In The Young and the Restless realm, Audra Charles (Zuleyka Silver) has garnered a reputation for being ruthless, manipulative and a bit self-serving. So as determined as she was to be her own boss in Genoa City with her new cosmetics company Vibrante, we never doubted that she would be successful in seducing Kyle (Michael Mealor) to secure the business and funding from Victor (Eric Braeden). However, what we did doubt is whether everything would go to plan in her Kyle plot.
Fast forward to The Young and the Restless episode airing on July 18, and news of Damian’s (Jermaine Rivers) murder continues to make its rounds among Cane’s (Billy Flynn) party guests. After hearing the crushing update, a very upset Audra rushes to Kyle’s train car for comfort, and he happens to be in nothing but a towel.
Not once opting to put some clothes on, Kyle listens as Audra shares all the sordid details of what the guests know so far about the homicide. Additionally, she becomes engulfed with emotions thinking about how heartbreaking this news will be for Amy (Valarie Pettiford) and Nate (Sean Dominic) to learn.
For Amy, Damian was her only son, and for Nate, he was just getting to know his long-lost brother (we still both Amy and Nate will have more time to bond with Damian because we aren’t convinced he’s dead, but we digress for now).
As Audra and Kyle continue to talk, she expresses her concern that they may be doing business with a murderer, as she suspects Cane is the guilty party here. Kyle claims they don’t know that to be the truth at this juncture. She then responds by noting she feels safe in the moment with Kyle, and that's all it takes for the duo to exchange some longing looks and share a passionate kiss.
That’s where the episode ends for them, so we can’t say yet if the two will stop themselves or go ahead and hit the hay. Again, Kyle is only in a towel. But whether Kyle and Audra go all the way or don’t, they’ve now cheated on Claire (Hayley Erin) and Nate, respectively. This was essentially what Victor wanted as part of his alliance with Audra, thinking Kyle’s infidelity would end his relationship with Claire and send Kyle packing out of Genoa City.
However, with that being said, Victor only gets to run his victory lap in this scenario if Audra tells him about what happened. We aren’t sure she’ll be willing to do that.
Let’s think about this. The murder of Damian changes things dramatically. Audra is close to Amy and Nate, and would she really want to add this layer of scheming to their grieving process? By telling on Kyle and their infidelity, she’s telling on herself. She may not want Nate to have to deal with losing a brother and have to process the fact that she cheated on him for her career (although she clearly has feelings for Kyle as well).
Plus, when Audra learns that Cole (J. Eddie Peck) died, she may not want to dump this cheating scandal on Claire’s plate. Audra isn’t a friend of Claire, but she is human and may want Claire to be able to grieve in peace and have the support of Kyle.
All in all, we just think Audra may opt to keep her mouth shut for the time being. That, of course, puts her in quite the predicament with Victor, but with someone trying to pin Cane’s murder on Nick (Joshua Morrow), the Newman patriarch may find himself rather distracted. But since we are talking about the soap world here, the secret will spill out sooner or later.
New episodes of The Young and the Restless air weekdays on CBS. Episodes become available to stream on Paramount Plus the next day.
