147. Hat Trick

Richard finds the connection between Kit and Roland Saunders and uses it to blackmail her. Angela gives Vickie a look at her ancestors and tells her to be proud of her heritage. Meredith rescues Tony from Kolinski, for the time being. Angela offers financing to Lance and Melissa, but at too high a price. Emma secretly marries Karlotti so she may have a child. Chase takes steps to stop the Tuscany Land Corp. from buying up the valley.

148. Battle Lines

Peter threatens Angela and Roland Saunders as he tries to discover their connection to Kit Marlowe. Due to Angela's interest in Maggie's baby, Maggie concludes that she must give the baby up for adoption if the child is to lead a decent life. After Maggie refuses to allow Emma and Karlotti have her child, the two instead apply to adopt a child. While Angela plans Dan and Vickie's engagement party, she promises to give them a vineyard. Peter forces Tony to tell him about Kit. After Chase makes Gabrielle a proposition, he offers Lance a partnership with him and Tony. Angela plans to solve the mystery of Kit Marlowe.

149. Nowhere to Run

At Angela's engagement party for them, Vickie and Dan set the tone of the party by trying to avoid it. After Kit demonstrates a need to tell Tony good-bye, both Richard and Peter confront Saunders. Maggie arrives looking for her baby, which she now knows is Chase's. After Emma confounds Angela by introducing her adopted son, one of the guests is found dead in the winery.

152. Loose Cannons

As Tony begins to mistrust Kit, Angela ensnares Melissa, and Richard attempts to console Maggie. Richard plans a trip for Maggie to overcome her melancholy, but a ghost from the past interrupts. Melissa's secret world tumbles when Angela finds out about it. Chase decides to file for a divorce. Tony suspects that Kit Marlowe may have used him in order to remove suspicion from her. Angela offers Dan a new job. Lance offers hope to Chao-Li. Although Emma traps Karlotti with plans for a church wedding, her offer of community property turns him from a man in hot water to one who has just struck the mother lode.

153. The Great Karlotti

When Emma and Karlotti's church wedding concludes, Emma discovers how great her husband really is. As the couple stands up before Father Bob for their nuptials, Karlotti's reputation as a lover is enhanced. In her attempts to bring Lance back home, Angela humiliates Melissa in front of Lance, Richard and Dan. Maggie and Chase search for clues to find their baby in Boston. When Lance discovers Kit's whereabouts, he plans to intercept her in his quest to help his father. Wilkerson reports to Angela that he has Tony "nailed to the wall". Vickie and Eric return from their escapade.

154. Chain Reaction

When Kit comes to Tony's defense, the gesture proves worthless. Tony's trial proceeds as if D.A. Wilkinson had scripted it, until Kit arrives at the courtroom. After Chase uncovers evidence that Melissa had engineered the botched paternity test, he is too late to intercept her due to Angela's threats. Chao-Li loses face because Angela and Lance stay up all night to take care of him. After Chase and Maggie decide on a quick divorce, Richard sees his chance for happiness.

158. <7.03> Redemption

Unsuccessful in luring Lance back to her side, Angela turns to Dan to manage her winery and find someone new to run the spa. However, when Dan assigns Melissa to manage the spa, Melissa, to Angela's consternation, creates a successful nightclub for the Del Oro. On the turn of a card, Richard wins Eric's Nevada land and plans to create a town called Channing. While Maggie agrees not to press charges against Melissa, Nicole continues to harass Maggie until Angela enters the fray.

159. <7.04> The Big Bang

When Richard Channing and John Remick offer to help Maggie pay off Angela, each plays dirty to make sure that he will be the one to whom she is indebted. When Angela sends Lance and Dan to investigate Emma's new job, she is too late. Vickie not only tells Maggie that she is pregnant, but also confesses Eric's gambling mania. Dina is seriously injured in a car accident with Lance. While Maggie and Richard visit his new Nevada property, they are unaware that they are under surveillance. Consequently, they return home to face Angela's demand for payment.

162. <7.07> Sweet Revenge

After Richard rejects Carlton Travis's offer of a truce, Travis kidnaps him and Angela. After Maggie hires an old friend to plan a birthday party for Richard's son, Angela brings a puppy as a gift to the party. Melissa spirits her son away for a picnic and becomes lost in the Australian bush. Dina's nurse gets her to sign Lance's half-million-dollar check over to her. Lance suspects that Frank Starr tampered with his car.

163. <7.08> Manhunt

After Angela digs into the past to save Richard from Carlton Travis, she must open old wounds. Angela goes to the wife of a Supreme Court justice and one of Washington's most celebrated hostesses to recruit help in rescuing her son. When Lance is arrested for murder, Melissa comes to his aid. A man who Dan suspects is a thief turns out to be his father. While asleep, Lance is injected with a toxin that will kill him within 24 hours.

166. <7.11> Across the Bridge

When Maggie returns to the valley with Vickie and Eric, she learns that Richard and Liz have been traveling together. Eric realizes that his gambling debts are following him and that he must pay more than money to escape them. When Melissa starts to experience strange phenomena due to Angela's hired illusionist Foster Glenn, Melissa's world begins to fall apart. Emma's success as a columnist disturbs Angela, who goes to Father Bob for advice about her family.

167. <7.12> Twist and Shout

After discovering that Maggie has finally accepted Richard, Emma and Angela throw a surprise engagement party. During the party, Melissa makes her entrance dressed only in a bathrobe. Lance discovers that the charming stranger he has befriended knows secrets that could directly impact him. Liz makes an announcement that infuriates Angela but delights Maggie. Melissa overhears Angela talking about her plan to drive Melissa insane and have her committed. Richard saves Eric from making a terrible mistake.

168. <7.13> Rescue Me

After Vickie vanishes from Angela's party, Richard and Eric frantically search for her. After Dan is surprised by the arrival of a half-sister whom he didn't know he had, he puts her to work in the grape fields. Shannon tries to leave the valley after Lance questions her. Melissa is able to deflect Angela's scheme to get her committed so that Angela instead loses her hold on Dan. Angela succeeds in prying into Maggie's affairs.

171. <7.16> A Madness Most Discreet

Maggie and Richard decide to try again, while Angela proves uncharacteristically supportive. When Lance moves back into the manor house, Angela joyfully greets him with the news that Carly will be staying for a few days. In a misguided attempt to help Emma, Curtis digs dirt on Richard. At Lance's instigation, Melissa enters into an elaborate masquerade to rescue Emma. In his effort to break the codicil to Chase's will, Richard enrolls some dangerous assistance. When Gabrielle returns to the valley on the anniversary of Chase's death, she gives Maggie some hopeful news.

172. <7.17> Stormy Weather

When Maggie and Richard spend their wedding night at Falcon Crest, they are trapped in a house with no food, no phone, a murderer, and no way out, while Angela listens at every keyhole. A storm forces Angela to be the unwilling hostess for Maggie, Richard, Dan, Melissa, Vickie, Eric, Garth, Curtis and Sheriff Buckman. I order to keep the uninvited guests, Lance, Carly, Chao-Li and her mother occupied during their forced hibernation, Emma organizes a game of murder. However, when the game turns into reality at midnight, Richard is the prime suspect.

175. <7.20> Channing vs. Channing

After a court hearing with Judge Ambrose, Angela wins visitation rights to her grandson Michael, which infuriates Richard. Maggie receives reassuring cards from Vickie and Eric, which let her know that they are all right. When Lance finds an ally within the Justice Department to help pursue his investigation of Richard, he receives a warning that he may be in danger. Carly organizes a surprise party for herself and Angela. Angela finds out that Maggie has a drinking problem. Although Melissa's Uncle Frank saves her from disaster, he pays a price.

176. <7.21> False Faces

After Richard begins to realize the problems he and Maggie face, he seeks professional help. After Angela plants a spy in Maggie and Richard's house, she directs Carly to report on Melissa, and considers a suit for custody of Michael. Dan seeks financing for his trucking company, but refuses Angela's offer of a loan. When Lance and Kathryn travel to Africa in search of Remick, Lance learns that he is not getting the help that he expected from Kathryn. Richard adds a movie studio to his newspaper and television holdings.

179. <7.24> The Key to Angela

At Falcon Crest, the last codicil to Chase's will bequeaths to Melissa "the key" to Angela. Worried, Angela directs Lance to discover the secret to "the key", which she fears could lead to the destruction of her and her family. Maggie accepts Angela's invitation to stay at Falcon Crest until she can come to terms with her emotions about Richard. Carly discovers that Dan's mission to make money is more dangerous than she had realized. Richard is frustrated in his attempts to obtain Vickie and Eric's release from Switzerland. While Melissa makes a decision about Frank's operation, Richard may be in more trouble than he realizes.

180. <7.25> King's Gambit

When Richard tries to correct some mistakes and has difficulty making anyone believe him, Maggie is the only person who really trusts him and his story of his involvement with The Thirteen. After Richard and Maggie reaffirm their relationship, she returns with him to their home. As Eric has further business to discuss with Madame Malec, Vickie returns without him. Carly saves her brother's life. Angela plots to bring Lance and Melissa back together. Richard's inability to prove his innocence places him in trouble with the government.

183. <7.28> Last Dance

After Melissa and Lance are rescued from the cave, Richard informs Angela of Melissa's plans. After The Thirteen program Eric to assassinate Angela and Richard, Eric shoots Angela, wounding her. After a meeting with The Thirteen, Richard, on the condition that Maggie and his children are to be left alone, agrees to allow Eric to kill him. With the newly discovered deed, Melissa wrests Falcon Crest from Angela but loses Lance and Frank in the process. Several months later, Angela meets a bearded man in the shadows of a church and asks him, "Isn't it about time Maggie knew you were still alive?"

184. <8.01> Changing Times

As Maggie is haunted by nightmares over her husband Richard's death, Angela surprises her friends and family with her calm resignation over losing control of the winery empire, while Melissa mercilessly wields her newfound power over everyone within her domain, down to the field hands and household help. As Maggie must take control over Richard's vast financial empire, she tries to cope with the agony of his murder by the underground group, The Thirteen. After leaving years ago after a dispute with her family, Pilar Ortega, not only the daughter of the vineyard foreman at Falcon Crest but also now a bank vice president, returns and provokes intense curiosity throughout the valley.