S02E01: 'Just Can't Give Up'

Its five months since Holly Walmsley was kidnapped. Holly is still missing and, like any other parents, Donna and Ian are devastated. On top of this, they are also stricken with worry about how they are going to repay the £500,000 Sal lent them to pay Holly’s ransom. The only possible way that they can raise such a sum is to sell the house that Ian worked so hard to buy. But when the police call to ask them to identify the body of a young girl who answers Holly’s description, money becomes the last thing on their minds.

Kyle and Chardonnay on the other hand, have never been happier. Kyle’s mother, Jackie, has just given birth to her baby in a luxury Florida clinic and hands him over to the couple to bring up as their own, as planned. Chardonnay is besotted with her adopted son and is instantly carried away with buying designer baby-wear and creating an extravagantly equipped nursery.

Tanya is in court, but the case isn’t quite what everyone expects. Given that Sparks’ Chairman, Frank Laslett, remembered at the end of the last series that it was Tanya who put him into a coma, it seems a little strange that he, not Tanya, is the accused. In a Machiavellian move, Tanya decided to accuse him of attempted rape before he could accuse her of assault. In court, Tanya’s emotional testimony is convincing, but when Frank takes the stand, he falls apart under cross-examination and comes across as mentally unstable. Now that Frank’s on the ropes, it is simplicity itself for Jason’s agent, Hazel Bailey, to step in and persuade him to change his plea to guilty by reason of insanity.

Before Holly’s kidnapping, Donna had begun a passionate affair with her husband’s team-mate, Sal Biagi. She is so relieved when the dead girl turns out not to be Holly that she goes off to seek comfort in his arms, and bed. Sal begs Donna to leave Ian, but how can she? He’s not only facing the loss of his daughter, but also his career – even given the tragic circumstances, Sparks’ manager Stefan Hauser is fast running out of patience with his poor form on the pitch.

There’s a welcome diversion for the Turners when the Pascoes invite them to a barbecue and then ask them to become baby Paddy’s godparents. Even macho Jason is touched. Jackie, who hadn’t been consulted, is livid – Jason is an animal and not fit to be a godfather, let alone Paddy’s biological father. She storms off into the house upon hearing the news, closely followed by a concerned Jason. Unfortunately, Jackie’s breasts choose that exact moment to start leaking and Jason would have to be blind not to notice. How long before he realises that Paddy is in fact the child he ordered Jackie to abort?

It isn’t long before Kyle’s constant baby talk begins to make Jason broody. He knows that there’s no chance of Tanya ever agreeing to get pregnant and, the more he thinks about it, the more he realises that Paddy could be his only chance to be a father. Jackie is also experiencing doubt. Concerned by the way that Kyle and Chardonnay are treating Paddy like a doll that they can keep picking up and playing with, she wonders if she did the right thing in giving him up. To make matters worse, the penny has just dropped with Jason and he’s demanding to be allowed into his son’s life.

Paddy might just be days old, but Chardonnay’s already negotiated his first glossy magazine deal. The photographers get much more than they bargained for when the shoot is interrupted by the chilling discovery of a woman’s body in the swimming pool.

Ian fails to turn up for the Sparks’ big game and Stefan is fuming. But after a mysterious tip-off about the whereabouts of his missing daughter Holly, it seems that for once, there’s something more important for Ian to be doing than playing football. Before long, he is looking through the front window of a house to see a young girl watching the television…could it really be Holly?