Courtney came to town after she learned that her son, Neil, had cancer. She told everyone that Neil was Joe's son, but in actuality Frank was the father. A few months after hitting town, her ex, John Kanelos arrived, intent on kidnapping Neil. He was murdered before he could. In December 1998, Courtney flew to Greece with Joe after Neil was kidnapped by John's parents. Courtney/Joe ended up stuck on an island together.

She got involved with Frank in stealing Julie's money and also teamed up with Frank to break up Karen and Joe. They framed Joe to make it look like he was a sex addict. To fund their scheme and get easy money, they stole the money Julie Devlin had hidden away in a secret account. Courtney began dating Chris to find the money, and after a few months of constant manipulation on both sides, the relationship ended unhappily. Frank and Courtney's lies were exposed, with Joe never trusting Courtney again. Not too long after this, Neil's leukemia returned, leaving Courtney panicked as to whether Joe would find out he wasn't Neil's father because of bone marrow testing. He eventually did, exposing yet another of Courtney's ugly secrets.

Frank and Courtney, always chemically combustible, had sex to conceive a bone marrow donor. Unfortunately, she lost the baby in a tragic car accident with Karen. Neil recovered anyway, and Courtney subliminated her grief by returning to her money-hungry ways. She took money from Lucy in exchange for convincing Frank to sign away his rights to baby Christina. When Frank learned this he was infuriated. They still maintained some semblance of a relationship, but Courtney freaked out when she learned Joe may have had HIV. Also seeing a chance to wrest Neil away from Joe's affection, Courtney leaked to the papers and television that General Hospital had an HIV-positive doctor on staff, then revealed Joe's name. Frank, Gabriela, and Joe teamed up to expose her scheme. Courtney and Frank loved each other as much as they hated each other, but even he couldn't forgive this latest betrayal.

In early 2001 viewers were told that Courtney had moved to Europe to work for Coutness Wilhelmina cosmetics.