Emily May Howell's brother, dr. Ruben L. May, is found dead by Kate who suspects Judge Stinson to have murdered him. Mike wants to have lunch with Dianne, but Pete is more lucky and Mike is very jealous.

Miss Friendly Santa Rita 1981 Lara Peterson is guest judge at the present beauty pageant. 'Cook Insurance' sponsors the event the 7th year in a row, so George is a judge, too, while Jim Stinson is the third. To his amusement Lara flirts with George, and Stinson is busy making passes on Melinda. Mike proposes to Dianne, and a rivalry between Kevin and Richard seems certain to occur, but Kate is intensely focused on finding Emily who is alive, indeed.

Dianne Benedict still has a debt to Bruce's creditors of $12.300, and Pete Dyson, an electric contractor, shows her a bill of $38.000 dollars. Her sister Kate seems to solve it by selling her Classic car to a mortuary, but the cautious Dianne lets Pete make a merger with Bruce's construction company. Dianne loses the election and Jim Stenson stays as judge, who inherits a lot of money from a presumably dead Emilie Howell. Prior to that Mrs. Howell has given Kate Benedict the assignment to keep a birthday party for her dog Pretty Boy. Melinda decides to take part in a beauty pageant called 'Miss Friendly Santa Rita', and again her father is horrified.

Salvatore Lopez reports Tommy Simmons dead and that leads to the solution of the Bruce Christenson murder case. Melinda is forgiving Kevin his drinking the night before their originally planned wedding and takes him with her to get married. DO they succeed this time??

Detective Jerry Kuntz who is the leader of the police investigation of the Bruce Christenson murder has elbowed his way into this position, and he seems very eager to let Tommy Simmons out of the scope. Some very special sunglasses were found beside the dead body, Kuntz delivers them back to the owner, Tommy, but a photo from the night of the murder shows Tommy wearing them on his forehead - in Mike Chulack'z presence. Again the investigation is focused upon Mike.

Tests from the autopsy proves Bruce regularly abused cocaine, and Dianne looses hope of ever finding any of the vanished money. However George and Felicity admit that they have handled Bruce's insurance money unsufficiently, and they fire their accountant. The technical investigations proves that he was not killed by his secretary, Joanna, as her bullet hit nothing but the wall. After some comic setbacks the police succeeds in tracing the person who faxes death threats to Dianne.

The 8 year old Brian teaches his mother Dianne, Kate and Melinda how to recover superficially deleted files, and Joanna is discovered as Bruce's lover. When her registrated gun is found she spitefully confesses the murder. On her father Sal's initiative Melinda starts dating Toly, and Kevin is despaired. Kevin sees faxes with death threats to Dianne and makes the police give her protection.

Dianne leaves the frying-pan and walks into the fire as Bruce is found dead by gunshot at Kate's office. Bruce's secretary Joanna is busy deleting files and Dianne finds both her own and Bruce's money vanished without trace. Mike is taken by the police for the murder because he keeps his silent about the affair with Dianne and the alibi. Felicity demands that Kwevin makes Melinda return her engagement ring, and George confronts the stripper and gets some answers he did not expect.