It’s that season of year again: When everyone gathers together, holds each other close and takes part in the time-honored tradition of Hanukkah Christmas Sex Week at Stansfield University.
Despite all of the condoms tossed around in this week’s Power Book II: Ghost, surprisingly few characters actually do the deed. But Tariq does get rid of a dead body, and Paz is back, so there’s that. Read on for the highlights of “Sex Week.”
CANE DISPLACED? | Cane and another masked man rob a church and pistol-whip the pastor. He hasn’t been home since his beat-down at the jail three days before, which is a problem, because he usually helps Monet handle things when they get their supply re-upped. So Diana tracks him down and advises him to show up when needed, which will slide him back in their mother’s good graces. He agrees, but makes her promise not to tell Monet where he is in the meantime.
But Cane gets picked up by the police on the way to the product delivery, so Diana calls Tariq to the bar. They wind up making out downstairs while the connect is giving Monet a hard time upstairs; when it gets violent, she shoots and kills him. Diana and Tariq run upstairs when they hear the noise, then Tariq winds up helping Dru dispose of the body. So when Ramirez gives Cane an alibi and goes with him to Monet’s, they learn that Tariq is handling things. And neither one of them seems excited about it.
SO CLOSE! | Tariq isn’t one of the finalists for the Canonical Studies fellowship. Carrie comes up to him after to let him know that if helping Zeke is hurting his GPA; of course, Jabari takes notice of their close conversation. But losing out on the chance to graduate early is the least of ‘Riq’s problems. And one of the most pressing issues at hand is that there are a ton of unfulfilled orders on the Course Correct app — and Simon Stern’s hubby, aka Tariq’s main source of funding, has noticed.
SEX, LIES AND JABARI’S BEING SHADY | Carrie and Zeke are still sleeping together, and he wants her to meet his aunt. Of course, that’s never going to happen, but she’s gentle as she reminds him that she’s a professor and he’s a student and a star athlete, so “Any of this getting out would be explosive.” She encourages him to go to the annual Sex Week Q Party — incidentally, which Simon Stern started when he was a student at the school — and hook up with some co-eds. He says he’ll go for appearances’ sake, if she wants him to, but he’s only interested in being with her.
Afterward, while Zeke is in the shower, Jabari shows up with takeout and some sweet talk about how they’re back into their old groove. After seeing evidence that he assumes backs up his theory about a Carrie/Tariq relationship, Jabari messes with Tariq’s part in a class exercise about The 48 Laws of Power. Essentially, they partner up and have to figure out each other’s secret in order to get an A. Lauren and Tariq are partners, and because they’re super flirty, their work session soon turns into a tickle fight in her dorm room. That’s the exact moment that her boyfriend, Malcolm, arrives and (like a creeper) starts shooting photos of the pair thrashing around on the bed “so you can see yourself,” he tells Lauren when she realizes he’s there. After Tariq leaves, Lauren tells him they’re done. “Don’t make a mistake you’ll regret,” he cautions. “You are the mistake I regret. Get out,” she shoots back.
Even more messed up than Malcolm’s reaction to Lauren’s (actual) romantic interest in Tariq is Jabari’s reaction to Carrie’s (in no way based in fact) romantic interest in Tariq. He calls ‘Riq into his office to offer him another shot at the fellowship… provided he write a personal essay that discusses the power dynamic between himself and a woman he’s been with. “I want details. Specifics,” the prof says, and even though it’s a very bizarre extra-credit assignment, Tariq jumps at the chance to be back in the running.
LADY PROBLEMS! | Despite his 400 courses and doing all of Zeke’s homework, Tariq finds time to tail Riley. He winds up at her court hearing for a possession of marijuana charge. And when her lawyer/uncle Saxe shows up, a shocked Tariq knows he has to do something drastic. So he tells Brayden that Riley tried to hook up with him twice — but Brayden doesn’t believe him and angrily wonders why his roomie is lying. But after hearing from Trace that Riley and Tariq were in his room that night at the party, Brayden starts to think that something’s up. Riley denies any guilt, but Brayden ends things with her, anyway.
And on the night of the infamous Q Party, Lauren swings by Tariq’s room and announces that she and Malcolm are done. They start to make out, but as she goes to unzip his coat, he shuts her down and makes it seem like she’s only trying to get with him in order to best him in the class exercise. She’s hurt, so she leaves; then we see that he really wanted to put a stop to any potential nookie because he still has blood and such all over his clothes from helping Monet with her kill earlier that night.
MEANWHILE, AT TASHA’S TRIAL | Saxe calls Paz (aw, hi Paz!) to the stand, then walks a very fine line between honoring his alliance with Maclean and making Steven Ott think he’s trying to get Tasha put away as a queenpin. Paz basically makes Tasha look really bad, and then Maclean makes it look like Angela’s sister doesn’t know what she’s talking about, so it’s basically a wash. Afterward, though, Davis is MAD… until Saxe presents him with “a direct line for taking Tariq down” — aka the file for Epiphany Turner, the exotic dancer who was helping Tariq move product — “and it’s a slam-dunk.”
Later, Paz visits Tasha in jail. Tasha reasserts that she didn’t kill Jamie, but Paz points out that she knows who did. And, unlike Angela, she can still survive this whole mess. “Maybe it’s your turn to walk away,” Paz says.
Now it’s your turn. What did you think of the episode? Sound off in the comments!
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