[8] EJ Wells, a famous European race car driver and entrepreneur, arrives in Salem and moves into the apartment across the hall from Sami Brady on 30 May 2006.

[9] The attraction between the handsome, charming Brit and Salem's resident bad girl is instantaneous and they quickly become good friends, despite her romantic relationship with Austin Reed at the time.

At the same time, EJ is revealed (to the audience) to be Patrick Lockhart's boss and the mastermind behind the so-called "gloved hand" crimes that have rocked Salem over the previous few months.

Sami learns that EJ is Stefano's son and that the police believe that he is behind the "black glove" crimes, which have been perpetrated upon members of her family, the Bradys.

On January 11, EJ turns on his father when he tells Sami, Marlena, Bo, and Hope that John is not dead but is being held by Stefano.

During this time, EJ, law degree in hand and with a renewed interest in turning over a new leaf, joins Mickey Horton's firm.

Due to a misunderstanding, Lucas is released from prison early and, despite having told Sami that she should move on, is livid when he discovers her in bed with EJ.

Sami, devastated by the death of the baby she believed was her biological daughter, lashes out at EJ, coming clean about hiding the pregnancy from him.

EJ and Sami find themselves on the same side when the details of the baby switch are revealed, and they discover that Nicole has had their biological daughter this entire time.

Rafe's sister, Arianna, gets a recording of Sami confessing to the shooting, but before she can bring it to EJ, she is killed by a hit-and-run driver.

The recording ends up with her fiancé, Brady Black, and found by Nicole, who blackmails Rafe and Sami with it so she can spend more time with Sydney.

She stole all of Stefano's liquid assets and went on the run with her three surviving children; also hoping to find EJ alive.

She brings him home, where he can be treated at the local hospital, and Sami agrees with his mother, Susan, that he needs to take a DNA test to make sure this was really EJ.

Sami comes back to town to find Nicole alive and married to her twin brother, Eric.

Later, after the rape scandal, we learn that Tripp was not Allie's rapist, but it was in fact his brother, Charlie Dale (son of Ava Vitali).

On September 25, Sami left town without her grandson and feels heartbroken but has to get back to EJ and take care of him.

One night, Sami confides in ex-husband Lucas Roberts that she is unhappy in her relationship with EJ, claiming he has been distant and thinks that he has fallen out of love with her.

Meanwhile, Kristen DiMera has been masquerading as Susan Banks after convincing her to switch places with her in Statesville so that she can keep tabs on then-boyfriend Brady Black's friendship with past lover Chloe Lane.

While being held captive in the tunnels underneath the DiMera mansion, Sami and Lucas fear for their lives and again turn to one another for comfort.

Sami then decides to first try calling her mother, Marlena Evans (possessed again by the Devil) and eventually gets ahold of Lucas and sends him her GPS location from the phone.

After it is revealed that Lucas was the one who was behind Sami’s kidnapping (a so-called “act of love”), he successfully frames EJ for the crime with the help of Chad by forging a paper trail of funds that had been sent to Jason through an account from DiMera Enterprises.

While most of Salem still believed that EJ was guilty of kidnapping Sami, only two people knew the truth: Kate Roberts and Chad DiMera.

When news breaks town that Abigail was murdered in the DiMera mansion the same night that Lucas got wasted, he fears that he did it and that that was how he ended up with his injury.

Devastated, Sami storms out of the church and rushes to the DiMera mansion to tell EJ that she was wrong about him while Lucas is escorted to the police station.

In a September 10, 2007 Soap Opera Weekly interview with Bryan Dattilo, portrayer of Days of our Lives' Lucas Roberts, the popularity and appeal of the EJ and Sami storyline was discussed.

[7]In an article about the Santo DiMera/Colleen Brady storyline in the July 17, 2007, edition of Soap Opera Digest, Days of our Lives former Co-Executive Producer Stephen Wyman referred to the December 29, 2006, incident between EJ and Sami as rape.

"[6] The article is about the Santo/Colleen storyline, in which the actors, Alison Sweeney and James Scott, portray two characters from the past falling in love.

Soap Opera Digest noted, "this story provides an opportunity for the actors to work together romantically in a less controversial tale.

If daytime's most famous couple [Luke and Laura from General Hospital] cannot escape the horror of the campus disco after 28 years, how could GL's and Days' non-couples hope to gloss over sexual assaults that aired just recently?

[16] She added that the "chemistry is a great thing", but that she did not believe it was enough to overcome the controversial scenes, even though a "unique formula" gave Luke and Laura a "free pass" to allow them to become one of the most popular supercouples on daytime television.