What Happened To Cane On The Young And The Restless?

When Daniel Goddard was suddenly written off "The Young and the Restless" where he had played Cane Ashby since 2007, per IMDb, it was a shock to fans who had seen the character come a long way from when he first appeared in Genoa City. In fact, the character wasn't even thought to be Cane Ashby at the time. He had everyone believing he was really Philip Chancellor III (Thom Bierdz), Jill Foster Abbott's (Jess Walton's) presumed-dead son.

Goddard shocked as fans back in 2019 when he was handed his walking papers and Cane took off for parts unknown. Two years later, when Soaps.com asked if there was ever a possibility he could return to the soap, Goddard gave what can be considered both a straight answer and a cryptic one.

"That's a good question," he said. "I would very much entertain it. There would have to be some different circumstances based upon the way the whole thing came to an end, which is a chapter out of Eric Braeden or Jeanne Cooper's tell-all book."

Goddard is referring to the legendary actor who plays Victor Newman, who wrote "I'll Be Damned" the late star who played the iconic Katherine Chancellor, who wrote "Not Young, Still Restless," and their tell-all tomes that give away backstage soap drama that can rival what is seen on screen. What happened to Cane and why did he suddenly disappear from the canvas? And would it be easy for him to return?

It turned out Jill Foster Abbott's (Jess Walton) son really was alive after all these years. He just wasn't Cane Ashby. Instead, he was hired by Cane to impersonate Philip Chancellor III, but by the time all that information had come out, Cane had already impulsively married Amber Moore in Vegas, and just as impulsively ended the marriage. Then, he fell for the much younger Lily Winters (Christel Khalil) and she for him, per Soaps In Depth.

Cane and Lily did their best to resist their attraction to one another, especially considering she had just got out of a disastrous short-lived marriage with Daniel Romalotti (Michael Graziadei) — and because her father, Neil Winters (Kristoff St. John), didn't approve of their age difference. Still, they made love and Lily became pregnant, but she lost the baby.

However, Cane was named the father of Chloe Mitchell's unborn child just as Lily was about to accept Cane's proposal. Luckily, the truth came out that Billy Abbott (then played by Billy Miller) was the dad, per Soaps.com. Cane and Lily soon too the plunge themselves, and then the truth came out. The man Lily called Cane was indeed Cane Ashby and not Philip Chancellor after all.

Cane Ashby may have started their life together as a lie, but Cane was not about to let Lily Winters get away. He was also determined to be there for her when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Lily let Cane back into her life when she saw how much he truly loved her, so before her ovaries were removed, doctors saved some of her eggs and she and Cane were able to use their friend Mackenzie Browning (Kelly Kruger) as a surrogate and become parents to twins, Charlie and Mattie, per Soaps In Depth.

All seemed right in the world for Cane now. He was no longer harboring a big secret, he had a wife and two small children, and he had found a new life for himself in Genoa City. But it turned out he had more secrets in his life. It turned out Cane had been involved in some unusual illegal activity before moving to GC, and some of it involved his own father, conman Colin Atkinson (Tristan Rogers). Lily's life came crashing down around her when it appeared that Colin had shot his son dead, per Soaps.com.

Just as Cane Ashby had a twin son and daughter, Cane was also a twin, so when Lily thought she was going crazy and seeing ghosts, it turned out to be the real Cane because Colin Atkinson had shot Cane's twin Caleb and not Cane. While Lily was happy to see her husband alive and well, she didn't like that he decided he would impersonate Caleb to try to figure out what his manipulative father was really up to, so Lily divorced him, per Soaps In Depth.

Cane was able to finally bring down Colin Atkinson, but he had also married Jill Abbott by then, and the pair managed to escape the law and appear and disappear regularly as they traveled the world, per Soap Central. After that Cane and Lily decided to marry again and this time they thought it would be for keeps.

Just because Cane Ashby and Lily Winters were together again, it did not mean it would be smooth sailing. Lily wasn't happy with Cane when she learned he knew about the affair her adopted brother, Devon Hamilton (Bryton James), was having with their stepmother, Hilary Curtis (Mishael Morgan). Of course, she forgave Cane again, but when she thought she spotted him kissing Lauen Fenmore (Tracey E. Bregman), Lily hopped into bed with a man named Joe Clark (Scot Elrod), who proved to be a bit crazy. Cane rescued Lily and all was forgiven. Of course, Cane then had to have a one-night stand with a woman named Juliet Helton (Laur Allen) that resulted in a son named Sam. Juliet died in childbirth and Lily agreed to raise Sam, per Soaps.com.

Cane's marriage seemed to go along swimmingly for a while and his twin son and daughter even caught a case of SORAS (Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome) and were full-fledged teenagers with teenage problems. The entire Ashby clan was soon devastated when Lily was sent to prison for after taking her eye off the road while screaming at Hilary in her car, per Soaps In Depth. At this point, Hilary had divorced Neil Winters, married Devon, divorced Devon, and then became pregnant with his child, per Soap Central. Hilary and her unborn baby perished in the accident and Lily was held criminally liable.

While in prison, Lily Winters Ashby realized she did not want to be in such an on-again/off-again toxic marriage anymore when she was released from prison, so she divorced Cane Ashby and started life anew. As for Cane, he developed a crush on Traci Abbott (Beth Maitland) when she based a character in her spy novel on him, but Traci maintained they should just be friends, per Soaps In Depth.

Then, some strange things started happening when a fake version of Katherine Chancellor's will showed up and it said all of her money was left to Cane and not to her grandson, Devon Hamilton. Cane eventually learned his father was behind that scam and left town to retrieve Devon's money, which he did, as Colin wire it all back, per Soaps.com. However, that was also how "The Young and the Restless" wrote Daniel Goddard and Cane off the show, so it's now assumed that Cane is still out there traveling the world and might return one day.