It wasn’t exactly the fairytale wedding of the century, but on the December 2 episode of General Hospital, Willow Tait (Katelyn MacMullen) went through with marrying Congressman Drew Cain (Cameron Mathison)…

the very man that she not only dumped at the altar earlier this year after learning of his sexual relationship with her mother, Nina (Cynthia Watros), but who she now stands accused of having shot

in the back! Soap Opera Digest checked in with Katelyn MacMullen for her take on Willow’s decision to say, “I do” to Mr. Wrong.

Forever Hold Your Peace?

When Drew popped the question to Willow again last week, MacMullen says, “I think at that point, Willow was kind of hoping that would happen. She’s out of prison, but she’s only out on bail. Her back is against the wall and she needs any hope that she’ll get through this. So I think she kind of wanted to latch on to Drew at that point.” Him re-proposing, she asserts, “was what she wanted, but it’s not that she wanted it because she genuinely wants [to be married to him]; she wanted it because she needed it!”

On the surface, the wedding is a success. Shooting it, the actress bubbles, “was just so fun. I thought the set was beautiful with all the flowers and everything, and I thought it was very intimate … but obviously, it was really complicated! Willow genuinely cares for Scout,” Drew’s daughter, “and meanwhile, she’s marrying Drew even though she doesn’t necessarily want to, but feels she needs to, and there were a lot of complicated feelings going on that were really fun to play with.”

Over the last several months, Willow has gotten in some good practice at holding her nose and convincing Drew that he has managed to get back into her good graces — but in the lead-up to the ceremony, Willow admitted to Nina that she’s not exactly marrying for the prospect of a romantic happily-ever-after. “I loved when Nina says, ‘Why are you doing this? You don’t love him,’ and Willow says, ‘I don’t have to love him, I love my children,’” MacMullen enthuses. “That’s when it’s really revealed that this isn’t a wedding based on love; it’s a tactic, it’s a strategy. I think Drew and Willow are both getting what they want and need, but it’s not out of real love.

I think this might be my fourth wedding as Willow,” MacMullen continues, “and it was fun to have another wedding where she’s playing with this secret — that she wasn’t doing it out of love for Drew, but she was doing it for love: the love of her children, and believing that this is going to bring her one step closer to being with them. That’s what Willow is fighting for.”

As determined as Willow is to regain access to Wiley and Amelia, the young ones she shares with her ex, Michael (Rory Gibson), Michael is just as determined to make sure that he not only retains full custody, but holds firm in his refusal to allow Willow visitation. And if Willow is to have any chance of seeing her kids again, she is first going to have to beat the charges of attempted murder stemming from her new husband’s shooting. “I think the optics are a plus, for sure,” MacMullen muses of becoming the wife of her alleged victim. “She is definitely thinking that it would potentially play better with a jury. But it’s definitely her belief at this point in time that there is no way she is going to get her kids back, or even stand a chance in a visitation hearing or a custody hearing, if she doesn’t have someone with power by her side.”

Points out MacMullen, “To even attend the visitation hearing, step one, she needs her freedom. And so there’s an element of keeping Drew as an ally because she doesn’t want him not to be an ally when she goes on trial. And then, if she gets past the trial, she wants to be allied with him again because he is someone who could possibly help her get her kids back. I don’t think she believes in the system enough, with everything she’s gone through, to believe that [the question of custody will be decided] fairly. She’s just kind of desperately clinging on to whatever or whoever she believes will help her get closer to her children.”

Desperate though she may be, the actress thinks there is a part of Willow that did almost back out. “I think she definitely had reservations,” she explains, “because I think she knows that when it comes to Drew, she’s kind of signing up for something really intense. You can’t marry someone like Drew without it becoming an all-in endeavor. I think she was having reservations before she walked down the aisle, but then it was like, ‘It’s already happening. There’s no backing out.’ And she can’t risk ruffling his feathers. She has too much on the line. She’s like, ‘I could go to prison, so what do I have to lose at this point? Either I lose all of my freedom, forever, and I never see my kids again, or I go through with this and possibly regain my freedom.’ She’s very much in a frame of mind where she feels like she has nothing left to lose.”

Given the dire circumstances she finds herself in, MacMullen thinks that Willow isn’t thinking about whether her marriage to Drew is truly a forever commitment. “He’s powerful and he cares about her, at least from what she’s witnessed,” the actress shrugs. “When she goes through with the wedding, I do think she’s probably thinking, ‘Okay, I’ll get my kids back and live with him for a little bit.’ She even says to Nina, ‘If I get my kids back, I’ll do whatever I have to,’ meaning live with him, be with him, whatever it takes. But since this is not something that she genuinely wants, she’s probably thinking, ‘Okay, we can get divorced later on.’ But even if it is a lifelong endeavor, at this point, she’s like, ‘That beats being in prison, never seeing my kids again, and losing all my freedom! If I have to live with this guy but I get my kids back, then that’s what I choose right now.’”

While the stakes couldn’t be higher for Willow, there was still room for some joshing behind the scenes during the filming of the wedding, particularly given that a glowering Michael was quite literally on the outside looking in, watching the ceremony through the window. “We definitely all had a little laugh at that,” MacMullen chuckles. “Rory killed it, of course, and there was a moment [when the cameras weren’t rolling] where were all like, ‘Oh, look, it’s Michael! He’s right there in the window over there. Michael, what are you doing?!’”

Back in the fictional world of Willow’s turmoil, though, there’s very little levity. Even with Lila’s engagement ring and Drew’s wedding band on her finger, and Drew and all of his high-powered connections at the ready to help her, Willow still doesn’t feel like regaining either her freedom or custody of Wiley and Amelia is a slam dunk. Sighs MacMullen, “I think she’s terrified that she might get convicted. There’s already been a case of a judge being paid off” — that would be the late Judge Heran, the judge in Willow and Michael’s original, highly nasty custody battle — “and she just doesn’t know what to expect. Her fate is in the hands of other people. It doesn’t matter if she’s innocent or not; she’s still afraid that the evidence could still point to her. People get put in jail all the time whether they did or didn’t do it! So of course she’s really freaked out over what could happen.”