The stage was set for fashion’s most anticipated event of the year—a celebration of legacy, creativity, and rebirth. At the center of it all was Steffy Forrester, returning from a personal and professional hiatus to reclaim her throne. But just as she prepared to close the show with her signature piece, disaster struck. A steel lighting rig crashed onto the catwalk. Screams filled the venue. Chaos erupted. Steffy barely escaped with her life.

Initial assessments confirmed everyone’s worst fear—it wasn’t an accident. The rig had been deliberately sabotaged. Someone wanted Steffy dead.

The investigation quickly turned up a troubling lead. Surveillance footage captured a hooded figure entering the rigging area hours before the collapse. The keycard used to access the restricted zone was registered to Hope Logan. Days earlier, she had been demoted from the fashion line—replaced by Steffy in what many believed was a calculated power play. She’d been angry. She’d gone silent. And she had motive.

Hope claimed innocence. She told Ridge and investigators she had only gone in to retrieve a sketchbook. But her late-night entry, the timing of the sabotage, and a cryptic message—“You’ll regret this”—cast a long shadow.

As media frenzy exploded and family loyalty frayed, another narrative emerged. A small-town sheriff reported an unsettling scene following Deacon Sharpe’s fatal car crash. A woman had been seen drenched in blood, muttering incoherently. The witness later identified her: Sheila Carter.

Sheila’s name sent shivers down every spine.

Digging deeper, Ridge and his team found a rented cabin linked to Sheila. What they discovered inside painted a portrait of a mind broken beyond repair—manic scribblings, obsessive plans, and evidence linking her directly to the attempted murder of Steffy. A second, stolen keycard confirmed it: Sheila had framed Hope.

Psychologists diagnosed Sheila with a dissociative identity disorder, triggered by grief over Deacon’s death. She had no memory of the sabotage. No comprehension of the lives she nearly destroyed.

Police located her outside a hospital where Finn once worked, talking to an empty stroller. When Finn arrived, she didn’t recognize her own son. She was committed, a shell of the woman she once was.

Hope was exonerated. But in the eyes of the public and the people closest to her, doubt remained. Her professional reputation collapsed. She resigned, withdrew, and vanished from the spotlight.

Steffy, once a figure of resilience, now lived in fear. Security was doubled. Children were relocated. Ridge tightened his grip on the family estate. But even in their fortified world, danger still loomed. Because Sheila’s madness hadn’t died. It had simply gone underground.

And as Ridge stared out the window into the wind, he understood: in their world of style and scandal, nothing ever truly ends. It just hides—waiting to strike again.