Readers Guide to Our Beautiful Mess

Zac, during a completely random encounter one night at a bar, ends up handing out with a group of guys. One of them is involved with a drug gang and Zac witnesses him being beaten to death. Since Zac was a witness, the gang tells Zac he will be taking over the drug delivery.

To make matters even worse for Connie, she learns that Zac, who always looked vaguely familiar to her, is the biological son of Jahn Harvey, a man she had an affair with years ago.

The affair almost ended Connie and Luke’s marriage. Now she and Luke have to pretend to be cordial to John, whom Zac wants to be a part of his life. Zac is the product of a one night stand between John and his mother Claire.

We also learn that Fran, right around the time the baby was conceived, was in a fight with Zac and slept with a random businessman in a bar. So the baby could possibly be his. 

John and Connie meet privately, and he tells her that Zac and Fran aren’t right for each other and that he will tell Zac to cut her off. He seems to have some inside information about this.

Fran confesses to her mother that the businessman she slept with was … John Harding. Wow, that man does get around.

But it’s not as much of a coincidence as it seems. Zac had arranged to meet John (for the first time) and Fran in a bar, but Zac didn’t show (he is perpetually running off to deliver drugs.) So Fran and John, not even considering that they could both be there to meet Zac, had a one night stand.

Connie meets John and asks him to stop being a part of Zac’s life. Then Luke calls and says Sophie is in the hospital. Fran tells Zac that there is some new and lethal batch of drugs circulating in the city. 

Zac drops his new batch of pills off a bridge. Then he goes and confesses everything to John.

Someone sends Fran a photo of Zac beaten and tied to a chair. Fran contacts John, who wants to call the police.

Fran gets kidnapped. Sophie wakes up.  John comes to the hospital to talk to Connie and Luke. He’s called the police, who haven’t seemed to do anything.

When a ransom demand comes in, John and Connie decide to go pay it.

Connie assures the drug gang she has the money when suddenly gunshots ring out. John tells her he “called the cavalry.” The drug guys have been shot but so has John.  As he’s dying, John tells Connie to tell Fran that he’d had a vascectomy so that she will feel sure that Zac is her baby’s father.

To sum up, John managed to 1) call the police 2) throw the bag of money as a distraction then 3) jump in front of the guy with the gun, 3) wrestle it out of his hands 4) shoot four drug gang members.

Epilogue: Fran has her baby, a boy named John-Luca. Connie attends John’s funeral. Sophie is recovering.