Jessica stops by the house of a friend, Lloyd Marcus, to review a manuscript. However, the murder of Lloyd's daughter Julia shatters the planned tranquil evening. At first all the clues point to a robbery gone wrong, then to matrimonial homicide. Jessica digs through the frames of the murder to find the real killer.
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- Cry into Chest: The camera closes on a shot of Sabrina crying on Jessica's shoulder.
- Frame-Up: A double example; Lloyd came upon his daughter's body, after she is apparently murdered by a local art thief, rearranges the scene to frame his son-in-law. Turns out his son-in-law was the murderer, and he was attempting to frame the art thief so he could claim the insurance.
- Gentleman Thief: Binky is more or less this, proving quite affable even when caught.
- Gold Digger: Lloyd suspects his daughter's husband Donald of ulterior reasons for marrying her, claiming that he lost interest in her sister Sabrina when she found out Julia had most of the money. This suspicion motivates him to frame Donald for Julia's murder, not being able to bear the thought of the man walking away with a million dollars in life insurance after marrying his daughter for ulterior motives and making her miserable.
- Graceful Loser: Two examples of this, when Binky is caught as the art thief, he shows no anger at being caught and graciously hands over the paitnings he stole. A much darker example comes at the end, when Donald is finally revealed as his wife's murderer. Even when Sabrina still shows disbelief at his guilt, he accepts his fate and admits that his wife's murder was a million dollar crap shoot that he lost, even asking the police chief to take him to headquarters.
- Gratuitous French: When talking to Jessica about the case, the mayor's wife says, "Cherchez la femme."note Ironically, both the art thief and the killer are men.
- Henpecked Husband: The Cedar Heights police chief's wife is on him to try and get a job as a plumber so he doesn't have any more late night calls (having already endured 17 years of them while he was a cop in New York). When Jessica points out that plumbers also get late night calls, he says that those late night calls earn 24 bucks an hour.
- Idle Rich: Binky Holborn, the droll young rich man Jessica meets, never seems to work a day in his life, yet the receptionist at the golf club tells Jessica that he's always prompt in his payments, unusually so for such a person. This, combined with his frequent trips to England, allows Jessica to figure out he's the art thief.
- I Have This Friend: Lloyd asks Jessica to look over a manuscript he claims came from a friend of his in Tibet, but from the slips he makes, it's pretty clear he's talking about himself.
- I Never Said It Was Poison: The closing accusation points out that Donald said too much in two fatal instances.
- Donald says he couldn't have been the killer because he was out with another woman when Julia was killed, citing the smashed clock as evidence. However, the police chief points out that he had already put the clock in an evidence bag when Donald came into the house. He wouldn't have known about it unless he had smashed it.
- Donald suggested the chief look into where the pizza cutter found at the crime scene came from as a way of finding the killer. The police chief had never discussed the implements found there with anyone but Jessica and Lloyd, so the only way he could have known about it was if he had left it there to frame the art thief.
- Inheritance Murder: Played with; during the investigation, Lloyd calls his son-in-law Donald a gold digger. However, Julia's sister Sabrina tells Jessica that Lloyd forced Donald to sign a pre-nuptial agreement saying he'd get none of Julia's money. It turns out the motive was money, but it was the insurance policy, not the inheritance.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Lloyd belatedly realizes that his impulsive attempt to frame Donald for killing Julia meant that he might have wrecked any evidence that would point to her real killer.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Thinking that some random art thief murdered her daughter, Lloyd tries to frame-up his son-in-law for it by manipulating the crime scene and getting rid of vital evidence. Turns out he didn't need to do so anyway since 1) Jessica would've figured out the real killer anyways, and 2) his son-in-law really was the killer.
- Papa Wolf: Lloyd believed that Donald had married his daughter Julia for her money and made her miserable, coming to hate the man so damn much that when Lloyd found Julia's dead body the very first thing he thought of was planting evidence on his dead daughter's corpse to frame Donald for murder. Wow.
- Rightfor The Wrong Reasons: Inverted? Lloyd framed Donald for killing his daughter Julia because he thought Donald was a Gold Digger and hated him—without knowing that Donald really had killed Julia for the insurance.
- Stopped Clock: A clock in Julia's house is found broken, which initially clears Donald when he is found to have been having dinner at the time it reads. That was part of his plan, but Lloyd described Julia's fingers as stiff when he tried to set Donald up, which would mean she'd been dead at least a couple of hours before the clock said she'd been killed.
- The Sociopath: When reveled to be a gold digger after all, Donald drops his courteous act and becomes not just cops to the murder, but does so in an incredibly gloating, almost proud way. He makes it clear literally all he ever cared about was money, and coldly reveals to his victim's sister - who was in a Love Triangle with the two of them - that if she had been the one to marry him she could've just as easily been the one he killed instead without a care in the world.
- Til Murder Do Us Part: Lloyd frames his son-in-law for murdering Julia so that he can't collect the million-dollar life insurance policy on her. It turns out he really did kill her, and that was the motive.
- Worthy Opponent: Binky Holborn gracefully accepts being caught, saying he didn't expect the scam could last forever, and he says he's pleased a person like Jessica was the one to nab him in the end.
- True Art Is Incomprehensible: Lloyd tries to invoke this. When an art spill painting from his daughter's room appeared stolen, he took the one from his own house, hoping that it'd appear identical to the one in his daughter's home and prevent anyone from realizing that the painting had been "stolen". Jessica sees right through it.
