‘Scandal’ season 5 episode 14 recap: Is Jake's relationship real?

ABC/Jordin Althaus

Credit: Jewel Wicker

Credit: Jewel Wicker

ABC/Jordin Althaus

By JEWEL WICKER/ Jewel.wicker@ajc.com, originally filed Thursday, March 16, 2016

Spying has always been a common occurrence on “Scandal,” but during the season 5 episode 14 episode titled “I See You” it seems to be all the characters do.

The episode begins with Olivia having dinner with Jake, his new fiancé Vanessa and her father.

Vanessa seems like a great woman. She tells everyone about how she met Jake after he bumped into her and caused her to drop her phone. When she ran into him again, she figured it was fate. She kept her cracked phone as a sentimental reminder.

Olivia thinks Vanessa is sweet, but she doesn’t trust Jake. She spends most of her time spying on the couple, aka sitting on her couch watching them have sex via the camera she’s placed in Jake’s home.

Jake, NSA director, makes it known that he knows Olivia is spying on him one night when he looks directly into the camera and smirks.

He confronts Olivia, blaming her “daddy issues” and relationship with Fitz for the reason she can’t comprehend that he’s fallen in love.

Vanessa, he says, reads Vogue and takes multivitamins. She’s normal. That’s her appeal.

Olivia plans to back off after this conversation, but something happens during a dinner meeting with Jake and Vanessa that changes her mind.

Olivia remembers that she first met Jake when he bumped into her in a coffee shop, causing her to drop her phone. They ran into each other again soon after. Jake later confessed that both encounters were planned.

Noticing the similarities in how she and Vanessa met Jake, Olivia decides to resume spying on him.

Elsewhere, Huck continues to watch his son Javi play soccer via a screen in his office. A man appearing to be Huck’s ex-wife Kim’s new boyfriend Sean appears at one of the games and Huck is convinced he’s someone he’s crossed paths with before. Believing the man to be someone he’s tortured in the past, he sets off to find him and kill him.

Huck thinks he is protecting himself, Kim and Javi, but after kidnapping Sean, he discovers that he’s been mistaken. Huck eventually lets Sean go, ensuring that he won’t remember any of the incident.

Huck realizes that he has to let his family go so that they can live a happy, normal life. He decides to stop spying on them.

The incident goes terribly wrong for Huck, but it is the cause of a much needed argument between Olivia and Quinn.

After Olivia refers to her fellow gladiators as “family” during a search for Huck and Sean, Quinn reminds Olivia that she abandoned them and her business for Fitz and The White House.

Olivia says that within a year of being kidnapped and powerless, she was with Fitz, helping to run the country. She was powerful.

“I don’t owe anyone anything. It’s my turn,” she says.

Later, Olivia tells Quinn the she couldn’t have left her business and focused on herself if Quinn wasn’t making sure that things continued to run smoothly.

Marcus, the newest OPA member, watches all of this. For the first time, Olivia and Quinn have decided to let him in on their insane history. It may be more than he bargained for, but he’s appreciative.

At the White House, Abby finds out that Cyrus is running Frankie Vargas' campaign. When she confronts Cyrus, he lies. At first he says he's not working with Vargas at all and then he says that Vargas approached him about being campaign manager, but he declined.

Cyrus begs Abby not to tell Fitz.

But, Abby is hungry for power. She tells Olivia that she wants to “slit [Cyrus’] throat and bathe in his blood,” but Olivia advises her to keep her white hat on.

Abby tells Fitz anyway, advising him to fire Cyrus quietly and hire her as his replacement.

Fitz tells Abby that she can have the job if she fires Cyrus herself. She does this and then heads to the Oval office to have a drink with Fitz and Susan Ross.

Fitz and Susan have recently found out that oil tycoon Hollis Doyle is running for president.

After spending the episode trying to get Mellie and Susan to promise to pull the plug on the EPA for 500 million dollars, Hollis decides to just run for president himself.

And, he does so using the campaign slogan (“Embrace America’s Tomorrow”) that Mellie was hoping to use. He stole the idea from her during one of their meetings.

Susan is angry that Hollis is running for president, but Fitz doesn't seem worried.

“Hollis is a joke. No one will take him seriously,” he assures her.

“Scandal” has been chaotic without Hollis Doyle. It’s hard to imagine how crazy the show is about to get now that he’s back.

Scandal” airs Thursday nights at 9 p.m. on ABC.

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