Monica has given him a week to accept her terms or she'll show Jackie the security tapes. There's no way he's going to do it. Maybe if were going to be just once & then it would be over...but it wouldn't be just once, Monica would have those tapes to hang over his head for the rest of his life. And Mary herself...he never got her to acknowledge their 'break-up', he has no idea how she's handling it. Maybe she doesn't care, Nicolas didn't mean much to her personally, but then women like her don't like their toys taken away from them, or toys that rebel & leave early...Nicolas has one week before this crashes down on him. He has no choice but to confess to Jackie, before he's exposed anyway. He has one week to be everything he can be for Jackie, to try & prove himself in some way before he tells her what he's been up to, and how it's going to be different, if she'll just forgive him. When he comes home, he scoops Jackie up out of the parlor, not even greeting his brother watching TV with her, and makes love to her with a fierce passion. Just one week left, he thinks, because she might not forgive him.

Nicolas makes Jackie skip her morning workout, and only lets her out of bed to tend to the baby, weaving a protective cocoon around himself & his family, trying to make it strong enough that nothing from the outside will get in. And Jackie won't be able to leave. But they do have to come down for dinner when Debbie shows up. Whatever her motives, she's set her sights hard on his brother & Andrea is clearly smitten with her in return. "Have you emailed those designers I told Nico about yesterday?" Debbie asks Jackie. Nico chokes on his food while Jackie looks quizically at him, "You didn't tell me you ran into Debbie yesterday, Nico," Jackie says. "Yes, at the spa at the Bellagio," Debbie chirps on merrily, and Nico wonders if she's completely oblivious or if she's getting back at him for talking her down to his brother, "I ran into Nico with Mary Strong." Nico decides Debbie is doing this on purpose, she was there when he was shooting his video, when he slipped into Mary's dressing room before her photo session, she was at the same party when he got found out by Andrea. God knows what his brother has said to his new girlfriend about Nico's supposed 'one night stand', but Debbie clearly knows otherwise & is out to expose him.

"Nico didn't mention that...or the spa...," Jackie says, looking at him harshly. "Mary Strong...that's that nasty red-haired actress from that party, isn't she, Nico?" Andrea says, wth a menacing growl, "Why were you with her?" His brother's eyes narrow into hard slits & he continues in Italian, "You better not lie to me, brother, I'm not going to keep quiet for you if you're going to lie...." Jackie's Italian is good enough now that she must have understood that. The expression on her face shows that she understood perfectly. "Nicolas, what's going on?" Jackie asks, her voice cracking. He didn't even get that one week.....

"I was not with Mary yesterday," he says to his brother. "You were supposed to be at a photo shoot," Jackie cuts in fiercely. Nico sighs, "That was lie," he admits. "And I lied to you, Andrea, when I told you the party was a one night stand. That wasn't the first time, it was the last." Nicolas is able to look at Andrea when he speaks to him, but he can't face Jackie at all. He looks down at the floor as he speaks quietly, embarassed that he has to make full confession in front of witnesses, at the table, "Jacklyn, I let you believe Mary had been a client of mine, before you & I met, but I never met her until recently...I've been having an affair." Nico is still unable to look up as Jackie runs out of the room. Debbie follows her, leaving Nico alone with Andrea, who explodes in a torrent of Italian expletives, calling his older brother every foul thing the language can express. Both men rise from the table, Andrea's fist clench & rise in a fighting stance & Nicolas closes his eyes and braces himself for a jaw breaking punch. But the blow never comes: Debbie comes in & stands between the brothers. She takes Andrea's arms, opens his fists & puts keys in his hands, "Take him out of here. She wants him out. Take him to my place for now, I'm staying here with her & we'll deal with details tomorrow," she says, and smiles gently at Andrea, "I don't want to see a lot of blood on my carpet, okay, Andrea? No fighting." she says with a tight laugh. It gets his brother to smile, "I promise," Andrea says to Debbie, kissing her before she turns to go back to Jackie. "Let's go," Andrea says, not looking at Nico as he heads towards the door. Nicolas follows, his head hung low. He'd rather Andrea break his jaw so he could spend his night drugged & hospitalized: having to spend the evening talking about this with his brother is most definitely the more painful consequence.

NEXT