From the moment The Young and the Restless’ Holden (Nathan Owens) stepped foot on the show’s canvas, he’s proven to be charming, has a way with words to get under some people’s skin and he’s quite sneaky.
Case in point, he’s managed to charm his way into a friendship with Claire (Hayley Erin) while ruffling the feathers of both Nate (Sean Hastings) and Lily (Christel Khalil) by pretending to be Damian (Jermaine Rivers) and then making subsequent snide remarks. But let’s zero in on his dynamic with Claire.
In The Young and the Restless episode from July 1, Cane (Billy Flynn) met with Holden at Crimson Lights and tasked him with getting close to Chelsea (Melissa Claire Egan), Adam (Mark Grossman), Mariah (Camryn Grimes) and Claire. Holden seemed more than ready to accept the challenge with Chelsea, Adam and Mariah, and he noted he was already friends with Claire. Cane didn’t really explain the rationale behind his assignment, but it was clear he has some future nefarious intentions for his “targets.”
Fast forward to The Young and the Restless episode airing on July 11, and two important things happen that spell trouble for Claire. First, Holden finds Claire alone at Crimson Lights, and she shares with him that Cole (J. Eddie Peck) died. Holden is quick to offer his condolences and confesses that he has experience grieving a father, as his own dad died of cancer. Wanting to offer Claire some comfort, he suggests they get breakfast, and she hesitantly agrees to go with him to Society.
Their breakfast outing doesn’t exactly go as planned, because when they arrive at Society, they run into Chelsea and Adam. The reconciled couple is onto Holden being Cane’s handler and spy in Genoa City, and subtly grill him, but don’t make it a complete interrogation. Heck, Adam even teases the possibility of hiring Holden at Newman Media to help cover his inquisitive tracks.
Once Adam and Chelsea return to their table, Claire realizes she’s not in the mood for breakfast, and she and Holden talk about how she misses Kyle (Michael Mealor), who is off with Audra (Zuleyka Silver) in France. That leads us to the second important thing that spells trouble for Claire.
In France, Audra and Kyle pitch their perfume competition to Cane. He initially is not interested in the idea, but notices their “chemistry.” Because of their “flirtatious” banter between each other, Cane agrees to delay his public reveal that he’s Aristotle Dumas until Audra and Kyle’s perfume battle plays out. The duo celebrates the good news over drinks in Audra’s train car.
With all that being said, we have a strong hunch that Cane is going to utilize what he saw between Audra and Kyle for his benefit. Cane already has cameras all over his French estate, so we suspect he’ll soon pay extra attention to the footage of Audra and Kyle. Audra is already trying to tempt Kyle to give in and cheat on Clarie, and since we think she’ll prove successful, it’s not hard to picture Cane capturing the moment.
Then once he has the footage, we believe he’ll probably make sure to get the images to Claire “anonymously." Cane would do this all with the purpose of making sure to send Claire running into Holden’s arms for comfort.
With Mariah and Tessa (Cait Fairbanks) dealing with their own drama, Holden has proven to be Claire’s only friend in town. If Claire leans on his shoulder to vent about Kyle, would things then take a romantic turn? We don’t see why not, as Claire and Holden shared a meet-cute moment months ago, and we’ve actually been waiting for that dynamic to be explored.
On a final note, if our theory is true, Holden may want to be careful. Claire is nice and sweet now, but we can’t forget Jordan’s (Colleen Zenk) parting words that there is some of the deranged villain inside of Claire Newman.
New episodes of The Young and the Restless air weekdays on CBS. Episodes become available to stream on Paramount Plus the next day.
