When The Young and the Restless’ Audra (Zuleyka Silver) decided to make a deal with Victor (Eric Braeden) to destroy Kyle (Michael Mealor) and Claire’s (Hayley Erin) relationship, we had a hunch things wouldn’t go entirely to plan.
Sure, we thought there was a good possibility that Audra would be able to seduce Kyle into bed, but not without some major consequences. We felt it was nearly impossible for her to sleep with Kyle and for Nate (Sean Dominic) not to find out and be furious. Her ambitious, and unwise, alliance with Victor just seemed destined to cost her the first relationship she’s had in a while that wasn’t rooted in deceit, corporate espionage or manipulation.
Along these lines, we couldn’t rule out the real chance that in Audra’s efforts to seduce Kyle she’d genuinely start to fall for him again. Before Audra and Kyle left for France, it was Holden (Nathan Owens) who picked up on some chemistry between the two. So her rekindled feelings for Kyle would have complicated her allegiance to Victor, and The Mustache could have noticed and burned her in their arrangement.
Having said all of that, during the week of July 21, Kyle called Audra out for trying to lure him into sleeping with her to satisfy the end of her bargain with Victor. Audra, of course, denied such a thing, and even credited her kissing him as being vulnerable after Damian’s (Jermaine Rivers) murder and being caught up in the moment. But Kyle refuses to believe that she wasn’t trying to trap him.
Then, in The Young and the Restless episode airing on July 24, having been chewed out by Victor for not delivering results with their scheme, Audra meets with Kyle and raises the point that he almost cheated on Claire. She further asserts that Kyle will indeed break Claire’s heart.
Responding in kind, Kyle brags about having destroyed Audra, noting how now that her plan has failed, Victor will soon crush her, leaving her with no job and no business. Furthermore, he guesses that when the full truth is revealed about the lengths she was willing to go to in order to satisfy her ambition, she’ll have nothing and likely no one.
That’s when Audra replies with something interesting. She counters that if everything Kyle is saying is true, then that makes her even more dangerous with nothing to lose. This has us thinking Kyle may not want to brag too much for too long.
We can imagine a scenario where Audra tries to pivot her strategy once everyone is back in Genoa City. She may be able to convince Victor she has one more card to play in terms of Kyle, but refuse to tell The Mustache any particulars. Then, Audra decides to split Kyle and Claire up by going after Claire.
Audra may come to realize just how close Claire and Holden are becoming as friends, and opt to exploit that dynamic for her benefit. For example, Audra could go to Holden and try to sway him into helping her make it appear to Kyle that he and Claire have something going on behind Kyle’s back. Now to get Holden on her side, Audra may have to beg a little, considering how poorly she’s treated her old “friend,” but he may get on board with the scheme if the price is right.
And heck, perhaps Audra doesn’t even talk to Holden first, but instead sees his bond with Claire and sets them both up to make it appear that Claire cheated on Kyle, even if it’s not true. Kyle is a man with a lot of ego, so he won’t take kindly to believing he’s been cheated on.
At this juncture, this is all largely theory. However, we just don’t think anyone should count Audra out yet.
New episodes of The Young and the Restless air weekdays on CBS. Episodes become available to stream on Paramount Plus the next day.
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