Hollyoaks reveals Ste Hay death fears in mysterious disappearance story

 "Anything could have happened!"

Hollyoaks star Gregory Finnegan has teased that his character James Nightingale's ex-husband Ste Hay could be dead after mysteriously disappearing without a trace while in a service station.

This week, following a devastating relapse, Ste made a mysterious phone call during a road trip and arranged to meet up with the caller. Then, while leaving the shopping centre to return to his friends, Ste suddenly vanishes, with the audience having no indication of where he's gone.

In episodes airing next week, suspicion about what happened to Ste will turn to James, with Ste's sister Leela Lomax leading an interrogation that puts James in the spotlight. However, when Ste's best friend Sienna Blake returns from prison, it's up to her and James to find out the truth behind Ste's vanishing.

Speaking exclusively to Inside Soap, Gregory confirmed that there are "big time" fears that Ste could be dead between James and Sienna.

With him, you never know," explains Gregory. "He was already on the edge, and James seemed to be pushing him over. He was making the wrong plays and trying to do nice things that just kept blowing up in his face. It’s pretty worrying, anything could have happened."

Ever since returning to the soap last year, Gregory's character James has been subject to much scrutiny from his fellow Hollyoaks villagers, due to the fact that he faked his death and didn't tell anyone the truth.

However, Gregory also reveals that things are set to get even worse for James.

"As ever, it’s going to get pretty dark before it gets better – and to be honest with you, right now, I have no hope," he teases. "It's looking pretty bad for James. There’s some really brilliant stuff. I hope for his sake that things pick up because the stuff that I’m filming currently, it’s not great…"