block Jack--he's not going to think people will just fall at his feet and bed him on the first date. As old as he is, I can't believe anyone finds him attractive or even that he thinks they would." Jack says, "Uh,... you really think so, huh?" Salena nods. "So I can just go?" "Jack, if everything really did happen as you say, I'd say you'd committed the perfect crime. But I'm confident it never could."

A moment after Jack gets up and walks out, Victor walks in. "I'd like to report a murder." "Whose," Salena asks. "Mine," Victor explains. Salena sighs. "It's been kind of a busy evening for that kind of thing, Mr. Newman. If you could take a number and sit over there while I get ready for you." "Don't you know who I am? I'm Victor Newman!" "Well, you WERE Victor Newman. If you were murdered, you're not him any more, and you're not in any hurry. Now take a number."

That's all for this episode. Hope you learned something. Don't miss Episode 30!
If you missed any older episodes, see the index.

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