For the past few weeks on The Young and the Restless, Victoria (Amelia Heinle) has found herself getting more infatuated with her forbidden relationship with Nate (Sean Dominic).
No matter how many times the Newman family cautions her about falling for him, she ignores them and gets further entangled with her employee, which is never a good sign considering her track record in the romance department.
The last time Victoria’s loved ones warned her about falling for a man they were talking about Ashland Locke (Robert Newman), and just like in the present, she didn’t listen then.
As viewers know, Victoria married Ashland only to discover he lied to her the entire time in an effort to gain access to the family company. Is Victoria bracing herself to face a similar deceptive fate with Nate? It looks that way.
In recent episodes, Nick (Joshua Morrow) has repeatedly stressed to his sister that if Nate was unable to be loyal to his own Winters family and he found it so easy to cheat on Elena (Brytni Sarpy), then Victoria should be wary of trusting Nate.
Nikki (Melody Thomas Scott) also told her daughter to be careful with Nate, emphasizing that it's never good for a boss to mix business with pleasure. In the soap world, these many warnings are really foreshadowing that a relationship is doomed.
Then take into consideration the Audra (Zuleyka Silver) factor. Since arriving in Genoa City, she’s hardly made it a secret that she can be a manipulative shark in business, and she purposefully set up Elena to catch Nate and Victoria fooling around, hoping Elena would kick Nate to the curb.
While some may have found Audra’s motives behind such a move a mystery, it appears that she just wanted to push Nate and Victoria closer together. As Audra sees it, Nate getting closer to Victoria could mean he gets a promotion at Newman, which means Audra could get a promotion, his current job.
When Nate stumbles upon the fact that Audra helped tank his relationship, Young and the Restless preview clips indicate that he won’t be angry.
Instead, he’ll own his ambition and recognize Audra’s desire to climb the corporate ladder. The two seem to be gearing up for a twisted collaborative effort to do whatever they can to get ahead at Newman, including Nate using Victoria.
Outside of their professional aspirations, Nate and Audra’s dynamic at times appears to be flirtatious. Is it possible that as the two climb their way to the top, they’ll begin a romantic dalliance of their own behind Victoria's back?
Regardless of the extent of Nate and Audra’s betrayal, we caution them to beware of the Newman clan’s passion for vengeance. Victor alone has masterfully burned Jack (Peter Bergman), Phyllis (Michelle Stafford), Billy (Jason Thompson), Diane (Susan Walters) and the list goes on.
The Young and The Restless episodes air on weekdays on CBS. Episodes can also be streamed on Paramount Plus.