Esther and Mercy

Part 15

Kate comes down the stairs. She just needs some time alone to think. But there's Esther, seemingly waiting for her. "Going somewhere, Kate?"

"What are you doing here? Go to your room." The girl doesn't budge. "Honestly, we're past that now. Aren't we?" 

"I know what you're doing. I will not let you or your sister hurt my children."

"Me? I'm not the one who passed out drunk and let Max almost drown in the pond. If it wasn't for John she'd be dead, and you'd probably still be in jail." 

"Who told you that?" Esther holds up Kate's diary. "It's very intimate. I learned so much about you."

"Give it to me." Instead, Esther goes on. "Jessica. Your cheating husband." This is just cruel. "Esther, give it to me." 

"Where you hide your wine bottles."

"I'm... I'm warning you right now." Esther opens the diary and begins to read aloud. "She was still kicking when the doctor told me it was something called phantom  fetal movement. For 16 days, I carried my dead baby." She reads as if she was narrating a dramatic audiobook. "Stop it. Esther."

"It was the cruelest torture I could imagine."

"Stop it. You stop it." Esther gives Kate a smug look. 

"What's wrong with you?"

"Kate, it's too late. It's your own fault. You took your family for granted."

"What do you mean?"

"What are you going to do? Hit me?" Kate gives up and goes back upstairs, feeling fully defeated. Is what she said true? Has she really been taking her family for granted.

Kate is on the phone with St. Mariana's again. They're not being very helpful. 

"We adopted them from you. How could you not know anything?"

"The Sullivans could have adopted them illegally. Do either of them remember anything that could help us?" 

"I'm gonna call you back." After finding Esther's Bible while collecting laundry, she found out it belonged to a place called the Saarne institute. So she did a little research and found the number. "Hello?" A woman speaks in a foreign language Kate assumes to be Russian. "Do you speak English?" Apparently not. "Is there anyone who speaks English there? This is very important." Kate is getting frustrated. "I don't know what you're saying." The phone is passed to someone else. "Hello? Is this the Saarne Institute?" 

"Yes." Finally, English! 

"I need to talk to somebody about two of your children. They were adopted by an American family. Both girls." The man responds, confused.  "They is not come from here."

"Well, you I haven't even told you their names yet."

"You do not understand. Saarne Institute is not an orphanage. It is a mental hospital." Kate nearly drops the phone in shock. Why did Esther have a Bible from a mental hospital? 

Danny is making good on his promise. He climbs up to the treehouse, only to coke face to face with Mercy and Esther. "Are you looking for this?" Mercy holds up the bag containing the bloody hammer, "Poor Sister Abigail. We couldn't have done it alone, you know. Max is just as guilty as we are." Says Esther. "Whatever Max did, you made her do it." Mercy looks guilty for moment. But it's gone the next. 

"Think about it. How did she even know what was up here? It's always better to burn the evidence. If they find these things, they won't just be coming for Mercy and I. They'll be coming for Max too. Is that really what you want?" Esther sets the bag on Fire, then lets the treehouse start to burn. "Esther? That wasn't part of the plan!" Esther had told her sister that they were going to burn the evidence, then frame Danny for the fire by saying they saw him with weed. (That part wouldn't be totally false. Esther really had found weed and a dirty magazine up there.) Esther just pulls Mercy down the ladder.

"Wait. What are you doing? Are you crazy? Let me out! Let me out of here!" Daniel panics as he tries to escape the inferno. Esther holds Mercy back. It's clear that the blonde isn't on board with this scheme. Finally, mercy breaks free and runs inside. "Mommy! Come quick!" 

"It's called the Saarne Institute. S-A-A-R-N-E, Saarne." Kate tells someone  on the phone.

"It's in Estonia." Wait, that makes no sense. "Estonia? No, this can't be right. All of their paperwork is from Russia. I'm sending them a picture of them right now. Maybe their birth mother was a patient there. I don't know. Maybe they were even born there." That might be the case. 

"Mommy! Help! Danny's hurt!" Kate rushes outside just in time to see her son fall from the collapsing. "Oh, God.Call 911!" She rushes to his side,  "Oh, God, no. Daniel? Mommy's right here. Can you hear me?" He appears unconscious. He's still breathing though. "Please wake up. Honey, Mommy's right here, okay? You're gonna be all right."