Shortly after Luke and Laura Spencer’s (Anthony Geary and Genie Francis) wedding in 1981, Laura disappeared and was presumed dead. However, she had really been captured by the evil Cassadine family and was imprisoned on their island in Greece for two years. Forced to marry Stavros Cassadine (then John Martinuzzi), his brother Stefan Cassadine (Stephen Nichols) was the only one who truly cared for her, and the two gradually developed a connection. Laura had a baby named Nikolas, but eventually managed to escape the island, abandoning both Nikolas and Stefan.
In 1996, Stefan brought Nikolas to Port Charles because Luke and Laura’s daughter, Lulu, needed a bone marrow transplant. Stefan moved into Wyndemere, the Cassadine family home on Spoon Island, and his room contained a painting of Laura and several items from her time on Cassadine Island because Stefan was still pining for her. Just a few years earlier, Katherine Bell (Mary Beth Evans) came to town pretending to have been a long-lost friend of Scotty Baldwin’s (Kin Shriner) late wife, Dominique Taub (Shell Danielson), in order to bilk him out of her money.
She turned out to be Dominique’s sister because her mother was the cook for the Taubs and had an affair with Dominique’s father. In 1994, Katherine and Lucy Coe (Lynn Herring) created the first-ever Nurses’ Ball. Since Luke and the Cassadines were mortal enemies, when he inadvertently left a gun behind at Wyndemere, Stefan took it, planning to make it appear as if Luke shot him.
Katherine didn’t know Stefan shot her
On Spoon Island, Stefan fired at a tree, having no idea that Katherine was there, and accidentally shot her. He ran over to help, and their eyes locked. At General Hospital, Katherine woke up and learned the bullet had damaged her spine, paralyzing Katherine’s legs. A guilty Stefan kept visiting her to see if she was recovering, and Katherine mistakenly thought he was a hospital employee. Katherine was starting to develop feelings for Stefan but he was married to Bobbie Jones (Brighton Hertford) at the time.
He even picked Katherine up and brought her to a nearby window so she could see how an ice storm had made everything outside look fantastic. Stefan later gave her a small crystal statue of a tree to remind her of what she saw when he held her. Eventually, Stefan and Bobbie got divorced, and he and Katherine became a couple. Although Katherine felt defeated and feared she wouldn’t regain her ability to walk, Stefan stayed with her and consistently offered words of encouragement.
When Bobbie suspected him of cheating on her with Katherine because he constantly checked in on her, she worked with Luke to see what Stefan was really up to. Stefan discovered Bobbie spying on him and threw her out. He soon revealed his true identity to Katherine — and that he was the one who shot her. She was so upset that she told Stefan to go away for good.
She fell off a parapet — twice
After Katherine was finally able to get up and walk at the Nurses’ Ball, she and Stefan admitted their love for one another and made up. His cousin, Alexis Davis (Nancy Lee Grahn), conspired with Stefan’s mother — the evil Helena Cassadine (Constance Towers) — to make him believe that Katherine was actually his half-sister. Stefan broke things off with Katherine, who was devastated. Eventually, the truth came out and they were reunited once again. They decided to get married and held a Bacchanalia at Wyndemere to announce their engagement.
However, Helena was disguised as Laura, and when Katherine found the room with the painting, she stated that all the supposed heirlooms that Stefan had given her were really presents he’d bought for Laura. Luke and Alexis had rigged the railing of Wyndemere’s parapet so that Helena would fall off it. Unfortunately, Katherine had figured out that Nikolas was Stefan’s son with Laura, and in a daze, she backed out onto the parapet and plummeted off when the railing broke.
Katherine was presumed dead, and Stefan got arrested for her murder. He was eventually exonerated, and at the same time, Helena had secretly taken Katherine and used experimental drugs to revive her. She later had an affair with Nikolas as revenge against Stefan, but Nik really only had eyes for Emily Quartermaine (then Amber Tamblyn). Stefan and Katherine would never reconcile, and later, Helena threw her off the parapet again. This time, Katherine died for real.
