AU where Alex Drake wasn't in love with Toby Cavanaugh— she was in love with Aria Montgomery.

1

With a rapidly beating heart, Spencer sat there, chained to the bed in some... underground dungeon that was supposedly built by her evil twin sister Alex Drake. Alex was sitting across from her with a wicked smile plastered on her face. She laughed just as wickedly, smirking at Spencer as if she had gotten everything that she had wanted. And maybe this really was what Alex had been wanting— to trap her here forever and ever, keeping her like a prisoner for the rest of time.

She had already explained a few things: she, obviously, was Mary's other daughter, and was given up for "adoption" (really, she was sold to a wealthy couple in England). She lived over in England for quite a while, then she ran into somebody there who was familiar in Spencer's life: Wren Kingston. She then developed a relationship with Wren. He was quite eager to be with Alex— she was a wild carbon copy of Spencer Hastings (somebody who he had never really gotten over). Wren introduced her to Charlotte Drake, and they became inseparable. Wren and Alex became inseparable from Charlotte and her lover Archer Dunhill. They became a group, and Alex loved Charlotte so much. So, so much... Charlotte always told her tales of how horrible the Hastings family was.

That was why she was devastated when she heard the news that Charlotte Drake had been murdered. Charlotte insisted that she would return to England soon, and then boarded on a plane to the United States. The disappointing part was that she never returned. Alex never saw her again.

Then, Alex decided to come to the United States after hearing about Charlotte's death from Wren. She visited her grave, and bawled her eyes out. Honestly, she loved Charlotte more than she loved Wren. But Wren was a very loyal man, and he loved Alex deeply— so much that he would do absolutely anything for her. So, Alex used that to her advantage. She decided that she was going to make Spencer Hastings and her friends pay for making her lose Charlotte Drake. After convincing Wren to help her, and threatening Mona to do the same, Alex took on the game as A.D., torturing the girls as punishment for their hatred towards Charlotte, as well as forcing them to figure out who killed her. It worked in her favor: she got to torture the girls (who she hated) while getting them to find out the truth (which she wanted badly).

But as Alex watched the girls, she realized what she was missing out on. She didn't get the family and support that Spencer got, all by the luck of the draw. Instead, she was sent off to England. She had a family, but they didn't really love her. They didn't really care about her. But lucky Spencer had best friends that loved her unconditionally, forgave her for every mistake, stood by her side through thick and thin. And she had Toby, who had always been in love with her. She had so many people loving her. But Alex had nobody anymore. Her family didn't love her. Charlotte was dead. Archer was dead. There was Wren... but she wanted more than him. She wanted Spencer's life.

"So... if you got bored with Wren... where is he... now?" Spencer asked. She was afraid to get the answer, especially considering the twisted grin on Alex's face.

"I always keep him nearby," Alex responded, holding up her necklace. Spencer furrowed her eyebrows, unsure of what she was implying. Alex laughed again. "I turned him into diamond. I keep his ashes here."

Spencer brought a hand up to her mouth, shocked and disgusted. She felt her stomach churning. She didn't want it to be true. Sure, she never really had a real relationship with Wren, but how Alex had used him, killed him, and turned him into a diamond necklace was sickening and horrific.

"So, you want my friends? Is that it?" Spencer demanded.

Alex tilted her head to the side.

Spencer sighed. "...And Toby?"

Alex laughed loudly, hitting her hand against the wall to calm herself down.

"Can't you just leave him out of this?" Spencer begged.

Alex kicked her feet onto the ground, sitting up straight.

"Oh, Spencer... The thing is, I don't really want Toby. At least not anymore. I thought I did. He is quite handsome, and he certainly loves us a lot," she laughed. "I wanted him at first. I kissed him goodbye before he settled for Yvonne. I could see it in his eyes that he wasn't over us. The kiss was great, and I was planning on seducing his vulnerable self after Yvonne died. Lucky for you, I didn't. My plan was to be with him, but I fell in love with somebody else."

Spencer felt relieved that she wasn't planning on messing with Toby anymore, but she was still fearful. Alex was obviously going to mess with whoever this person she had unexpectedly fallen in love with was.

Alex could tell that Spencer wanted to know who this person was. Smirking, she got up from where she was sitting and exited the room. She locked the door before walking across. She pressed a few buttons, and the gray walls split, uncovering the large glass doors of another room, just like Spencer's. Inside of the room was... Ezra Fitz. He was laying there unconsciously, but she could recognize him. She swallowed hard. Alex had kidnapped Ezra and brought him here, too?

"You're in love with... Ezra?" Spencer inquired, surprised.

Alex rolled her eyes, laughing again. "No, no, no... not him. He's just a pawn in the game to get what I really want. He was an obstacle I had to eliminate."

Spencer started putting the pieces together. What Alex had just said could only mean one thing...

"You're in love with Aria," Spencer concluded, staring at Ezra's 'cell' with wide eyes.

God, she hoped that he was just unconscious and not dead, but she wasn't sure, considering the fact that Alex was trying to eliminate him completely, not just keep him prisoner.

"I always knew you were a smart girl," Alex said, tapping on the glass of Ezra's cell. She turned around, looking back at Spencer. "You should be relieved now, though. Toby's all yours... well, if you ever get out of here, that is. If you do, then... you're quite lucky, 'cause I've already seen it in his eyes. That boy's in love with you... or me. Oh, what could've been between us, if only I hadn't found somebody better."

Spencer furrowed her eyebrows. Alex loved Charlotte, her half-sister, and came to Rosewood to avenge her death. Somewhere along the way, she began to envy Spencer's lifestyle, and that was probably aided by the tales that Charlotte told Alex about the girls before her death. And during that time, she somehow went from obsessing over Toby to being in love with Aria. Spencer wasn't exactly sure of how everything fit together, but her primary concern at the moment was the fact that she and Ezra were locked up in this weird dungeon place, and Alex was about to go out into Rosewood and cause trouble... and she was setting her sights on Aria, because apparently, she was in love with her.

Kidnapping Ezra made sense then. Alex loved Aria, but Aria was going to get married to Ezra tomorrow. Alex wanted to disrupt the wedding by making sure it never happened. And surely that meant that Ezra was going to die by the end of this, if everything went Alex's way.

But Spencer couldn't let that happen. She had to find a way to get out of here. She wasn't going to let Aria lose Ezra.

"Where are you going?" Spencer asked as Alex was preparing to leave, although Spencer already had an idea of where she was headed.

"Off to see Aria the night before the wedding that's not going to ever happen!" Alex laughed. Suddenly, she shifted to an American accent, "They're all expecting me back there soon for the big sleepover."

Spencer pressed her lips together. "Fine, but... what makes you think that this is gonna work out? Aria loves Ezra. And you might love her... you might kill him... but what makes you think that she'll ever love you back?"

Alex tilted her head to the side with a smirk so large that it was scary.

"My lovely," she said in her British accent, "I already know that she does love me."

"What?" Spencer asked, confused.

Alex stepped over to Spencer's 'cell.'

6 MONTHS AGO

Aria was on her bed, searching for bridesmaids' dresses on her laptop. While she was staring intently at her screen, Alex climbed onto the bed, putting her hand on Aria's shoulder.

"Hey," Aria greeted. "I promise we'll sleep soon... Ezra's been nagging me to find the bridesmaids' dresses already." She turned to look at Alex. "What do you think of this one? I think you'd look so good in it, Spence."

"Sure... maybe," Alex shrugged her shoulders. She pressed her lips together. "Hey, Aria... are you sure you really wanna go through with this? Are you sure you really wanna marry him?"

Aria furrowed her eyebrows. "I mean... of course I want to. Where is this coming from? Why are you asking me this?"

"I don't know," Alex responded. She suddenly looked up, staring right into Aria's eyes. "Well, actually... I kinda do know."

Aria stared back at her, completely confused. Shockingly, Alex leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on Aria's lips. She made the first one gentle to ease her into this, not wanting to scare her away. Quite obviously, Aria was going to be confused. She was supposed to marry a man in six months, and now her best friend was asking her if she was sure about it and kissing her? Luckily, Aria didn't fight it. It took her a bit, but she ended up kissing back.

"Spence..." she breathed, unsure of what to do. "What about Toby? You were telling me that you still—"

"Shh," Alex smiled. "Toby's in Africa. I'll deal with that later. And I won't tell Ezra about this... or anyone. In fact, we don't ever have to talk about it again. I've just... I've wanted to do this for a long time, so can't we just do this once? It'll be our secret, I swear. You can still marry him if you want to."

Aria was still confused. Of course she loved Ezra. She had always loved him. They had a great, beautiful love story, and she intended to marry him all along. But her friendship with Spencer had always been special, too. She just never thought that it was possible for anything to happen between them, since both of them were supposedly straight. Plus, Spencer had recently been talking about the possibility of getting back together with Toby when he returned from doing charity work in Africa with Jason. It seemed out of the blue, but she couldn't help what she was feeling.

When Alex kissed her again, she gave in. With their lips still pressed together, Aria shut her laptop and pushed it off of the bed. She let Alex dominate, kissing her harder and harder, and pushing her back against the bed. Skillfully, Alex pulled her tank top over her head, revealing a sexy black bra underneath. Aria knew that she wouldn't be able to stop herself. Whether or not this meant anything, she was too attracted to Spencer in the moment to stop this.

PRESENT TIME

"Oh my God!" Spencer cried. "You slept with Aria, pretending to be me!?"

Alex grinned. "Relax, Spencer. I was going to do the same with Toby, but luckily for you, I started to fall for Aria way back. When I came back to town, I decided I needed to act on what I felt for her before it was too late... before she married Ezra with a clear head."

"Is that why you targeted Aria back when we were playing the game? Is that why you blackmailed her into working for you?" Spencer asked.

"I guess so. I loved playing with her... talking to her. Part of me was hoping that she wouldn't complete every task that I said, because then I could send that file and have Ezra shipped off to jail. But, this works, too. I'll just stop their wedding and kill him instead," Alex shrugged her shoulders, still smiling menacingly.

"Oh God..." Spencer muttered, running a hand through her bangs. She had no clue how she was going to escape from this place and save Ezra before crazy Alex returned and murdered him.

She also couldn't believe that Aria apparently had feelings for her. She wasn't sure what she was supposed to do with that information. But whether or not Aria still truly wanted to marry Ezra, she wasn't going to let Alex murder him. She needed to find out how to get out of here.

Maybe it was a good thing that Alex was running off right now to go pretend to be her, because it bought her time. While she was crawling into bed with the other girls the night before the wedding, Spencer had time to figure out how to escape. It was much better than Alex staying here and murdering Ezra first.

"We can chit-chat more later, my dear sister," Alex said, and started walking away from Spencer's cell again. She shifted back to her American accent. "I've got to get to the Lost Woods Resort before any of the girls start wondering where I am!"