Ever since they staged little Albie’s kidnap in EastEnders, Karen Taylor (Lorraine Stanley) and son Keanu (Danny Walters) have been skating on thin ice.
Karen aroused hardman Phil Mitchell’s (Steve McFadden) suspicions by flashing the cash at her birthday party.
Now her ex, Mitch Baker (Roger Griffiths), decides to confront Keanu about roping his mum into his kidnap plan – and starts a chain of events which lead to a dramatic car crash.
The plot actually started when Karen put the sinister idea to run away with little Albie in Keanu’s head.
When Keanu changed his mind, he came up with a story about Albie being kidnapped – leaving mum Sharon Watts (Letitia Dean) panic-stricken.
After an enormous hunt for the lad and Karen delivering a ransom note, Sharon handed over £50,000 of her ex Phil’s cash to get her son back.
Albie was secretly being cared for by Karen’s brother-in-law Malcolm – who had no idea of their evil plan.
Mitch confronts Karen after her birthday, smelling a rat, and when she fesses up he insists that she pay the money back.
He heads over to see Keanu who is unrepentant about what he’s done, leaving Mitch rattled.
Heading off in his van, Mitch ends up in a car accident when his van hits Harvey Monroe’s (Ross Boatman) taxi.
A furious Kat (Jessie Wallace) demands that Mitch pays for the damages, but Karen ends up going behind his back and clearing the debt with the ransom money.
Phil examines the notes Karen gave Kat and sees they are his marked bills.
And after getting Sam (Kim Medcalf) on the case, Phil finally gets the evidence he needs to prove Karen and Keanu staged little Albie’s kidnap.
But ahead of Karen’s exit from the show, what will happen next?
