In last week's "Scandal," a (mostly) innocent man died because the charming Jake Ballard (Scott Foley) convinced Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) that said man, CIA director Osbourne (Kurt Fuller), was the mole that both Olivia Pope & Associates and the President (Tony Goldwyn) are hunting for.
Naturally, Olivia doesn't like being wrong, and Darby Stanchfield (who plays trusted OPA Gladiator Abby Whelan) told TVGuide.com that OPA is in their "most vulnerable state" yet as they work to uncover the real mole this week. "Everything you know from the last episode gets turned on its head. As we dig deeper into who the mole is, OPA ends up literally in a state of emergency by the end of the episode."
Luckily for fans of the dysfunctional relationship between Abby and David (Joshua Malina), the hunt for the mole will keep the pair in close quarters during the April 4 episode. "There's definitely some confrontation that goes on," Stanchfield admitted. "He comes back to the office so it's hard to ignore the past. That comes bubbling up again and it's incredibly dysfunctional. They can't just come out to each other like adults, they have to hash it out and be scandalous."
Still, the actress believes the pair are kind of meant to be, despite all the drama and secrets between them. "They work for two opposite sides -- maybe not so much anymore, but there's been so much with the politics of Defiance and the Cytron voting memory card and Abby's loyalty to Liv," she told TV Guide. "All of that has really complicated everything. It continues to create a distance between them. I think they totally dig each other. I also think Abby is really dysfunctional and doesn't really know how it works with a good guy, but she wants one. In a strange way, I think they're perfect together."
Many fans have wondered whether David -- who is just as much of a White Hat as the rest of the OPA gang -- will ever join the team full-time, and Stanchfield thinks he'd be a perfect fit. "OPA and David are circling each other and sniffing each other out. He has a lot to offer and has a lot of connections," she said. "He would be a great addition to OPA, but I think that both sides have trust issues. I think there's great potential and great amounts of drama if he actually does join OPA. I don't know how that would go for Abby and David. When we you work with someone you have a past with, it gets even more complicated."
As for Olivia's deepening relationship with Jake, Stanchfield's apparently not a fan of the enigmatic military man: "Jake's a snake! Not too far down the line, the OPA Gladiators will get to know who he is and they interact with him and that becomes really interesting. It opens up a whole other can of worms."
Check out a preview from tonight's episode below, in which we discover that Jake is even sneakier than we gave him credit for:
Do you think Abby and David are meant to be? Do you trust Jake?
