When Lily opened her door, she found Petra in her apartment lounging on the couch with a script in her hand, and as soon as she saw Lily she jumped up and charged her.

"How are you! I heard all about your bad day; come and tell me everything." Petra pulled her down onto the couch as she threw the script off to one side.

"How did you hear about it?" Lily asked in surprise. Petra wasn't on set all that often. She worked from the safety of an office on the other side of town. For her to have heard about it meant it must have been spectacularly bad, even worse than she thought.

"I talked to Mason, he told me."

"Uncle Mason knows we're friends?" Lily asked, confused. She was clueless as to who knew what. She had the feeling that Finn knew more than she thought he did and now Petra, who else knew stuff she didn't know they knew. Her mind was in overdrive.

"Uncle Mason!" Petra asked as she jumped up from the couch, suddenly angry and agitated. "Did he ask you to call him that, I know you're naïve Lily, but you didn't fall for that did you. I have to admit that I am disappointed in Mason. I never thought-"

"Stop!" Lily shouted at her friend whose tone had continued to rise as she spoke. "Uncle Mason is a friend, so is Aunt Cassie. I babysit for them sometimes."

Petra stopped to stare at her as if she had never seen her before. "And you never thought to tell me that you babysit for Mason and Cassandra Stevens?"

Lily closed her eyes, dropping her head back on the couch with a groan. The day could not get any worse; she just wanted it to end.

"Did you know that Mason would be at the audition?" Petra asked, looking at her with narrowed eyes.

"No, he, they, rarely ever talk about work when I'm around. I had no idea that he was connected with the show until he walked in, and as soon as I saw him I wanted to run the other way. He, well, Aunt Cassie, did tell me I got the part though, so I knew before you called."

Petra fell to the couch next to her. "Why didn't you tell me you knew him?"

Lily shrugged. "It felt a little bit like bragging, and I didn't want you to think that I thought I was special."

"You are special Lily, which is why you ended up in three men's arms today." She teased, instantly ready to forgive Lily. The good thing about Petra was that she didn't hold onto stuff.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you," Lily looked over at her friend, finding it hard, as always, to believe that she forgave that easily.

"It's alright, you have always been kind of private, even when we were kids I knew there was stuff you didn't tell me about your parents. I get it; I figure you'll tell me if you want to." She wasted no time in getting to the point of her visit. "So, how did you end up in three men's arms today? But most importantly, what was it like to sit in Finn's lap? I bet that was exciting!" She grinned at her friend.

Lily groaned as she began to tell her the whole sordid tale, even the part about Finn giving her a lift home.

"It really has been a bad day for you, hasn't it?" she asked.

There was a knock, and then the door or her apartment swung open. "You should lock your door, Lily." Lily leaned her head over the back of the couch, looking at an upside down Davis.

"Go away Uncle Davis, I'm spending time with my friend Petra, I won't be able to make it for dinner," she insisted, glad that Petra was giving her an excuse to get out of it.

"Nope! We all wanna hear about how miserable your day was; it's our chosen entertainment for the evening." He let his eyes dart over to Petra. "Your friend can come too," he offered with a charming smile.

"Davis Stevens this is Petra Thatcher, she works with Mason. Davis is Mason's brother." Lily supplied for Petra's benefit. "We don't want to come to dinner, tell Uncle Mason, no thank you."

Petra jumped out and reached to shake Davis's hand. "Of course we want to come to dinner! I've heard of you. Mason mentioned that you were coming to take some shots of the cast for the second season."

Davis shook her hand with a friendly smile before turning his attention back on to Lily.

"Come on; you don't have a choice, Mom is going to be conferenced in on the conversation, so it's all set-up. Plus Laura was guilted into making her lasagna and chicken parmesan for everyone. Cassie said something about contributing a salad also, but I wouldn't get your hopes up for that being included in the meal."

"Please Davis, can't you say I wasn't home or something?" she begged while Petra looked at her like she was crazy.

"Nope, Mason said that he and Elias wanted to talk over some song choices with you for later in the season." Davis reached for her bag and held it while he motioned for her to join him.

"No one said anything about my helping with music!" Lily objected as she stood and let Davis lead her out the door with Petra following. It seemed like a weak excuse at best. That sounded more like a job for the director and not an actor.

"There's a lot Mason doesn't tell a lot of people about; you know that, but there is always a method to his madness," Davis assured her as he all pushed them in his waiting truck with Penny Evers behind the wheel. "See, I brought your Aunt Penny as reinforcements."

"Hey, Penny!" Petra greeted, leaning over the seat to give her a side hug.

"Hello, Petra," Penny greeted.

Penny and Sam Evers were who she lived with when she first arrived in Savannah. They were best friends of her real Aunt Kate and Uncle Lee. Penny was the mother of four kids that ranged from the ages of 10 to 4, three boys and one girl, so she was truly an enforcer and probably the best choice for Davis to include on his mission.

The trip to the house was a short one, and they barely had time to buckle their seatbelts before they arrived. They could have walked, but chances were that Davis was afraid that she would have tried to make a run for it, and she probably would have.

As they wound their way through the back gate they could hear the sounds of a piano coming from the house above, and when the entered the house Lily was fallen upon by everyone, they all wanted to hug her and tell her she was awesome and then laugh with her, not at her, or so they said.

Penny introduced Petra before she moved back to the stove to help Laura, who was pulling something out of the oven.

"Lily, that's Laura Wren!" Petra hissed. "And isn't that Elias Emory being swatted by Cassandra Stevens?"

Lily looked over to where Elias was attempting to reach into the basket of bread while Aunt Cassie swatted his hand away. "Yeah," Lily agreed, accepting her bag from Davis before she threw it down in a corner. "Do you want a drink or something?" she asked, reaching for a soda from the fridge, narrowly missing a towel that was lobbed across the kitchen and into the sink. Someone had told Mason to clean the table, and he was doing a half-hearted job at best.

Cassie started yelling at him about almost hitting Lily with the towel and something about Lily's day having been hard enough without Mason blinding her. Mason started to yell back about her not asking him to do so much, wasn't it enough he worked to put food on the table, he shouldn't have to clean it as well.

As soon as he said it, a hush descended on the kitchen as Cassie stared him down.

"I think you're not the only one who's gonna have a bad day today, LeeLee," Elias said not so softly behind her.

"Ohh Ohh, I know this one! The last time you two were at it like this-" Mason's hands clapped over Davis's mouth, ending his sentence before he could finish it but Davis's eyes danced behind his brother's hand, and he looked like he was going to burst with joy. When Mason released his mouth, Davis remained silent as he hugged him close then turned and hugged Cassie.

Lily watched the scene play out, glad for the reprieve, but clueless as to what was happening as the attention turned to Davis, Mason, and Cassie.

There was an awkward silence for a moment before Laura interrupted. "The women need to talk to Lily alone, so if you're not a woman, please leave." She was dialing the phone as she spoke.

So much for her reprieve.

They watched at Davis, Mason, and Eli left, leaving Lily and Petra with Cassie, Laura, and Penny.

"That was Elias Emory!" Petra hissed again as she fell into a chair at the table. Lily was still trying to figure out what had just happened with Mason and Davis. The Stevens family had a lot of silent communication that happened between them, and she had yet to break the code.

"Now, LeeLee, tell us everything." Penny insisted.

"LeeLee?" Petra mouthed with an arched eyebrow and then a grin.

Lily sighed, realizing she was going to have to tell them everything. Elizabeth Stevens joined them on speaker phone, and Lily told them, in detail what had happened. By the time she was finished, all of the women had stopped what they were doing to give her their total attention.

"Lily," Laura said softly. Laura was the only one that did not call her LeeLee. "I know that Mason was comforting you, but you said that both Finn Baxter and Preston Mudd wouldn't let you go, did you feel threatened?"

"I've heard things about Mudd," Cassie admitted softly.

Petra's eyes grew round as she looked from Laura and Cassie to Lily. "I didn't even think about that," she said.

"Laura and I have been in this business a long time," Cassie said, "we know how the game is played. I've been lucky because I've always had Jasper and Mason, but not everyone is as lucky." Cassie looked at Laura, who gave a weak smile of recognition. "Are you sure you don't want Mason to let everyone know you're family, it will protect you from a lot of bad stuff."

Lily shook her head. "No!" she said emphatically. "I need to make it on my own."

"Did you feel threatened?" Laura asked again, going back to the heart of the matter.

"Not with Finn," she blushed, but none of the women called her on it, thank goodness, "but Preston Mudd walked in on me in the dressing room too." 

Petra's eyes grew even rounder if that was possible at her admission.

"Lily, do you want help?" Laura asked.

"No," Lily shook, "this is something I need to figure out on my own, but I promise if it gets out of control, I will let someone know." The thought of Uncle Mason rushing in and firing Preston Mudd made her shudder. If that happened, she would either have to let everyone know they were family or let them think that she and Mason were having an affair and he was defending his turf, neither of which was very palatable. She also wasn't keen to be the one to get the director fired before her first week was over.

"LeeLee," Elizabeth said from the phone on the counter. "Sweetheart, I know it was a terrible day, but I'm going to tell you what I have told all of my children at one time or another. If it weren't so important to you, it wouldn't matter. Know that the reason it all matters and hurts so much is because you are finally getting to do something you've waited a long time to do, and that's is something to rejoice about."

"Not to mention you've already had the most embarrassing day ever so things can only get better," Petra said on a positive note.

"I'm not so sure about that," Lily said as she thought about Finn Baxter's dark-eyed stare. Things always seemed to fall apart when he was around.