In 2003, Sharon Newman did the only thing she could think of after locking lips with father-in-law Victor: She left Genoa City. But as she was regrouping in Denver, had the misfortune of catching the eye of businessman Cameron Kirsten, who got her drunk, took advantage of her and then beat her to a pulp.
A year after Sharon had raced home, Cameron showed up in Genoa City to make a deal with Newman Enterprises, which was being run that week by Nicholas. Of course, the baddie was less interested in signing contracts than he was in tormenting the object of his obsession.
As New Year’s Eve drew near, Cameron coerced Sharon into helping him plan the shindig. She didn’t want to, obviously, but if she defied him, he’d tell Nicholas all about their time in Denver. Well, maybe not the part about how he’d smacked Sharon around.
Clueless as to just how nefarious a character Cameron really was, Victor and wife Nikki could only marvel at what a swanky and elegant soiree he’d thrown. Being a villain through and through, Cameron probably didn’t even give Sharon credit for planning the menu!
At the blowout, Cameron handed Sharon the address of a seedy motel and ordered her to meet him there. (Why a gazillionaire wouldn’t book a fancier place is a question for the ages.) When she refused to surrender to his advances, they fought, and she wound up clubbing him with a bottle of bubbly.
Thinking that Cameron was dead, Sharon wrapped his body in a sheet and dragged it behind a dumpster. Yes, even though in it was where he belonged! Eventually, ex-con Larry Warton, being the good Samaritan that he was, moved the stiff into the sewer for the damsel in distress.
Not caring a whole lot that Cameron was despicable, his spare lover — Sharon’s onetime BFF Grace Turner — tended to his injuries, demonstrated the ease with which she disrobed and marveled at the wastefulness of using a full bottle of champagne to try to kill somebody.
Rather than take “She’s just not that into you” as an answer, Cameron bloodied himself like he was headed to a Halloween hootenanny and stalked Sharon to the point that she wondered whether she was losing her mind… or had already lost it.
At her wit’s end, Sharon dragged Nikki into the sewer to make sure that Cameron was still there. The in-laws did indeed find a body, but it wasn’t Cameron’s, it was… huh? It belonged to Frank Barritt, the biological father of Sharon’s daughter, Cassie. Cameron had had him killed for… reasons?
On Mother’s Day, Cameron made his grand comeback, telling anyone who cared that he’d been MIA for months because he’d taken off for the Caribbean with an old girlfriend. When Sharon privately asked, “WTH?” he pretended that all he’d had to do with champagne on New Year’s Eve was drink it.
When Cameron offered Nick a job at Kirsten Incorporated, Sharon finally decided that she had to tell her husband what had happened with the psycho. In response, Nick introduced his fist to Cameron’s face to see how much he enjoyed being beaten up.
To escape prosecution for Frank’s murder, Sharon reluctantly agreed to leave the country with Cameron. Luckily, Nick snuck onboard the getaway plane, wailed on Cameron and managed to strap parachutes to all three of them before leaping to safety. Finally, Cameron was arrested… but he wouldn’t rest until he’d gotten revenge.
Some 20 years later, just as Sharon was welcoming to the family lil’ Aria — daughter Mariah Copeland and her wife Tessa Porter’s adopted daughter — she received a mysterious gift: a bottle of champagne. Coincidence? On a soap opera? We doubted it.
A blood stain on the bubbly’s label gave Sharon and Nick the notion that maybe, just maybe the bottle wasn’t a present from a secret admirer or an over-the-top thank-you for an especially good cup of coffee.
Finally, at the tail end of May sweeps in 2023, Cameron was spotted checking into the Genoa City Athletic Club. Had decades in prison mellowed him? Portrayer Linden Ashby had something to say about that.
Advertisement
