Coronation Street spoilers to follow.
Coronation Street's Debbie Webster was at the centre of the soap's latest twist tonight (January 25), as she suggested to Abi Franklin that she had murdered Ray Crosby following his attack on Abi... only for the soap to later reveal that Ray was still alive after all.
In the ITV soap's latest double-bill, the sleazy businessman was nowhere to be seen after drugging Abi (Sally Carman), who had recently exposed the true extent of his villainy in an earlier episode.
As the residents tried to work out where Ray had gone, with Abi suggesting he could even be sunning himself on some island somewhere, Sally Metcalfe (Sally Dynevor) quizzed Debbie (Sue Devaney) on what she knew.
Debbie claimed that she was in the dark about everything that Ray had been up to, insisting that she had no idea about his bribery in the planning committee meeting or that Ray (Mark Frost) had manipulated and assaulted Faye Windass and was, in general, as wicked as he's now been proved to be.
Later though, Abi confronted Debbie in the Bistro, having remembered that the latter was there the night Ray almost killed her. Abi told Debbie that she knew she was the one who had called the ambulance after seeing that she was hurt, and criticised her for continuing to work for Ray and not staying with her until the paramedics had arrived.
Seemingly desperate to clear her name, Debbie then told an increasingly frustrated Abi that Ray had taken her away from the scene by force and was about to bundle her into the back of his car when she managed to whack him around the head with a car jack.
As a shocked Abi listened on, Debbie shared that the blow killed him outright and that she'd later disposed of Ray's body in the river, prompting Abi to urge Debbie to go to the police.
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"You have to tell them what happened. You've gotta go to the police," Abi said.
"No, they won't believe me, Abi, please," Debbie replied. "He would've killed me and he would've come back for you."
Later, however, viewers were left gobsmacked when Debbie later met up with a very-much-alive Ray and his lawyer Miles in secret, and told him that she had a passport and a flight to Turkey booked for him to flee the country – but she'd only hand them over if he agreed to sign his business over to her.
Angered by Debbie's brazenness, Ray barked that he wouldn't sign anything until he had safely arrived in Turkey.
Afterwards, Abi said that she would keep Debbie's supposed attack on Ray a secret, considering that the act essentially saved her life, but only if she would sell all of the houses that Ray had acquired on the cobbles over the last few months back to the Street's residents.
With Debbie now on the verge of being the sole beneficiary from such a deal, it was a condition to which Debbie happily agreed.
Coronation Street airs on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 7.30pm and 8.30pm on ITV.
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