The Lady Killer

The Lady Killer is the twelfth episode and the summer finale of Season 3 of Pretty Little Liars. It aired on August 28th 2012. The episode is referred to as "#thebetrAyal" by ABC Family during its promos.

​Synopsis
In the beginning, we see two bodies being loaded into the back of an ambulance, near a lighthouse. Behind the police barriers, Hanna is overcome with tears as Aria and Spencer hug her. Inside the barriers, a glazed-looking Emily is being questioned by the police. They ask her if she was a friend of the deceased, and Emily fails to give an answer.

Two days earlier, Aria, Spencer and Hanna discuss about how to tell Emily that Paige has Alison's body and is "A". Hanna asks then why would Paige drug herself, and Spencer says that it's the perfect alibi to cover up Paige drugging Emily on that night as well. They lure Emily to Hanna's house with promises of an apology for how they acted towards Paige.

However, when Emily arrives, they "hit her with the truth". They show her the earring from Ali's grave that they found in Paige's bag, but Emily says that A has planted things where they were before. She also suggests that the girls are lying to her: "When did it become so easy for you to lie to your friends?"

She leaves promptly, after saying, "Three to one. A wins." The girls realize that this is what A, or Paige, wants - to separate Emily from the girls and have her all to herself.

Aria tells Hanna about Wesley letting slip that Ezra had gotten a girl pregnant in high school. She says that the woman, Maggie, has a son, but the catch is that she didn't tell Ezra about it yet. Hanna tells Aria that Ali was wrong for once saying that secrets kept them together. "They tear us apart."

At school, Spencer and Paige are at their lockers. Spencer tells her that if she has something to say, "say it." Paige says she won't let the girls take Emily away from her, and that she will hurt Spencer if she comes between her and Emily. Spencer says "I know who you are." Paige slams her locker door shut with a smirk and walks away.

Paige is at Emily's house. Emily says to Paige that they don't know who she is. Emily then reveals to Paige that the girls are being tortured by a new A. Paige seems offended that the other girls think she is the new "A". Then, Paige gets a text from "A", telling her to go to Ali's grave at the Rosewood Cemetery at 10pm or Emily gets hurt.

At school, Aria, Spencer, and Hanna decide to tell their parents about Paige being "A." "A" sends them a text: "Stand down, bitches. Play it my way and Emily stays safe."

Mona, dressed as a nurse, flashes her ID card to the receptionist as she walks out of Radley Sanitarium, also holding some keys.

A sends an email to Spencer, Hanna and Aria telling them to meet him/her at Alison's grave at 10pm with Maya's bag, without Emily. They get pictures of Spencer, Aria, and Hanna with a shovel near the Rosewood Cemetery on "that night", from "A." They conclude that Paige is trying to make the rest of them look bad while keeping Emily in the clear, and that by them bringing Maya's bag to her at Ali's grave, Paige can erase any proof of her killing Maya. The girls hear a noise downstairs and when they look out the door they see a shadow. The door handle into Hanna's room turns, but it's only Caleb.

Hanna tells Caleb about "A's" text. He tells the girls that he is going with them.

Hanna calls Emily and she tells Hannah that she is going away with Nate that weekend to a place called the Lighthouse Rock Inn. Emily hangs up angry and her mom comes in.

Emily tells her mother that she is going out of town with Nate to avoid all the reporters hounding her about Garrett's trial. They are going to stay in a Lighthouse Rock Inn in Belmar. Her mother would rather have Emily stay home with family, but Emily says, "with Maya's family," and also mentions that Nate and Maya's parents will be there. Spencer and Hanna are okay with Emily going out of town, thinking that a little trip will be good for her. As Hanna leaves, Spencer looks at a flyer for a Halloween Ghost Train Party.

Toby surprises Spencer by coming back to town. They share a kiss and she apologizes.

Aria sits in Ezra's apartment. She seems on edge, wondering about how to tell Ezra about Maggie and her baby. Maggie unexpectedly shows up at his apartment, and recognizes Aria from her visit to her classroom. Ezra introduces them to each other. While Ezra is distracted at the door by another visitor, Aria asks Maggie why she's here at Ezra's.

Maggie says she wanted to see how Ezra was doing. She then wants Aria to keep her son, Malcolm, a secret from Ezra until she figures out what is the best thing to do for her son. Aria protests at first, but Maggie says that there is more to the story than she knows, and that everyone has a secret, "Amy." Aria reluctantly obliges as she watches Maggie and Ezra chat. Hanna finds out that Caleb plans on bringing a gun tonight. She tells him to get rid of it otherwise he can't come. He puts it away in a draw. Hanna says it "feels to easy" that Mona and Paige would just give up. We see Mona in black gloves and a black "A" hoodie. She receives a call from "A", and responds, "I'm here" and then "I understand." Toby and Spencer kiss and then have sex. Afterwards, they go downstairs and Toby says he didn't take the job to get away from Spencer. He says "I love you" and Spencer says it back. Toby leaves. Crying, Spencer calls Hannah and says she is "so ready for this to be over".

Mona goes to "A's" lair. She walks up to an "A" member, or possibly "A", who is sitting in a chair, and says,"Change of plans." Caleb takes the gun out of Hanna's drawer and puts it back in his backpack. Nate and Emily arrive at the inn. The three girls and Caleb go to Ali's grave. Caleb hides with the bag, but leaves the girls with a sound recorder in case of "A." At the Lighthouse Inn, Emily is woken up by a phone call from "A" (presumably) telling her, in a distorted voice: "You have one minute. Get out." She looks around for Nate, but she can't find him.

It is 10.40 and the girls are still waiting for "A" who is late. They call Nate and leave a message checking that him and Emily are safe. Caleb calls Hanna and says there is no car in sight.

Emily looks through Nate's bag and finds an envelope. He comes in the room and almost catches her. Nate says that his parents will arrive in a few hours. As he is depositing some wood into the fireplace, Emily sees yellow paint splatters on his boots. This rings a bell to her. Emily goes through her phone and looks at pictures of Maya at True North - one of the pictures shows Maya sitting on a picnic blanket, with a yellow paint-splattered boot opposite her. Emily realizes that Nate was the guy from True North that Maya had dated, and ultimately, her stalker.

Spencer finds two locations for the Lighthouse Rock Inn - one in Bayhead, one in Belmar. After no one arrives at the graveyard, Caleb gets in his car and tells the girls to get to Bayhead and find Emily while he goes to Belmar.

Emily heads out for fresh air, but Nate stops her. He gives her her jacket. Emily heads through the woods and tries to call the girls. However, she is stopped by Nate. She says that he scared her half to death, and he says, "Not really. But I will."

Nate and Emily are back in the inn. Nate makes Emily watch a video of Maya telling Emily that she was staying in Noel Kahn's cabin because her True North stalker had come to Rosewood. Maya says that their relationship will rekindle. Right behind her, Nate continually bangs a knife against a table.

As the video ends, he tells Emily that he had always loved Maya and that he was never her cousin. He's not who he claims to be - rather, his name is Lyndon James. He says that when he found Emily at The Brew talking about Maya, he was at a cross between hating her because Maya loved her, but loving her as well because he could connect to Maya through Emily.

The girls are driving and Hanna calls Caleb to see how far away he is. He says he is a couple of miles away from Belmar. He says he loves Hanna and she says it back. Aria says that the Inn is just up the hill.

Lyndon says that when he and Emily kissed, he thought that maybe he didn't have to hate Emily, but then Emily played him, like what Maya did. He tells Emily that since she took Maya from him, he will take Paige from her and he pulls a gagged, sobbing, Paige from the closet, knife in hand. Emily snatches her phone as Lyndon gets ready to kill Paige. However, he gets a distraction as he hears footsteps right outside the inn. Emily takes the opportunity to run out through the back.

Aria, Spencer and Hanna enter the cabin looking for Emily, but no one is there. They realize she is in Belmar where Caleb is headed.

Lyndon follows Emily all the way up into the lighthouse. Emily tries to call 911, but cannot answer as he fights her, knife in hand. In the struggle for the knife, she stabs him in the stomach. He falls to the floor.

Caleb shows up and leaves his gun on a shelf in the tower while comforting and hugging Emily. Suddenly, there is a gunshot and we see in later scenes that Caleb has been shot in the abdomen. Caleb's and Lyndon's bodies are loaded into an ambulance as a completely distraught Hanna sobs, with Spencer and Aria comforting her. The police confirm that Lyndon is dead, while questioning a traumatized Emily about Lyndon. "The deceased was a friend of yours?" Paige goes up to the police while Emily runs forth to the other girls. She says to the police that someone had sent her a text telling her to go to Alison's grave, but Nate had gotten her before she could get there.

Later, the four girls are in the hospital, waiting to hear further news about Caleb's condition. He is in surgery, and isn't dead. The girls see Garrett and Veronica Hastings walk in. Veronica walks over to the girls and apologizes for what Emily experienced. However, she says that thanks to Emily, Garrett is a free man. The girls get a five-way call from A, yet again in a distorted voice, saying: "Emily, I owe you one."

Emily looks up at Garrett, who smiles in return.

Near the end of the episode, a disappointed-sounding Mona, back in the nurse's outfit, is seen walking back to Radley with a black-hooded member of the A-Team. She says she would have stayed in Radley if she knew Nate was going to get Garrett out of jail. She says to the member that they need to get Maya's phone from Paige, and that it should be easy because Paige doesn't even know she has it.

With disappointment, Mona says "It sucks that we didn't get to make that phone call. Ring ring? 'What's Paige doing with Maya's cell phone? OMG, she must be the killer.' Oh, well. Even the best laid plans go awry." She says to the member, "I'll see you soon." She goes into the sanitarium. The "A-Team" member turns around, and it is revealed to be Toby. He jogs down the street and out of sight.

At the end of the episode, "A" is in the lair again. "A" looks at a flyer for a Halloween Ghost Train Party in Rosewood on October 31st, and calls someone. "I'll take two tickets for the Halloween train."

Trivia

 * This episode had many parallels to the movie Scream. (Which Lucy Hale had a cameo in the fourth sequel,)
 * Emily, Spencer, Hanna and Aria all get a phone call from their stalker A. On Scream, Sidney gets a phone call from Ghostface her stalker.
 * Spencer loses her virginity to Toby. On Scream, Sidney loses her virginity to Billy.
 * Nate kidnapped Paige as well as tied her up and put her in a closet. When Nate showed Paige to Emily, he had a weapon to her. In Scream, Stuart kidnapped Sidney's dad. He tied him up and put him in a closet. When Stuart took her dad out, he had a gun to his head.
 * Paige was suspected of being the villain, but almost ended up killed by the real villain, just like Sidney's father.
 * Spencer trusted Toby, but he turned evil on her. Sidney trusted Billy, but he turned evil and tried to kill her.
 * Spencer and Stuart both said Sharon Stone at one point.
 * The scenes with the girls watching as Caleb and "Nate" are loaded into ambulances resembled the final scene in Scream when Dewey is being carried away on a stretcher.
 * When Emily was woken by a phone call from "A." Sidney was asleep when Ghostface called her.

Title

 * The title will be a reference to the killer of Alison or Maya. It could mean that one or both of their killer's is a female. It also means that a female from the show will come close to dying.
 * It may also have something to do with "The Lady Killers" - a 1955 British black comedy film made by Ealing Studios. A gang of five diverse oddball criminal types rent a two room apartment in an isolated house on a London cul-de-sac from an octogenarian widow with three pet parrots. The group's mastermind, Professor Marcus, tells her a cover story that they are members of an amateur string quintet and would like to use the rooms to hone their musical skills. In reality, they are plotting to rob a bank and plan to use Mrs. Wilberforce's naiveté and her Victorian sensibilities to their advantage. When the gang set out to kill Mrs. Wilberforce, they run into one problem after another, and they get what they deserve. Professor Marcus and the group are killed and Mrs. Wilberforce never dies after all.

Main Cast
Troian Bellisario as Spencer Hastings

Ashley Benson as Hanna Marin

Lucy Hale as Aria Montgomery

Shay Mitchell as Emily Fields

Guest Stars
Bianca Lawson as Maya St. Germain

Janel Parrish as Mona Vanderwaal

Ian Harding as Ezra Fitz

Keegan Allen as Toby Cavanaugh

Tyler Blackburn as Caleb Rivers

Larisa Oleynik as Maggie

Lindsey Shaw as Paige McCullers

Yani Gellman as Garrett Reynolds

Sterling Sulieman as Nate St. Germain/Lyndon James

Lesley Fera as Veronica Hastings Noel Arthur as Police Officer #1

Featured Music

 * "Freaks" by The Hawk In Paris (Mona walks out of Radley Sanitarium dressed as a nurse)
 * "The Backpack Song" by Bear Attack (Emily packs for her trip with Nate)
 * "In My Veins" by Andrew Belle Ft. Erin McCarley (Toby and Spencer have sex)
 * "Highly Suspicious" by My Morning Jacket (Mona visits "A's" lair and tells him there's a change of plans)