Here goes....
1. Abby gets Jeff Cunningham out of her family's lives, KL. Bemoaning Abby's failings as a mother, Jeff took the kids for their regularly-scheduled visit and then....simply disappeared with them. She hit the lowest point of her life as her kids were missing and her brother Sid died unexpectedly. So Abby got into contact with Jeff, begged for his forgiveness, and convinced him that she wanted to reconcile. He still had feelings for her, so he ultimately agreed to re-marry her. When he showed up at the courthouse, he was greeted with papers forbidding him to ever contact their kids again, lest Abby have him arrested for kidnapping them. When Karen asked how she could do such a thing to the kids' father, she simply responded "He hurt me. Nobody gets away with that."
2. Karen and Gary lose Lotus Point, KL. Though Lotus Point had seen better days, the resort was still very important to owners Gary, Karen, and Abby. So when a Japanese company wanted to buy the place, Karen was especially resistant. After Abby managed to sway Gary toward selling out, it was revealed that Abby owned the "Japanese" company, and she planned to drill for oil underneath the property. By the time Gary and Karen discovered her deceit, Abby had gotten another step ahead of them. Since she would be sued into oblivion and end up in jail for defrauding her partners, she instead announced her plans to turn LP into a nature preserve. In the eyes of the press she looked like a heroine. Gary cracked that Abby "could make the Rape of Poland look like a Sunday-school picnic."
3. Paul Galveston gives the worst gift ever, KL. Paul was 'grooming' Gary in order to make Greg jealous. When Paul died and left Empire Valley to Gary, it looked like a giant middle finger to Greg, who became obsessed with getting the land back. Empire Valley was the site of a secret, satellite-eavesdropping facility (long story). Greg was even more obsessed with getting it back---but Gary was horrified and blew the facility up. Greg pouted and cursed his father's memory for handing the place over to Gary...only for the world to learn that the "valuable land" was a toxic waste dump--and it was leaking arsenic all over the place. So Paul had pulled a two-pronged trick on his son and Gary.
4. Claudia serves her special salad dressing, KL. Alex Barth was blackmailing her, so Claudia cooked him a special dinner to 'butter him up'. As he ate a healthy serving of salad, she told him a story from her days as an anthropologist where a tribal chieftain invited an enemy to a dinner as a truce gesture....when in fact, the chieftain had mixed a large amount of poisonous mushrooms (?) into the food he served to his rival. The gleeful way Claudia let the story unfold---and Alex's increasingly horrified facial expressions and eventual dash to the bathroom--was a highlight of Claudia's time on the show. She did not kill him, but she made it clear how easy it would be to do it.
5. Gary's Dead! Oh, wait..., KL. The Wolfbridge Group wanted Gary Ewing Enterprises to unfreeze their assets so construction could continue on their joint venture at Lotus Point. Since Gary was being so uncooperative, Mark St. Claire ordered Gary to be murdered, thus "his widow" Abby could un-freeze the assets. A shot rang out at the ranch; Cathy screamed; Mack called Karen to announce Gary had been murdered. Val saw a body wheeled away and practically miscarried in the driveway. We even saw brief shots of his funeral. We saw Gary in hiding (in jail) soon after, and learned that Ray Geary had been the accidental victim. The writing in this stage of the Wolfbridge saga was sufficiently suspenseful that it wasn't hard to believe they really would kill Gary off, though his being alive was a secret they could not keep very long.
Honorable mentions: Karen as Mata Hari, KL. The infamous JR Ewing showed up in Knots Landing intending to drill for oil right off the shoreline. Karen decided to take one for the team by cozying up to America's Favorite Womanizer, doing everything short of....that while Gary broke into JR's office to dig up the necessary dirt on his brother to stop the plans. Apparently there was something there because JR often asked about that mighty-fine Fairgate woman whenever he saw Gary.
Paige has to 'fess up about Peter, KL. Just as Abby and Olivia realized neither of them had killed Peter, Abby realized it had to be Paige. Paige had caused her a LOT of trouble by not coming forward (cue flashback of Abby dragging Peter's bloody corpse around town). So Abby casually mentions that "a witness" had come forward and was talking to the police...only telling this lie in front of Paige, who freaks out and confesses her role in Peter's death to Mack and the cops.
