The governor’s phone call came too late to stop the needle, but not to save her life. Sami Brady was already on the execution table, the lethal injection flowing into her veins, when the order came to halt the procedure. She was rushed from the death chamber to the trauma center, alive but shaken, and the whole city of Salem was reeling. The news spread fast.
Roberto Barelli, a reputed mobster, had confessed on his deathbed that he killed Franco Kelly, the murder Sami had been convicted of. The district attorney had admitted it to the press. Sami had been hours, even minutes, from dying for a crime she didn’t commit, and now her life had been handed back to her. At the hospital, her family gathered.
But the relief was tangled with suspicion. Nancy, the foreperson of the jury, was sick with guilt. “They’d already given her the juice. Her blood could have been on my hands,” she told her husband Craig.
He tried to comfort her, but the damage was done. Sami’s father Roman, a detective, was already turning away from celebration and toward vengeance. “Roberto’s statement saved Sami’s life,” his colleague Mickey said. “Who in the hell was responsible for Sami being in the death chamber in the first place?
” Roman shot back. “I’m telling you, I am going to make sure Lucas pays for his crime. ”
Lucas was Sami’s ex-husband, the father of her son Will, and the man who had custody of the boy. He had been the one who found Franco’s body and planted evidence to frame Sami.
But tonight, Lucas had played the hero. Kate, Lucas’s mother and the woman behind the frame-up, was gleeful. “The D. A.
bought the story. He bought the whole story that Roberto shot Franco and framed Sami,” she bragged to Victor. “I was so proud of Lucas. Abe and Roman were practically shining lights in his eyes to get him to crack, but he gave an award-winning performance.
”
Roman didn’t buy it. He confronted Kate directly. “I know you’re counting on me letting this go out of relief that my daughter’s still alive,” he said. “But I know exactly how I’ll feel in the morning—like throwing every bit of my heart and soul into proving Franco was killed by Lucas and you framed Sami for murder.
”
Kate tried to deflect, reminding him she had held him while he cried at the hospital, that she had helped get Roberto’s confession. Roman was unmoved. “You knew exactly what he was going to say because you wrote the damn script. ”
Meanwhile, Sami was being examined by Dr.
Mike Horton. “Your vital signs are normal,” he told her. “Normal? What is that?
” she asked, still floating in disbelief. “It’ll come back to you,” Mike said. Austin, her old love who had stood by her, was there too. He had fought for her, refused to let her face the execution alone.
Tracey, a kind stranger who had led a candlelight vigil outside the prison, urged them to be a family. “You and Austin and Will. You belong together. ”
But things were complicated.
Austin and Carrie, her sister, had been trying to reconcile. Now Austin couldn’t look at Carrie. “It’s like we never even meant anything to each other,” Carrie told Mike. Mike was in love with Carrie.
He asked her to move in with him, but Carrie was afraid of scandal, worried about her family’s reputation. “You are the chief of staff. We have your reputation to think of,” she said. But Mike was insistent.
“I love you so much, I want to take out an ad in the paper and tell the whole world. ”
Carrie wasn’t the only one with secrets. Ali, a nurse, had filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Mike as part of a scheme with Craig and Nancy to ruin him. They were trying to push her to follow through.
Ali was conflicted, though. “When Carrie finds out I’m suing Mike, she is going to freak,” she said. “She’ll drop Mike, and I will be there to pick up the gorgeous pieces. ”
But Mike confronted Ali directly.
“Sexual harassment? You know there are no grounds for a charge like that. I want you to call your lawyer and have this lawsuit dropped. ”
The tension was everywhere.
Eric, Sami’s brother, was furious with Lucas. “You’re the reason she got put on death row in the first place,” he said. “You would have let her rot there if her execution date hadn’t been moved up. ”
Lucas insisted he wanted Sami free for Will’s sake.
But Eric saw through him. He also saw through Nicole, Lucas’s new wife, who had married Lucas after a whirlwind romance that was, in truth, a paid arrangement. Nicole had been questioning Lucas all along. After the confession, she confronted him.
“You lied to me, Lucas,” she said. “What do you mean? I didn’t lie to you. ”
“I know a lie when I hear one.
I have told enough of them. You killed Franco. ”
Lucas denied it, tried to play the loving husband. But Nicole wasn’t buying it.
“You’re the one that’s been telling me for months how much you hate Sami. Why would you try to help her? ”
“Because she was actually going to die. ”
“What do you mean?
You knew she was on death row, and it didn’t seem to bother you at all. ”
“Well, maybe it didn’t bother me so much, but it would have bothered Will. It was for Will. ”
Nicole had had enough.
She tried to leave, but Eric stopped her, telling her she didn’t have to stay married to a murderer. Kate showed up and reminded Nicole that she had been paid five million dollars to be Lucas’s wife. “That is not a temp job,” Kate snapped. “You don’t own me, Kate,” Nicole shot back.
“Five million bucks says I do. Which means I give the orders, you obey. Got it? ”
Kate had her own plan for Lucas.
“You, my darling son, are going to go on playing the hero all the way,” she told him. She was confident she could handle Roman, confident she could outlast the detective’s obsession. But Roman had promised Kate he would never stop hunting her. “When you’re home sipping champagne, celebrating the fact that you and Lucas got away with murder, just know I’m out there getting every little piece of dirt I can on you.
I will find the truth. That is a promise. ”
Sami, meanwhile, was finally allowed to leave the hospital. She walked out through the crowd of reporters, only wanting one thing.
“I just want to be with my son,” she said. At home, Will was waiting. When he saw her, he ran into her arms. “Mommy!
”
“Mommy is home. I’m home forever this time. ”
“Forever? ”
“Yes.
I promise you, I am never going to leave you again. ”
Her family gathered around her, celebrating her life. But the joy was fragile. She didn’t have custody of Will.
Lucas did. And Lucas wasn’t about to hand him over. “Lucas won custody of Will,” Austin said to Carrie. “He’s not just going to hand him over.
”
“He might try and work something out with Sami,” Carrie offered. “Yeah, so he says,” Austin replied. “The important thing is that Will needs to be with his mom right now, and I’m not going to give up until she gets him back. ”
While the Bradys rejoiced, other storms were brewing.
Bo Brady was growing more convinced that the woman he knew as Hope was not Hope at all. “I’ve had this feeling for months,” he told her. “How could I say that the woman I love is not the woman I love? ”
She kissed him, tried to prove she was the same woman.
But Bo wasn’t fooled. “You’ve never kissed me like that before. You’re not Hope. ”
The woman, who was actually Princess Gina, Stefano DiMera’s pawn, was terrified.
Bo was getting too close. She couldn’t let him discover what she had done for Stefano, or that she had been helping him dig into John’s past to bring back the man who had once loved her. John, for his part, had stopped the hypnosis sessions with Marlena. She pressed him on it.
“Finding out about Stefano and what he did to you in your past was the most important thing in the world to you, and then you stopped caring. What changed your mind? ”
John smiled. “The point is the life I have here with you.
The future we are going to build for the kids, that’s the point. I’m going to marry you as soon as I can. ”
Marlena melted, but the shadow of Stefano loomed over them all. John had warned her.
“Not as long as DiMera’s still in our lives. ”
Bo, meanwhile, was planning his own reckoning. He accepted Vivian’s party invitation and asked Gina to come with him. After she left, he spoke aloud to himself.
“DiMera, you’ve done your best to destroy Hope, but tonight is going to be payback. ”
Gina, alone, was desperate. “You are getting too close, Brady. I cannot let you discover what I did for Stefano.
Oh, God, John. I need you now more than ever. I’ve got to find a way to get you back. ”
In the end, Sami was free.
She was with her son, surrounded by people who loved her. But the threads of guilt, revenge, and hidden truth were still tightening around everyone else. Roman had sworn to bring Lucas and Kate down. Nicole was waking up to the lie she had married.
Carrie and Mike were torn between love and reputation. And Bo was walking into a party with a plan to expose the woman who wasn’t his wife. Sami had escaped the death chamber, but the night was far from over.
