On the first episode of the fourth season it is revealed that Edie didn't intend to actually die, she had knocked over the chair which was keeping her up and held onto the bar above, and waited until Carlos would arrive. When he does to collect his stuff Edie lets go of the pole and starts to hang. Just then Karen asks to speak to Carlos about the garbage and while he goes to talk to her Edie is upstairs hanging, and Karen notices it from the window and Carlos runs up to save her. Edie survives and uses this as an excuse for Carlos to stay with her and when she returns to the street she is welcomed back by Gabrielle, Susan, Bree and Lynette and soon she learns about Carlos' secret bank account and she secretly uses it against him saying he knows he can trust her and she knows she can trust him, while Carlos is having an affair with his ex-wife Gabrielle. She says, "You can trust me with your secrets, just as I can trust you not to hurt me." She uses her recent suicide attempt to guilt and trick Carlos into staying with her, and he desperately tries to be with Gabrielle. In the second episode of the fourth season "Smiles of a Summer Night" Edie pushes Carlos too far such as blackmailing him a bit further and even asking him to marry him and says to him that if he was to say no she would let it slip about his illegal bank account, Carlos says yes however at the end of the episode it's revealed that Carlos is paying someone to stop Edie from runining his life. Most likely paying someone to kill her. After the loss of the baby, Carlos managed an early parole by seeking aid from a program designed for Catholic inmates. Through the program, Carlos made the acquaintance of a nun by the name of Sister Mary Bernard, who has inspired him to live a more religious life. This invoked the jealousy of Gabrielle, because the Sister is "a knockout", by Gabrielle's admission, and also because she seems to be convincing Carlos to resent Gabrielle. Sister Mary had invited Carlos to accompany her to Botswana, and he accepted at first. When he went to the doctor for his physical examination and vaccinations in preparation for the trip, he left Gabrielle to finish the questionnaire for him, on which she neglected to mention his allergy to eggs, instead, telling the nurse that he was allergic to fish eggs (caviar). This resulted in Carlos becoming sick from an allergic reaction caused by one of the vaccines, forcing him to stay home with Gabrielle. In the season finale, Gabrielle believed Carlos to be dead but soon discovered he paid the gardener, Ralph to do his community service instead. Ralph was hit by a car. Gabrielle also discovered that Carlos was having an affair with the maid, Xiao-Mei (who was carrying Carlos's and Gabrielle's child).

In the third season opener, Gabrielle tells Carlos that she wants a divorce. At Bree & Orson's wedding party, Xiao-Mei's water breaks. The baby is born black and the doctor tells Carlos & Gabrielle that the wrong baby was put in Xiao-Mei. Carlos and Gabrielle do not get to have their child making their divorce easier. After battling things out with Gabrielle for a while, going through a nasty divorce, Carlos and Gabrielle, during the hostage situation, come to terms that they do not wish to be the rage-filled, vengeful, bitter, schemers that the divorce had turned them into, any longer. Carlos's attempt to stop scheming clearly had limited success. Carlos moved in with Mike Delfino, claiming to have been his best friend before Mike was hit by Orson Hodge. Although it is possible that Carlos and Mike were close before the accident, there was not much evidence of this in the first two seasons, and taking advantage of Mike's amnesia would be perfectly consistent with Carlos's past actions. He has also began dating again although he and Gaby still have strong feelings for each other. Carlos tells Gaby that he's right across the street if she ever needs him.He later bonds with Travers McLain and then Edie Britt which reignites his need for children. Not long afterwards, Edie, having hit a dry spell in her love life, conspires with Travers to lure Carlos over to her house late in the evening so that Edie can make a move on him. Carlos judges Edie for using her son as "sex bait", and Edie gets upset by this. Later Carlos apologizes, saying he had no right to say it. Edie tells him that she's changed and strips in front of him, revealing her body's imperfections and showing a vulnerable side of her personality that she normally keeps hidden. When she's finished, Carlos hugs her, and later in the episode, Edie and Carlos are in bed together. Carlos and Edie awaken after having sex, both feeling awkward at how bad the sex was between them. Edie makes an excuse and tries to leave as early as she can. Later that day, Travers asks Edie if she was bad in bed, because he heard Carlos telling someone that on the phone. Edie confronts him and they reveal how bad they thought one another was, and they have sex for a second time. Things go worse and both Edie and Carlos have to go to the hospital when they sustain injuries. They agree to stay friends. Travers, Edie and Carlos spend the day together at the Zoo and when looking at pictures, they comment on how they look like a good family. They share an emotional moment together and Carlos kisses Edie, and they finally have good sex with each other, and their relationship hit a new level.

Carlos and Edie continue to have sexual relations but they fear being caught, and are nearly caught out by Mike. Edie uses her position as a realtor to use empty houses for their advantage. However, when Carlos reveals he doesn't want Gabby to find out, Edie is convinced he's still in love with her and puts an end to their relationship. Edie announces to Gabrielle at her engagement party that she's been dating Carlos, which doesn't go down too well. Gabby puts a smile on for the rest of the night but continues to be bothered about it underneath. She then confronts Edie and tells her she's not happy with it, but Edie refuses to stop seeing him. Gabrielle begins to put school girl tactics in motion to get back at her, and tells Lynette and Susan not to speak to her. Edie retaliates by inviting both Lynette and Susan to Travers's birthday party. Both think Gabrielle is out with Victor all day, so she won't find out, but they panic when they see her car pulling up by the party. She says if they don't leave the party their friendships are over, so Carlos takes action and carries Gabby out of the party. She tells him she's in love with Victor, but he reveals to her he and Edie will never turn into anything serious. Gabby realizes he's still in love with her.Edie's ex-husband, Charles, comes to pick up Travers. Edie tries to get shared custody of Travers when she suspects Carlos might be losing interest in their relationship. Charles learns about this and he and Edie get into an argument. Edie threatens to hire a lawyer so she can get full custody of Travers. Carlos learns of Edie's plan and tells her that she should think of what's best for Travers which is for him to stay with Charles and not have to go back and forth. He comforts her, saying that he will be there for her and Edie decides to call off her lawyer.

Edie becomes upset when Carlos laughs at the idea of them getting married, when suggested by Mike. Edie asks Carlos if they can move in together but Carlos rejects the idea, having already signing a lease with the owner of Mike's house, Lillian Simms, who's in a nursing home. In an attempt to undo this, Edie visits Lillian and lies about Carlos to get her to rip up the lease, which she does. Under the law she can change her mind within 72 hours of the agreement, Carlos is evicted and Edie offers him a place to stay. Carlos catches on to the fact she has had something to do with this, and she asks him why he won't commit to her. He reveals he's not in love with her, and she tells him she might be pregnant. The pregnancy test comes back negative, and Carlos finds himself disappointed. Finding a new way to keep Carlos, Edie suggests they try having a child even though they're not in love, and Carlos agrees. Edie, however, is still secretly taking her birth control. Carlos eventually finds the birth control and dumps Edie, which leads her to attempt suicide in the finale of season three.After finding out that Victor only married her to gain goodwill, Gaby kisses Carlos of the day of her wedding.

n the foruth season, Carlos goes home and catches Edie, which turns out she faked her sucide attempt and when she kicked over the stall which held her on the ground she held onto the bars above, and when Carlos arrives in the house to collect his things Edie lets go of the bar, and Carlos is stopped by going into the room by Karen who yells at him about the garbage. She then notices something on Edie's bedroom window and Carlos relaises it's Edie hanging and he runs up and saves her and she's taken to hospital. Carlos rings Gabrielle on her wedding night and tells her that they can't run away from Victor and Edie like they planned too earlier in the day when they kissed and Gabrielle is annoyed. Edie uses her sucide and her knowlegdge of Carlos' illegal doings with the bank to save money to get him to stay with her, however he wants to be with Gabrielle. In the second episode of the fourth season "Smiles of a Summer Night" Edie pushes Carlos too far such as blackmailing him a bit further and even asking him to marry him and says to him that if he was to say no she would let it slip about his illegal bank account, Carlos says yes however at the end of the episode it's revealed that Carlos is paying someone to stop Edie from runining his life. Most likely paying someone to kill her.

Susan sees new neighbor Mike Delfino as an opportunity to find a better life than the one she is living. Completely clumsy by nature, Susan, at one point was locked outside of her own house completely naked and wet in broad daylight after ex-husband Karl drove off with her towel caught in the car door; she had to cover herself with a plant pot as she made a mad dash for the back door, only to fall into a bush and be discovered by Mike, who managed to unlock her door. She also accidentally burnt Edie Britt's house down. Susan is naturally inquisitive and is perhaps the driving force behind the housewives' efforts to discover the truth about Mary Alice Young's suicide which hit her hard. She is particularly suspicious of Paul Young. She dislikes Zach Young and worries about the threat he poses to her daughter Julie Mayer, describing him as "rampage crazy" (whilst admitting that she herself is "adorable crazy"). Susan is also a neighborhood gossip and busy-body as she hires a private investigator to uncover the dark secrets of the Youngs and Mike Delfino with whom she ends up in a relationship anyway.

She also has a long-running competitiveness with Edie which was one of the key plot point of season 2. She is dumped by Mike after he discovers she sent Zach, Mike's natural son, away. She also discovers that she is the result of her mother's one night stand with the owner of a feed store. When she attempts to make contact with him and tell him who she is, he has a heart attack but survives. She later meets her stepmother and discovers her father to be a heavily cheating husband. Meanwhile her ex-husband tried to win her back by sabotaging all her relationships but dates Edie all the way. After she slept twice with her ex-husband Edie burns her house down as a revenge. This works as a trigger and she finally gets over Karl and is about to be asked in marriage by Mike Delfino when he suffers a hit and run by Orson Hodge and falls into a coma.

At the beginning of season 3, Susan claims that Mike can still wake up after 6 months of being in a coma as everyone says the opposite. In the hospital, Susan meets a man named Ian Hainsworth. She begins to go on dates him as Mike doesn't wake up. After they had sex, Mike Delfino wakes up out of his coma. He then rejects Susan because of all the lies Edie told him to get with him and she reunites with Ian, whom she had left after Mike woke up. She is also having trouble adjusting to her daughter being in a relationship with Austin McCann and she and Edie Britt soon catch him cheating on her with Danielle Van De Kamp. Although she is obviously still in love with Mike, she has agreed not to see him anymore so that Ian would do anything to get him out of prison. She slowly falls in love with Ian and he proposes to her. Problems become to surface as Ian gets more and more uncomfortable and tries to lock Mike out of Susan's life by playing her at a poker game (and winning). All of this leads Susan to believe he doesn't trust her, even more when Ian's mother has her sign a prenup which she dodges by blackmailing Ian's father, a crossdresser, with his secret.Nevertheless, despite his loss, his feelings for Susan continue to grow. He is constantly seen as a threat by Ian, especially after Mike saves Susan and him from their car, which was overturned in a lake. After a heated argument between Ian and Susan, she walks over to Mike's for consolation, and they share an intimate kiss. This renews Mike's belief in the possibility of winning her back, and so he continually forces his way into her and Ian's lives, even confessing to what occurred at the poker game. After learning about this, Susan sends both of them away and cancels her wedding with Ian. She would continue to ignore their advances (including having her daughter turn the two men away on one occasion), but admitted to a counselor that she was deeply in love with both men. She eventually decided to go through with her marriage to Ian and informed Mike. While Susan listened to what was essentially a voicemail Dear John Letter, however, Ian called off their engagement and decided to return to England. He did this citing that Susan was in love with him, but that she was more in love with Mike. As she was being left by Ian, Mike moved away from Wisteria Lane in the middle of the night leaving Susan alone.Mike is on a camping trip, so Susan goes to the woods to find him. On the way Susan complains to her wilderness guide, Toni about her complicated love life, and Toni tells her that she doesn't think Susan can handle a permanent relationship because she invites in too much drama. Susan decides to sneak off while Toni is sleeping and try to find Mike on her own. Back at the campground, the one hiker is reported lost, and Mike recognizes Susan from her description. Susan leaves a message on Mike's cell phone promising him that if he takes her back that she will not make their relationship dramatic and they will be a normal couple. In the morning, Mike finds Susan and picks her up and they kiss.Mike and Susan go out to dinner, the night exactly a year after he and Susan were meant to get engaged and Mike got ran over. Susan waits for Mike to pop the question all night, but Susans disappointed when he doesn't. On the way home, Susan tells Mike what she expected and when they pull up into Wisteria Lane the trailer Susan decorated on the night they intended to get engaged was waiting on her driveway. They live the experience they were meant to have that night and they get engaged. Susan calls around, telling everybody the wedding is back on, and that she plans to have the same arrangements as with her and Ians wedding. She tells Gabby of their plans but Gabby tells her she's now booked her own wedding for that day. Susan learns shes taken the exact wedding she and Ian were supposed to have, which leads to an argument. They apologise to each other and Gabby cancels the flowers but eventually Susan gives Gabby the wedding date. Realising how many sacrifices Mike makes to give her the perfect wedding, she tricks him into having a quickie wedding in the woods in the middle of the night. It is a very small wedding, as the only guest is Julie, yet Susan states it is perfect as Mike is all she needed.

Susan and Mike had just gotten married and Susan starts to wonder if Mike is happy. When asked if he was happy he firmly said that he was the happiest man in the world. Later the same day Susan notices a moving van parked outside. When she goes outside she quickly realises that her new neighbors were her old friend Katherine Mayfair and her daughter Dylan. After all the other ladies met Katherine she invites them inside for lemonade. After Katherine told Bree to cut down her Pine tree Bree got mad. Susan quickly took notice and just sat there. When Susan goes to the gynecologist's office she is suprised to find out that her doctor for the day is her new neighbor Adam. With Adams head buried in her crotch she felt embarrased. He later apologized for the awkwardness that she had felt. At the end of the first episode it is revealed that Susan is pregnant. In the second episode of Season 4 "Smiles of a Summer Night" Julie asks Susan if she can go to a party, however Mike tells her he'd rather her not go due to the fact he's seen some crazy parties in the house where Julie was going too even though Susan had given Julie permission to go to the party she sided with Mike and Julie was banned. However Susan decided to go behind Mike's back and tell Julie she just wanted Mike to feel as if he was part of the decision making process and she allowed Julie to attend the party. Later that night Mike tells Susan he drove past the house earlier on and saw things like girls running around topless, people staggering around drunk and music blaring. Susan said she needed to run to the store and she went to the party to pick up Julie however some boys at the party mistaked her for a stripper but she told them she was pregnant and she took Julie and Dylan who was with her home. Mike later found out and he told Susan that he respects her decisions on how to raise Julie how she wants as it's her child.

Gabrielle, a retired model in her late 20's, married Carlos Solis for money but found satisfaction with John Rowland, her teenage gardener. She questions her relationship with Carlos, commenting once that she loved him and all her teenage fantasies had been fulfilled, yet she still wasn't happy. Gabrielle absolutely despises Carlos' mother, Juanita.The families of Gabrielle and Carlos Solis are from the Mexican city of Guadalajara.Towards the end of the season, Gabrielle learned that she was pregnant, as a result of her husband replacing her birth control pills with sugar pills (it is implied that John is the biological father, as Mary Alice speaks of the baby to come while Gabrielle and John are having sex; however, this is academic as the child did not survive). She almost left Carlos after finding out the truth about her birth control pills, but eventually decided to blackmail him into taking complete care of the baby in return for her testimony.

It was discovered that Gabrielle is Roman Catholic, and refuses to divorce Carlos because of her faith. This is simply a lie to cover for her desire to continue her quest for materialistic satisfaction, which Carlos could provide and for her status as being a wife. She lost the baby after being attacked when her house was broken into by Caleb Applewhite, the son of neighbor Betty Applewhite, who had been keeping him chained in her basement because she thought he had committed murder. Believing Gabrielle to be in pain from her loss, Carlos sent a former inmate, Hector Ramos, to help her deal with it. Through Hector, Gabrielle began to realize that she was more deeply affected by the loss of the baby than she would at first admit.Her most recent rival is Sister Mary Bernard, a pretty Catholic nun who has apparently caused Carlos to turn over a new leaf, and who Gabrielle fears will eventually persuade Carlos to end the marriage. When she heard that Sister Mary's group was short of the money it needed to send Sister Mary to Botswana as part of a relief effort, Gabrielle personally donated the money, just to ensure that Sister Mary would be out of the way (at least for a while), and lied to the doctors on the medical forms for Carlos' physical evaluation so that he would be forced to stay home with her. Gabrielle also invoked the jealousy of Lynette when she planted a supposedly "friendly" kiss on Tom at a party; Lynette got her revenge by making out with Carlos right in front of Gabrielle.Gabrielle and Carlos want to have a baby, but cannot since she cannot become pregnant again because of her miscarriage. They try adoption, but they find out that John Rowland's mother works for the adoption agency they go to, and as a measure of revenge for Gabby sleeping with John, she steps in and all but rips up the adoption papers in front of them, then tells them that every other adoption agency will know about them. As luck would have it, however, they have a chance to adopt pole-dancer Libby Collins' daughter (who Gabrielle names "Lily"). Libby changes her mind three times, ultimately taking Lily back; this left Gabrielle heartbroken.The Solises finally decide to make their new maid, Xiao-Mei, the surrogate mother of their baby. The in-vitro fertilization works and Xiao-Mei gets pregnant. In the second season finale, Gabrielle finds out that Carlos is cheating on her with Xiao-Mei. Following this, she surprisingly does not blow up at Carlos; instead, she orders that Xiao-Mei help her throw Carlos's belongings out of the hous

In the third season opener, Gaby and Carlos are said to be getting a divorce. At Bree's wedding party, Xiao-Mei's water breaks. Xiao-Mei's baby is born black and the doctor reveals that the wrong baby was put in Xiao-Mei, and therefore Gabrielle and Carlos will not have a child. Gaby also runs into John Rowland and has sex with him, but only this time John was cheating on his companion. John tells Gaby that he can't do this to his fiancee and leaves.When Gaby learns that a woman is trying to kill her husband for cheating on her and holding several people at a supermarket hostage, she tells Carlos that she can relate to that woman, and she tells him that they should end their bitterness towards each other before it gets worse. Carlos agrees. Carlos and Gabrielle get divorced, but are at peace with each other. When the divorce is settled, she changes her last name back to Marquez.After a visit from a member of the Lakeview Adventure Scouts, she decides to try to return to modeling. She meets up with her former agent and all seems to be well - until she gets to the shoot. She meets the new star, Tonya, and tries to bond by giving advice to her to no avail. She then finds out that she is to play the role of a mother in "typical" mother dress. She doesn't buy it and tries to make it work for her, even going so far as to dress up like Britney Spears and call herself "hot mom" or Tonya's "big sister". The photographer gets her agent on the phone, and she comes by the shoot and reads her the riot act, basically telling her that she can't just come back from 10 years of "playing house in the suburbs" and carry on like nothing had happened, and drops the bomb on her further by telling her that she had to pull special favors just to get her into the shoot she's in. She reluctantly finishes the shoot, then comes home, deciding to leave modeling for good. Gaby then starts mentoring young girls in pageantry and is very attracted to one of the girls' single father, Bill. They begin a short-lived romance, which ends when Gabrielle gets a stalker. She thinks that the stalker is Carlos which in turn makes her end the relationship because she feels she is not over her divorce. The stalker actually turns out to be Zach Young, who with his massive amounts of money, has been buying her expensive gifts. She ends up going on two dates with Zach, the first to meet her stalker, and the second to gain bail money to get Mike out of jail. After these dates are over, she makes it clear to Zach that she wants nothing more than friendship, but it doesn't seem that he thinks of it that way from his point of view.Gaby met mayor candidate Victor Lang and Victor was immediately attracted to Gaby. After a series of events, Victor managed to get Gabrielle to go to dinner with him. Although she said that there will never be anything between them, Victor promised that he will marry her. He proceeds to pursue her with the help of gifts but she only feels attracted to him when he tells her about the mistakes he made during his first marriage, admitting he is only human.After noticing how the females around look at Victor at his rally for mayor, she decides to have sex with him in the back of his limousine. After 24 hours of waiting for Victor to call, she makes him jealous at his rally by kissing another man. Later, when Gabrielle refuses to answer him after a number of calls, Victor visits her house and confesses his love for her.After spending the night together at Victor's house, Victor asks Gaby to marry him. She doesn't give him a straight answer but it remained obvious that she was still shaken up by her divorce from Carlos. After a violent press conference emerges from compromising photos of Victor and Gabrielle in an elevator, Gabrielle comes to Victor's rescue and accepts his proposal.

After Edie Britt announces to Gaby that she was dating Carlos, she put her schooled tactics to use and tells Lynette Scavo and Susan Mayer to stay away from her. But Edie gets revenge by inviting Lynette and Susan to Travers' birthday party. Gabrielle threatens to end her friendship with Lynette and Susan, but Carlos intervenes and throws her out of the party. After she tells him she's in love with Victor, Carlos reveals to her that his relationship with Edie will never change. After being given a parking ticket by a meter man, Gaby is told by her caterer that she won't have to pay for anything else if Victor Lang is elected mayor. Later she is arrested for kicking the meter man. Victor angrily scolds Gabrielle for making a big spectacle for his image as the newly elected mayor. After being shown Gaby's bruised wrist from her fight with the meter man, Victor hires two men to go and beat the meter man to a pulp.When Susan announces that Mike proposed to her and the wedding is back on she calls around, telling everybody the wedding is back on, and that she plans to have the same arrangements as with her and Ians wedding. She tells Gaby of their plans but Gabby tells her she's now booked her own wedding for that day. Susan learns shes taken the exact wedding she and Ian were supposed to have, which leads to an argument. They apologise to each other and Gaby cancels the flowers but leaves the same date. While talking, Gaby and Susan come up with the idea of sharing the wedding day, but the next day they realise they don't want to. To spare Gaby's feelings, she tells her Mike disapproves with the idea. When Gaby discusses it with Victor, shes shocked to learn the press will be at their wedding and that most of Victors efforts is all about his image. Gaby becomes worried that marrying Victor will be a mistake. She goes through with the wedding in the season finale, but shortly after the ceremony, she overhears Victor telling his father that Gaby is the best thing he's ever done for himself and would be good for the "Latino vote" in an upcoming election for governor. After the realization that she's just being used, Gaby suddenly finds Carlos in an unused room, where he apologises for ruining the wedding, and laments about the mistakes he made in the past. Gaby then kisses Carlos passionately.

In the fourth season it is revealed that Gabrielle and Carlos planned to run away together, however, Edie Britt's planned staged suicide attempt (she nearly ended up killing herself when her plan backfired and Carlos got distracted by Mrs. McClusky) stops Carlos from going through with running away. Guilty, Carlos says that Edie needs him right now and the two continue to have an affair. Edie later reveals to Carlos that she knows about his secret bank account and she tells him she can trust him as long as he doesn't hurt her, forcing Carlos to propose. Gabrielle later tells Victor how she feels like she's not his wife and more of a possession and she asks him if they could go away alone for two weeks and Victor looks through his diary and tells her that they can both go away during two weeks in April, which does not seem to please Gabrielle. In the second episode of Series Four Smiles of a Summer Night Lynette asks during her lunch if anyone would like to attend to her chemo seeing as she kicked Tom out for being too emotional, Bree, Susan and Katherine Mayfair all offer to do it however Gabrielle pretends to not hear the question and Lynette confronts her about it and Gabrielle gives in and decides to give with Lynette. However when she's there Gabrielle seems uncomfortable and awakard and she tells Lynette that she was five when her father died from cancer and that her mother asked her not to cry because her dad wanted Gabrielle to be smiling so she smiled all night even after he had died and she tells Lynette she's scared of losing her and Lynette promises her she won't.

Lynette used to be a high-powered advertising executive but now her husband Tom travels almost all the time and her ADHD afflicted boys and infant daughter are driving her crazy. It is as though she took a new job she thought she would love, and now she desperately misses her old one but she is so driven that she tries to apply the same go-getter methods she used at work to being a mom. And it doesn't always work. Worse, Tom seems to have no idea how harried she is. He's oblivious to her plight, and his cluelessness only fuels her frustration. Lynette is fearless and able to say it like it is. When the world's scariest stay-at-home mother, Maisy Gibbons, insists on a politically correct version of Little Red Riding Hood the impressionable Lynette gives Maisy a talking to, even offering to "throw down" outside. But Lynette, although a toughie, is also an intense overachiever, and in her frenzied attempt to get the costumes made on time, she winds up getting hooked on her sons' ADHD medication. The career woman who once had it all begins to unravel, realizing she's not cut out for the life she leads.

Strung out and exhausted, she hallucinates that Mary Alice is offering her a revolver. When she finally calms down, she admits to Bree and Susan, that she thinks she's a terrible mother. This admission itself only becomes more painful to Lynette when her friends confess that they too found motherhood challenging. For the first time Lynette realizes that no one has an easy time of motherhood, and she sobs to the girls, "We should tell each other this stuff."Seeking a solution to their problems, Tom and Lynette hire a nanny, but she turns out to be a little bit too attractive to keep around. Then, when Tom is offered a lucrative promotion that entails him traveling for work even more, Lynette finds a way to ensure that the offer is retracted. Nostalgic for her old days on the career path, she is ambivalent and frustrated with the challenges of what is supposed to be a placid, ideal life.

As she begins to see what's right for her family might not be right for her, Lynette displays mettle we haven't seen before. When Tom quits his job and decides to be a stay-at-home dad, Lynette is torn by her desire to return to work and anxiety about leaving her kids.In the ending of season two, Lynette thinks that Tom is having an affair with a woman living far away. She follows Tom and sees them hug and kiss. Lynette then leaves Tom and takes the kids with her. Tom finds her after their son broke his arm from jumping off of a balcony and proves that he did not cheat, but instead he has a daughter that he never knew about. Her name is Kayla and she is 11. He had a one night stand with a woman named Nora Huntington and Nora got pregnant, before he was with Lynette.

Not long after Lynette got to know about Kayla, she and Nora moved to Fairview to be closer to Tom. Nora's constant interfering in Lynette's life pretty soon had Lynette desperately trying to find a way to get rid of her. Lynette forbade Nora from talking to Tom after catching her trying to move in on him. In response, Nora stopped by their house to tell them that she was moving to Mexico and was taking Kayla with her. Lynette and Tom then decided on taking Nora to court to get legal custody over Kayla. Later in the day, however, plans changed when both Nora and Lynette found themselves on the wrong end of a hostage situation in a supermarket. During this situation, both Lynette and Nora got into an argument that caught the attention of Carolyn, the woman who was holding them hostage after trying to kill her own husband for having an affair. This resulted in Nora telling Carolyn that Lynette was trying to steal her child and Lynette countering in response telling her that Nora tried to steal her husband. This remark sent Carolyn over the edge, shooting Nora. Whilst Nora was drawing her last few breaths, she told Lynette to take good care of her daughter, Kayla. Nora's death sent Lynette into a rage, leading her to tell Carolyn that maybe she deserved to be cheated on. Carolyn drew her gun, aiming at Lynette to shoot her. Lynette's new neighbor Art Shephard threw a can at Carolyn's head while she was shooting, causing her to only shoot Lynette in the arm instead of the chest. Carolyn was shot by another one of the hostages. In all, leaving two dead (Carolyn and Nora) and two injured (Lynette and a supermarket employee). Afterwards, Lynette was hospitalized for her injuries.She is now struggling to get her stepdaughter to feel at home, though she overheard Kayla saying she would never love her. She was also upset when Kayla destroyed a doll, given to Lynette by her grandmother, as a peace offering. Recently, Lynette decided to quit her job and work with Tom at their pizzeria and helps celebrate with everyone when Ian and Susan announce they're getting married on the Pizzeria launch night.In "My Husband, the Pig" its Lynette and Tom's ninth anniversary and Tom has planned to do something special and a big surprise, Lynette says she doesn't want a surprise and just wants to have an early night and have a bath. Tom is quite upset by this but agrees with his wife's decision, he cancels the limo and carriage ride he had planned but the limo driver never got the message and picks Lynette up and calls Tom who is at a poker game with Ian, Orson, Mike and Carlos. The Limo driver tells him he dropped Lynette off two hours ago, Tom rushes there and finds Lynette freezing cold in her dress she gets into his car. They both celebrate their anniversary in a diner and drink to nine years and Lynette tells Tom she's loved every minute.Afterwards she has a disagreement with Tom over the color of the uniform at their pizza place because "orange means something bad is gonna happen". Indeed, Tom hurts his back and Lynette has to take care of the whole pizza place for at least 4 months. Meanwhile, Tom and Lynette's relationship continues to regress with the new manager, Rick, on the scene. He attempts to bring in new types of food and to change the menu at the pizza parlour. He cooks for Lynette's family at her home, and everyone seems to enjoy it including the children, even though it contains spinach. Despite Rick's cooking skills, Tom doesn't feel the need to change the menu. Lynette and Tom argue about this and despite Tom's decision, Lynette goes over his head and changes the menu. Kayla then finds a review of the pizzeria in the paper and reads the report on how they've become a much better place now they've changed the menu to Tom, who feels threatened and inferior by this. Lynette begins to have growing feelings for Rick and stays late at the restaurant every night. Tom and the kids come to the pizzeria to surprise her, where Kayla sees chemistry between Lynette and Rick. Kayla tells Tom she thinks Lynette likes Rick, and Tom suggests to Lynette he should come back to work and fire Rick, only to receive objections from Lynette. Tom becomes aware of the dangers of Lynette cheating.Scavo Pizzeria is robbed while Lynette's there. Lynette and Rick are stuck in the walk-in freezer, where they grow closer to each other. Later, while Tom, Lynette, Rick, and a security guard are looking through security tapes, Tom is unpleasantly shocked to find Lynette having dinner with Rick. Tom confronts Rick and tells him to quit working at the pizzeria because Tom and Lynette's marriage, will survive. Lynette realizes that she's in love with Rick. Lynette fires Rick and tells Tom that Rick quit his job to work somewhere else where they're offering him a better salary. Tom tells Lynette that he's coming back to work, as the doctor gave him permission to. In her bathroom, Lynette quietly cries to herself because she misses Rick.

Lynette and Toms marriage continues to decline and Lynette doesn't speak to Tom for five days. In an attempt to rebuild their marriage, Tom gets his old college friend and marriage councilor to try and speak to them without Lynette knowing, but she clocks on to Toms actions and becomes even more frustrated with him. With Toms doctor informing him on his back recovery, Tom suggests to Lynette they have sex as it's the only way they can communicate unless they talk instead. Lynette agrees to sex and refuses to talk but becomes violent with Tom, straddling him, tearing off his shirt and kissing him roughly. She says "I said I'd have sex, I didn't say I'd make love," as Tom gasps in pain. Then she begins to unbutton Tom's jeans, when he seizes her wrists, and asks why she's mad at him, and she reveals it's because he had lunch with Rick and because she had to fire him. Lynette then shoves Tom back onto the bed, hurting his back. Tom's back spasms and he moves suddenly causing Lynette to fall off the bed, banging her head on the side table. She goes to hospital for her injury and Tom finds out Lynette fell for Rick and misses him. The doctor performs a CAT scan on Lynette and finds swollen lymph nodes and suggests they do a biopsy as it could be Lymphoma.

In the season finale Getting Married Today, Lynette informs her sister Lucy during a telephone conversation that she has been diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma and also informs her that they are having money troubles. Lucy, however, is unable to help as her husband Dave just lost his job and doesn't have the $10,000 to lend. To get the money they need, Tom arranges for Lynette's mother, Stella Wingfield, to lend them the money---much to Lynette's chagrin. It was explained that Stella is a breast cancer survivor and that they are not on the best of terms with one another because of Stella's actions and implies that they were mistreated as children (as well as that Lynette essentially raised her own two sisters because of Stella's ways). Lynette also blames her mother for driving away her beloved stepfather, Glen. At the end of the episode, after her mother learns about Rick from Kayla, Lynette realizes that she and Stella are going to have to learn to live with one another as she will need help to manage her family while undergoing chemotherapy treatments for the cancer.

In the fourth series, Lynette is now bald due to her cancer and has resorted to wearing wigs. Lynette has opted not to tell her children, friends nor anyone except Tom and her mother that she has cancer. A woman from Parker's school pesters Lynette about getting decorations done for the Gala/Ball, which is Lynette's responsibility. After finally realizing that Lynette cannot handle the same responsibilities as a cancer-free parent and after being bothered about the gala enough, Lynette takes off her wig and explains that she has cancer and the woman says she'll ask someone else and walks away shocked. Bree, Susan and Gabrielle notice her bald and Lynette tells them about her cancer and all four of them decide to no longer keep secrets from each other. Katherine Mayfair, Bree, Susan and Gabrielle run Lynette a lunch and Lynette tells them she kicked Tom out of her chemo sessions for being too emotional and she asks if anyone would like to join her everyone but Gabrielle offers to do it and Lynette confronts her about it later on and Gabrielle tells her that she doesen't like hospitals but gives in and decides to go with Lynette. During the sessions however Gabrielle is awkard and uncomfortable and always trying to leave the room with excuses however Lynette asks her about it and Gabrielle tells her about her father dying from cancer and how she's scared of losing Lynette from it and Lynette promises her she won't.