lisa pikaard is addicted to love…hewitt…
So after a very long break, The Client List is finally back and we are just beginning to get into the mess that is the Riley, Kyle and Evan drama.
If you’ve never seen the show, it’s full of drama, passion, intrigue, sex, and more drama. Unfortunately there are some really terrible Southern accents but that is easy to overlook once you get swept up in the storyline. As the last season ended on June 17, almost 9 months ago, Riley (Jennifer Love Hewitt) decided to kiss Evan (Colin Egglesfield), her estranged husband Kyle’s (Brian Hallisay) brother. Evan is the man who was always there for her especially when her husband was not. That, however, was not the biggest drama at the end of the season. Riley has been put temporarily in charge The Rub, the spa that she works at, which is essentially a massage parlor that provides a little something extra for a few key clients. She took over so her boss Georgia (Loretta Devine) could hide out from the cops who have been sniffing around, trying to bust the parlor for those aforementioned sexual acts. As the season ended Riley and Kyle are at the spa and the police arrive. This caused quite a stir because Riley was there trying to remove the little black book that contained the list of prominent clients who received extras at the spa. The episode ends with Kyle, trying to talk to Riley, asking her if she’s in trouble. That’s the last thing we saw all those months ago.
Well, it was finally time to see what was going to happen. Were the cops going to get the book? Was Riley going to go down with the spa? Shockingly, no. Instead the cops arrested Kyle. He apparently stole a truck full of copper before returning home to Riley after he walked out on his family. The cops didn’t even look twice at Riley. I thought that it seemed a bit peculiar that the police didn’t even speak to Riley at the scene and I was right. Super suspicious activity ensued at the police station … though the episode tried to play it off subtly. The most suspicious of all? When Riley fell asleep at the police station only to wake up with her purse open on the floor. Why is this suspicious? Oh, maybe because the notorious little black book with the parlor’s client list was in that purse. While nothing came of it in this episode I have a feeling that we haven’t seen the end of that situation.
http://youtu.be/jve4TC3agjw
Later, Riley gets the opportunity to speak to Kyle and finds out that he was stealing to provide for his family because he was desperate and didn’t want to go back home empty handed. Riley decides that she’s going to try to help him out when she realizes that she knows what it’s like to do something illegal to provide for her family. She talks to her best friend, Lacey (Rebecca Field), the only one in on what’s going on at The Rub, but Lacey points out that Riley is not stealing from men; they request her services and pay for it. None the less, Riley chooses to help her husband.
We also learn a bit more about how the ‘client list’ actually works. Essentially, if a client says something against the spa, that person is be held responsible and exposed (for soliciting sexual favors). Then, that person is pretty much forced to expose the person who originally brought them in and a chain reaction, which could take down many powerful and prominent citizens, begins. This glimpse into the way that the list works may be a hint that we may see that whole chain break down this season.
So what else happened? Georgia returns and it seems like it is just in time to save the day. Two girls quit working at the spa because they were probably freaked out about the cops hovering. Georgia, however, is not back in the way that people expected. She’s in love and said that The Rub cost her her first husband and she doesn’t want to keep lying about what she does. Riley is still in charge and, with the financial responsibility of lawyer fees mounting (no pun intended) she proposes that Georgia sell her the spa. In the end, Georgia makes her decision to sell the spa, but just after she tells that to Riley, one of her high powered clients tells Georgia that the police have a search warrant for Riley’s home and he can’t keep the police away from her. We will see what happens with that next episode.
Needless to say there was a lot of brotherly drama in this episode as well. Kyle tells Evan during a visit to the police station that he saw Evan with Riley and a brawl breaks out. Riley has to go bail him out of jail too and they have quite a disagreement in the car on the way home. Evan, however, realizes that he needs to be patient in order to be with Riley and after apologizing with flowers it appears as though that relationship will continue to progress. Kyle has more to worry about though than his brother and wife — his hired lawyer wants to know who his accomplice was in the copper theft. Instead of giving him up he instead says that he has information a prosecutor would love to have. We don’t learn what that information is but the episode alludes to it potentially having to do with Riley or Evan.
Next week will certainly be an interesting one. Evan and Riley get some much needed alone time, the search warrant is issued, and I am in suspense for the next seven days waiting to know what’s really going to be uncovered. No matter how bad the accents are, I cannot wait to see what happens with Evan and Riley. Welcome back Client List, welcome back. It’s about damn time.
