Twisted Mister

Melrose Place grad Linden Ashby joins The Young and the Restless November 21 as a sexually sadistic software giant. We'll learn that he and Sharon Newman, the neurotic heroine played by Sharon Case, had an anonymous-and very abusive-affair earlier this year. "The plot explains what happened when my character was off the show," says Case, who took a hike last January during a contract dispute and was gone three months. Add Ashby: "This is stuff that happened out of town, stuff Sharon is not proud of and doesn't want anyone in Genoa City to know about. Suddenly, it shows up on her doorstep." Flashbacks of the duo's trysts are reportedly quite violent-some so violent that Case needed a stunt double.