Scandal's Katie Lowes: Has Quinn Ditched Huck for Charlie?

While everyone is stressing out about B613 and Operation Remington, OPA and Huck (Guillermo Diaz) have failed to notice that Quinn (Katie Lowes) has gone rogue.

Spurned by her mentor, Scandal's youngest member of Olivia Pope & Associates decided to take matters into her own hands by buying a gun in hopes of honing her skills independently. Instead, she found help from Charlie (George Newbern), who, viewers learned, has been working for Rowan (Joe Morton) to lure her in. What does Rowan want from Quinn? And what's up with that steamy kiss coming in Thursday's episode (10/9c, ABC)? TVGuide.com caught up with Lowes to get the scoop:

Exclusive Scandal Sneak Peek: Quinn kisses ... Charlie?!

How does Quinn feel about actually getting lessons from Charlie on how to hone her skills?
Katie Lowes: Quinn is really between a rock and a hard place. Huck is her everything. Huck is her mentor and inspiration. He's her sense of belonging. With that taken away and there being a major discord, mostly because he just doesn't want Quinn to follow in his footsteps, she needs somewhere to go. She has a major itch to scratch. Huck opened that door to her, and then he's like, "But wait! I don't even actually want you going through this door." She starts to take it upon herself. When Charlie first offered his services in last week's episode, she's definitely a different Quinn from first season, so she was wary to take the opportunity to learn from him. At the end of the day, she just wants to learn how to shoot a gun and Huck's not helping.

How would Huck feel about Quinn getting closer to Charlie?
Lowes: I think he would be really pissed off. I know that Huck and Quinn don't have a sexual relationship, but I think it's like cheating. That's how I associate it. Charlie and Huck have a very complicated, messed up relationship that's filled with torturing each other and, at the same time, respecting each other because they are both at the top of their field. I don't think Huck would be very thrilled at finding that out at all.

How do you think her relationship with Huck has changed?
Lowes: Her relationship with Huck is in really big trouble. What's sad about it is that her side has not changed. She's like, "Why can't we just be Huckleberry Quinn like we always are? You keep teaching me stuff and I'll get better at this, and one day we can be peers and I can help you in your times of struggle. I'll be your sidekick." In her ideal world, she wants that. But he really feels like he created a monster and he doesn't know how to stop her, except by just basically not helping her anymore and cutting her out.

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We know that Charlie is getting close to Quinn for Rowan. Why her in particular?
Lowes: I think Quinn is the way into Olivia Pope & Associates. She's the youngest one and the weakest link. Huck most likely wouldn't get close to Charlie. Rowan seems to know everything and he probably knows how close Quinn is with Huck and that Quinn has an addiction problem with B613-type work.

We haven't seen Quinn make her first kill yet. How do you think that would affect her?
Lowes: I don't think Quinn would react well to a kill. As close as she is to enjoying torturing people and things like that, I do not think she has crossed over to the Huck zone where she would get high off of killing someone. Not to say that that may or may not happen in the future, but from what I play of Quinn now, she hasn't crossed into that territory yet. She's fascinated by it, but I don't think it would be an easy thing.

We posted a sneak peek in which Quinn and Charlie kiss. What's going on there?! Do they have a spark?
Lowes: In Shondaland fashion, it's very complicated. I think that Quinn hasn't gotten any in a while. [Laughs] She's been in a man's world. She's been around Huck for a long time. Things have been turned off in that way since Gideon (Brendan Hines), which was like two years ago. When Charlie just aggressively takes her like that out of the blue, it really shocks her to be touched or pursued at all. That's something that's so far from her mind.

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OPA will be dragged into the Remington investigation. How will they help Olivia (Kerry Washington) with this?
Lowes: It's just crazy. Remington is so insane. We've gone through election rigging and other things, but Remington is dealing with Olivia's personal life. We've never done that before. We didn't know these things about Olivia Pope and her backstory with her parents. With Quinn's new side path that she's on, she's not as much in the OPA side of Thursday's episode. But she does do some hacking.

Are you 'shipping Charlie and Quinn?

Scandal airs Thursdays at 10/9c on ABC.