General Hospital’s Willow ‘Blindsided,’ Blames Michael For Arrest, Says Katelyn MacMullen (Exclusive)

When Willow Tait joined her ex-husband, Michael Corinthos, for a supervised visit with their two young children, Wiley and Amelia, the last thing she was expecting was to wind up in handcuffs. But that’s exactly what happened to her on the October 13 episode of General Hospital after Anna Devane and Dante Falconeri placed her under arrest for the attempted murder of her ex-fiancé, Drew Cain. Soap Opera Digest got the inside scoop on Willow’s arrested development from her portrayer, Katelyn MacMullen.

When a mystery person first plugged two bullets into Drew’s back early in September, Willow — who he’d been poised to marry before she dumped him in dramatic fashion at the altar when she learned about his secret sexual relationship with her mother, Nina Reeves — was among the first names on the PCPD’s long list of suspects. Nina quickly stepped up to provide her daughter with an alibi … which, unfortunately for Willow, was made up, and last week, that alibi crumbled. Sighs MacMullen, “I think the minute Nina started lying to the police, Willow was probably like, ‘Oh, no, this isn’t good.’ But I don’t think she ever thought it would come to something like this! I don’t at all think she was expecting to get arrested.”

Alas, on last Friday’s episode, Anna discovered something inside the home of Elizabeth Webber, where Willow has been staying, that made her arrest all but a done deal: Edward Quartermaine’s missing pistol, the weapon used in Drew’s shooting. And given that she was finally getting the face time with her kids that she was so desperate for, said arrest certainly came at an inopportune time. “She was there just soaking up this time with her children and then the police came through the door,” MacMullen sighs. “That alone was kind of surprising to Willow because she knows they’re questioning everybody, but she’s like, ‘Why now? I’m with my kids!’ She’s like, ‘Can’t this wait until I’m done hanging out with my kids? Even if you’re here for Michael, can’t you just wait until we’re done here?’ And then all of a sudden, she’s getting arrested?! It was the last thing she expected and just a total shock. She’s blindsided, devastated and angry. And she can’t believe they did it in front of the kids!”

And the (unpleasant) surprises kept on coming. Once hauled into the station, Willow discovered she wasn’t the only person arrested — her mom was, too, for conspiracy to commit murder! “I think she certainly blames Nina [for this predicament] because it’s like, ‘Oh, my gosh, she roped me into this alibi and now I look so guilty when it was never my idea to lie in the first place,’ ” MacMullen says. “At the same time, Willow feels like, ‘Well, she was obviously just lying because she was trying to protect me,’ which Nina does sometimes — she steps in just in an effort to be protective or helpful. So, now it’s like, ‘How do we get out of this? This is not good!’ “

Willow was thrown yet again when she learned the cops found the gun in her room at Liz’s place, and she’s swearing up and down that she’s innocent — and at the end of Tuesday’s episode, she made the claim to Chase that she was being set up. Specifically, by Michael! And to hear MacMullen tell it, that leaves Willow quite convinced that Michael is the one who pulled the trigger. “I don’t think she necessarily thought it was Michael at first,” the actress muses. “I think that even when Drew was like, ‘Oh, we’ll get him arrested,’ I think she was probably like, ‘Okay, well, even if he gets arrested, I know he didn’t do it and he has a very powerful family, so he’ll just get out of it immediately.’ But once she realizes there was a gun planted in her room and that Michael had just come to visit her to set up that meeting with the kids — she is absolutely sure that it was Michael because who else would set her up? And it was his grandfather’s gun, too! So, yeah, at that point, she’s convinced it was him.”

While things have been far from rosy between Michael and Willow for some time now, this represents a new low. “Willow even says something like, ‘I know things have gotten really bad between us, but for it to get to this?’ Like, it just has to stop — it’s just gone so far now.” MacMullen shares, “My acting coach and I talked about how Willow kind of saw Michael in this family that retaliates, and I think she was always afraid that Michael might live up to that way of life or could like turn dark or whatever, but she never thought it would happen to her. She heard stories of how he would retaliate in the past, but she never thought it would get to this level, so now, it’s like she is seeing her worst fears come true when it comes to him.”

Friends In High Places

The actress says that Chase is willing to consider the possibility that Michael — who he has a long history with himself, and whose cousin, Brook Lynn, is Chase’s wife — planted the weapon in his room. “I don’t know if he’s as certain about it as Willow is,” she allows. “But he certainly knows that the family has done this type of thing in the past. I think he’s not ruling out that Michael could absolutely be a suspect, and I think he’s even like, ‘Well, his alibi looks a little suspicious, as well.’ He’s probably not as sold on it as Willow, but he’s certainly not ruling it out. And he wants to investigate it further because something isn’t quite adding up.”