Two men try to track down their missing dog through an implanted GPS tracker. They track it to a building with a locked door where sounds of dogs ferociously growling are emanating. The men call the cops, who find blood, enter the premises and bust an illegal dog fighting operation.
One of the veterinary coroners calls Homicide because she found a human finger in one of the dogs’ stomach. ME Rodgers determines that the finger was a woman’s, probably in her late twenties to early thirties. And it was doused with chlorine. After searching a kennel in Ulster county and not finding any body, the detectives question Jay Carlin, the organizer of the dogfight. He then directs them to Marty Vance, one of the attendees of the dogfight, whose estranged wife Lauren is missing. She happens to have a bottle of nail polish the same color as the nail on the finger.
Everyone seems to believe Marty Vance killed his wife, but Marty goes on television with reporter Dawn Talley and offers a reward. The reporter who interviews Marty, first spins a tale about Lauren Vance’s alleged suicidal tendencies, and is then caught in a compromising position with Marty. Dawn is hauled in to a grand jury to testify, where she reveals the location of a “wooded area” near the kennel. A police search of the area turns up Lauren Vance’s body. Marty Vance is arrested for murder.
Cutter thinks he has all the evidence he needs. Marty Vance had a pool in his house, and thereby had chlorine to clean it. He had invested in real estate with Jay Carlin, and his estranged wife had suspected him of using investments into Jay Carlin’s wine business, to hide assets from her. But then, Cutter and Rubirosa realize that everything pointing to Vance, also points to Carlin. Except for chlorine.
After finding out that chlorine was once used to seal vintage wine bottles’ corks, Cutter and Rubirosa suspect that Carlin is counterfeiting expensive wine, by collecting the empty bottles of older wines, but filling them with cheap new stuff. A search of Carlin’s home turns up proof of his wine counterfeiting - and a sex tape of himself with the reporter.
Cutter calls Dawn to discuss her testimony and lets it slip that there are footprints in the kennel, supposedly left by whoever brought Lauren Vance’s body there. Later, the reporter and Carlin sneak into the kennel - where the police are waiting for them. They have Carlin on tape, not only knowing the combination to the lock on the kennel’s gate, but also fretting about leaving evidence of the body.
Carlin and Dawn are arrested and Marty Vance is released. The episode ends with Lupo taking the dog he just adopted for a walk.
Tropes identified here are
- Bait-and-Switch: The first part of the episode convinces the audience that Lauren was murdered by her husband. Then it turns out that she was actually killed by Carlin.
- Bluffing the Murderer: Cutter relies on Carlin’s desire to get rid of "evidence" to ensnare him at the scene of the murder. He also uses the reporter’s “zeal for a story” to ensure not only that the existence of the false “evidence” is passed on, but to catch her in the act of aiding and abetting Carlin too.
- Divorce Assets Conflict: Lauren Vance, the murder victim, suspected that her husband was hiding money in Carlin’s wine business, so she couldn’t obtain it in their divorce.
- Expensive Glass of Crap: Carlin sold cheap new wine as if it were high-quality expensive wine.
- Fanservice: Lara Flynn Boyle in a bikini, and then topless from the rear. And later on, a Side Boob and much later, in a Modesty Bedsheet.
- Femme Fatale: The reporter Dawn Talley certainly comes off as one. She sleeps with Vance, comes on to Cutter and was ultimately in cahoots with Jay Carlin.
- Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: A stolen pet exposes counterfeit wine and a murder comitted in order to prevent its exposure.
- No Ending: The episode doesn't show the trial of Carlin and Dawn, or its verdict.
- Patched Together from the Headlines: The Michael Vick dogfighting scandal, the Lisa Stebic murder and the behavior of TV reporter Amy Jacobson.
- She Knows Too Much: Lauren was murdered so she wouldn't report that Carlin was selling counterfeit wine.
- Slut-Shaming / Sarcasm Mode: Connie Rubirosa throws around the phrases “professional”, “profession”, “getting close to a source” and “practicing journalism” to imply that the reporter sleeps around.
- Till Murder Do Us Part: Subverted. At first it appears the murder was comitted by the husband, who was in the process of a divorce when his wife discovered he was hiding property from her. However, the episode does a Bait-and-Switch, and the actual murderer is Carlin.
