Big Sky Season Three Episode Thirteen Recap – Jensen Ackles Edition

 Big Sky 3.13 “That Old Feeling”

Night.  The parking lot of a country-style bar with a wide porch is decorated with white string lights and a large American flag.  A pickup truck pulls into the parking lot.  It’s Buck needing to switch vehicles.  Wide-eyed and panicked, Emily and Denise are still tied up in the back.  While Buck checks cars for one he can steal, the kidnapped women capture the attention of a customer.  As they gesture frantically and scream behind the duct tape covering their mouths, the Good Samaritan gets out his phone, but, before he can call for help, Buck comes up behind him and slams his head into the passenger window.  When the man collapses to his hands and knees, Buck snaps his neck while Emily and Denise watch in horror through the cracked glass. “Have mercy on me,” the soundtrack plays in the background as Buck uses his victim’s remote key to find his truck which has a trailer attached to it.  Buck peeks and waves at them through the window.

“We gotta find Buck,” says Beau as he and Jenny survey the massacre inside the restaurant.  “Avery?” whimpers a sad voice, and the sheriff’s eyes immediately raise to see his ex-wife in the room.  “Beau!” she says sharply as a deputy tries to bar her way.  “Oh, no,” he murmurs, then, “Hey! Hey! Hey!” approaching as Carla insists, “I’m not leaving!” “It’s OK,” he says, enveloping her in a hug.  “What’s happening?” she cries.

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly, then smooths back her hair.  “You need to know that Avery was doing everything he could to fix his mistake, OK?  He was trying to save Emily,” he says earnestly.  “Where is she now?” Carla asks in a small voice.  Beau can’t answer right away.  He looks down and then meets her eyes and says plainly, “We think that Buck Barnes has her.”  Carla covers her face for a moment in tears, and Buck puts one hand on the side of her face, the other on her arm, promising that they will find Emily. 

Jenny gets a call and pulls Beau aside.  Buck had been spotted north of their location.  He killed someone and stole a truck.  “My daughter?” Beau asks her, a slight uptick of panic in his tone.  Jenny tells him that surveillance footage suggests that he still has Emily and Denise and that they’re still alive.  Behind them, paramedics roll out one of the bodies.  “Ok.  I’m gonna call Cass.  I want her in on this.  Let’s move,” says Beau.  

Poppernak is sitting in a patrol car outside Sunny’s house.  Sunny is inside packing, including a gun.  Walter sneaks past the deputy.  He wants to ask his mother where Buck is.  “Why do you want to know?” asks Sunny.  “Because he hurt Paige.  He likes to cut out women’s hearts,” Walter tells her, slowly walking toward her down the hallway.  “I’m sick over what he’s done,” Sunny says.  “There is one way to fix that,” whispers Walter.  “I got a plan,” Sunny whispers back.  “I’m gonna set everything right.”  Walter stares at her with his big, dark eyes.

Cassie arrives at the sheriff’s office where Beau and Jenny are watching the surveillance footage from the bar’s parking lot.  Beau runs his hand down his face as they watch Buck drag the man’s body away behind the SUV. 

Beau turns away for a moment, as if he can’t bear to watch this criminal who has his daughter, but turns back when Jenny notices that Buck dropped something.  Keys, possibly? Cassie wants to ask Cormac, and Beau says they need to talk to Sunny again.  As he crosses in front of Cassie, she reaches out to grab his arm.  “We’re gonna get them back,” she says intently while he looks at her with open anguish in his expression. 

Sunny knocks on Poppernak’s passenger-side window.  He has orders to keep her there until the sheriff arrives.  He’s just following orders.

Walking down the hallway with Jenny, Beau pauses for a moment, turns away, then turns back.  “It’s just – it’s the ONE thing we’re supposed to do is protect our kids! The ONE thing!” His lip curls with self-hatred.  “You couldn’t have done ANYTHING differently,” Jenny reassures him. 

He lifts his closed fist to his mouth for a second, then breathes out, “She’s got to be so scared, Jenny.”  His voice drops to a near whisper.  “She’s got to be terrified.”  He shakes his head while his eyes fill with tears. 

“And every minute we waste chasing our tails gives that twisted son of a bitch a chance to do something to them.”  His voice thickens with emotion.  Jenny earnestly tells him that she thinks he’ll keep them alive for leverage and Beau hopes she’s right.  There’s really nothing stopping Buck from making an example out of one of them.  Beau turns away, then turns back with a sigh, and rubs his eyes with the back of his knuckles, visibly putting aside his pain in order to do his job. 

He says they need to talk to Sunny.

Poppernak, sitting in his patrol car outside Sunny’s house, hears a beeping alarm and sees smoke coming from the building.  Entering the home, he finds food burning on the stove.  At the sound of a car’s engine outside, he realizes it was a distraction so Sunny could get out of the house.  He radios that she’s on the move.

Cassie shows Cormac a close up picture of the keys Buck had dropped on the ground that they’d seen when they watched the security camera at the bar.  He recognizes that it went to the gate and cabin where they sometimes hunted.  He thinks he’d recognize it if they drove there.

Sunny drives through the night, jaw tight, gripping the steering wheel tightly and looking in the mirror for pursuing law officers.  Suddenly, Beau’s red jeep pulls in front of her, cutting her off.  “Get out of the car!” yells Beau, striding to her door.  “I was running some errands,” she states calmly.  “Where is Buck?” yells Beau.  “Arlen,” warns Jenny.  “Where did he take my daughter?” Beau is focused on Buck’s wife whose eyes open wide.  “Buck has Emily?”  “You better tell me right now or I swear to you -” Buck tells her in a deadly soft voice, causing Jenny to say his name again.

Sunny’s voice raises:  “I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about!”  “You don’t have a clue?” repeats Beau.  Jenny grabs his arm and pulls him back, telling him to stand down.  He frees his arm and turns in annoyance toward her.

In a quiet, intense voice, Jenny tells him that he needs to keep it together.  “Emily is out there, and I need to find her!” Beau responds fiercely.  “I know!  We just have to do it the right way!” Jenny responds.

Sunny is in an interrogation room watching the security footage from the bar showing Buck dragging away the body of the man he murdered.  Jenny is sitting at the table opposite her, but Beau is standing. 

“That’s who your husband is,” he says.  “Sunny, we found Buck’s bunker.  He IS the Bleeding Heart Killer.”  He is under control again, the professional sheriff.  “I know,” Sunny admits quietly.  She tells them that Buck asked for her help in escaping and that he hadn’t mentioned Denise or Emily.  Beau accuses that she was on her way to help him, but Sunny denies that, saying she was going to talk him into turning himself in. 

Jenny wants to know what the gun was for.  “In case he didn’t wanna listen,” Sunny answers.  Beau moves a metal chair away with an aggressive clang and leans forward over the table.  “Now you listen to me.”  His voice is low and his gaze intense. 

“You’re gonna help me get my daughter back.”  Sunny looks down, then nods.  “Of course,” she says quietly.

Buck is filling a red gas container.  In the closed in trailer, his captives, still bound and gagged, are frantically scrambling. Denise shows Emily that she has a knife.

Buck opens the door to reveal them sitting innocuously against the side.  Denise’s hands are trembling where she clutches the knife.  “You all behaving yourself back here?” he asks in a hearty, friendly voice.  He roughly pulls down the duct tape gag on each woman and untwists the cap of a water bottle.  In the dim light of the trailer, he looms, a battered, frightening figure with his black eye and blood-spattered shirt.  “My father’s going to find you,” Emily breathes defiantly, but Buck just chuckles.  “You want water or not?”  “And when he does,” Emily continues, looking directly at him, “he’s going to kill you.” The smile drops off the man’s face, but he still leans forward and offers her a drink.  “Buck!” whispers Denise.  “Buck!  She’s just a child.  You need to let her go.”  “Open your mouth,” he demands, holding out the water bottle.  Instead, Denise swings the knife up, but, with her wrists still tied, she is quickly disarmed.  Buck laughs, then begins to splatter out the water all over them where they cower helplessly.  “Next time, it’s gonna be gasoline and a lighter.  Now both of you shut up.” 

They cringe as he lifts three gas cans into the trailer and then exits, leaving them still trapped.  

“You trust her?  Cause I don’t,” Beau tells Jenny.  She says they have no choice.

It’s a risk they have to take.  It’s their best chance at finding Emily.

An incoming call comes in to Sunny’s number.  It’s tied in to a computer so the sheriff’s department can track it’s location.  “This is ride or die time,” Buck tells her.  “So this is what it’s come to?” she asks into the phone.  There’s a pause, and Beau gestures to her to keep talking.  She tells Buck that this is probably the end of the road for them.  He hasn’t been honest with her in a long time, perhaps never.  “I told you we could work this out, but not over the phone!” Buck responds, voice raising.  “Why don’t we start by talking about those women you grabbed?” says Sunny. 

Jenny grimaces.  “I see the cops got to you, didn’t they?” says Buck.  “All right; that’s enough,” says Beau.  He grabs the cell phone, and tightens his lips for a moment before firmly but quietly asking, “Where are they, Buck?”  “Hullo, Sheriff!” Buck begins, but is interrupted.  “You listen to me, you son of a bitch.  If you have any love left for your wife whatsoever, you’re going to tell me where my daughter is or I will personally bring the whole weight of the law down on her head!” 

“She has nothing to do with this!” scoffs Buck.  “That doesn’t matter!” Beau nearly yells. “Cause I’m gonna do whatever it takes to get her back.”  “I’ll tell you what you’re gonna do,” replies Buck.  “You’re gonna let Sunny go for starters and if you don’t, I’m gonna start hurting.  Emily.  Denise.  Doesn’t make any difference to me.”

Beau’s panic and anger is rising as he listens.  “No, no, no, no!  It doesn’t work that way,” Beau says, in a surprisingly steady voice.  “You’re not the one calling the shots here, ‘pardna’,” responds Buck. 

Beau closes his eyes in frustration as Buck says, “I’ll tell you how it’s going to go down.  Now listen carefully.” 

Cassie and Cormac are riding in a car.  “I wasn’t paying attention.  I missed everything,” Cormac says.  He missed the signs.  Cassie says there was nothing he could have done, but at least he’s here now, looking for the spot where Buck could have taken Denise and Emily.  Cassie hopes that Beau and Jenny made progress with his mom, but Cormac says Cassie shouldn’t put her hopes on that.  “You think she knew?” asks Cassie.  “I don’t know,” Cormac responds, “but they shouldn’t trust her.”  

Click *Next* for Part 2!