‘Bates Motel’ Season 3 Spoilers: Fan Favorite Character Returns In Episode 8 [RECAP]

Why does anyone live in White Pine Bay?! Season 3 of “Bates Motel” continued Monday night, introducing more problems for Norma Bates (Vera Farmiga) and anyone she gets involved with. The latest victim? Her poor psychiatrist/ lover, James (Joshua Leonard).

Town villain Bob Paris (Kevin Rahm) got his hands on innocent James in episode 8. With Norma holding the flash drive over his head, Bob needed some leverage – and with the help of a nail gun, he got just that. James squealed and told Bob everything.

But being the master manipulator that he is, Bob was still working Norma. He made a deal with her to insert a pool at the motel and he kept his word. However, Sheriff Romero (Nestor Carbonell) sensed that something was up with the abnormally deep hole that Bob’s workers started building. When he confronted his archenemy, Bob relayed everything that James spilled about Norma. Bob’s goal was to get Romero back on his side, but the White Pine Bay sheriff kept a straight face.

That straight face didn’t last long though. Romero immediately went to confront Norma about what he learned, but Norma wouldn’t tell him the truth. Although they’ve grown close, Romero left in a huff when he realized she was lying to him.

Throughout all that drama, Dylan (Max Thieriot) and Caleb (Kenny Johnson) left to go on Chick’s (Ryan Hurst) gun run. While on the road, Dylan placed a call to Emma (Olivia Cooke) to explain to her that he was leaving town for a couple days. He didn’t tell her that he was on the run to get money to help her – but there was some serious flirting involved. And that flirting led to a break up! After getting off the phone with Dylan, Emma approached Norman (Freddie Highmore) and told him that they should end things. She explained that she didn’t realize the “issues” he was dealing with, and that they were “never meant to be together that way.”

“It always seemed like you were with someone else even when you were with me,” she told him. And Norman didn’t fight it. After Emma promised him that they’d remain friends, Norman ran up to the house. But the break up did trigger something in him. He began to hallucinate that Juno, his stuffed dog, was alive.

Meanwhile, Dylan and Caleb ran into some issues while on their gun run. Turns out that Chick didn’t warn them about his “partners,” and those “partners” weren’t happy to find that Chick backed out of their meeting. After stripping Dylan and Caleb of their guns, Chick’s partners revealed that they didn’t plan on handing over the money. Instead they planned on sending Chick a “message” – by blowing out Dylan’s brains.

Fortunately for Dylan, Caleb had hidden a gun just incase they ran into a problem. They managed to shoot Chick’s partner and drive off before things turned deadly.

Episode 8 of “Bates Motel” concluded with Norma approaching James after never hearing back from him. She ended up catching him as he was fleeing town. He told her that he was tortured by men wanting to know all about Norma and that he told them everything. Before peeling out, he warned her to never contact him again.

Norma returned home and told Norman everything. After yelling at him that he was going to “kill” her, she promised to sort everything out. When she left, he began to hallucinate his mother. The strap of fake Norma’s dress was hanging off her, and Norman brushed the other one off. Realizing that he was touching her inappropriately, he yelled at her to get away from him. Running up the stairs of the basement, Norman began to hallucinate Juno again. Juno ran down the street and Norman ran after him. He eventually stopped when he found a car in the middle of the road. Standing in front of the car was a young brunette – Bradley (Nicola Peltz).