CSI: Miami

The episode opens with the usual views of Miami accompanied by some up-beat music. A car is seen speeding along the highway. We go inside the car and suddenly things are anything but usual. Wolfe is screaming in panicked pain, a half-inch steel nail sticking out of his right eye socket. Delko is behind the wheel, trying to drive, call for help and keep Wolfe from pulling out the nail, all at the same time. Wolfe is about to go into shock. Delko tries his best to keep him focused.

The ER staff are waiting when they arrive at the hospital. Delko wants to go with Wolfe but they won't let him. Horatio is already there, wanting to know what happened. Delko tells him he doesn't know; he was a block away from the crime scene when Wolfe called for help on his radio. Delko never made it to the original crime scene. Horatio did. Five hours ago.

We go back five hours to when Horatio and Tripp first arrive at the crime scene. A woman, Brenda Hall, has been found dead in her ex-husband's bedroom-to-be. The house is being renovated. Brenda has four nails sticking out of her upper torso. Brenda's ex-husband Gary lives in the house with their children, Lukas and April, and with his fiancée Charlene. Tripp notes that Gary has moved on faster than Brenda from their 18 year long marriage. Divorce sucks. Horatio quips that it's a killer.

As Brenda's body is being removed Horatio talks to Gary, who stresses that he is innocent. He doesn't know what she was doing there in the first place. The divorce was not amicable; Brenda was refusing to sign the divorce papers which prevented Gary and Charlene from getting married.

Calleigh is processing the crime scene and finds a nail gun. Wolfe walks in, right the nail gun's crosshair. Calleigh is surprised to see him and puts the nail gun down. Wasn't this his day off? Wolfe says it should be, since he's worked 12 days straight, but Delko has failed to show up so they called in Wolfe. He is clearly irritated, this isn't the first time he's been called him to do Delko's job. He finds burnt grass in the yard and gets a sample of it.

Horatio goes to Alexx who shows him an x-ray of the nails in Brenda's chest. It's clearly a crime of rage. One of the nails punctured an artery which led to her death. Alexx has also found bruises and scratches that are fresh. She gets samples from under Brenda's finger nails to find out who she had fought against. Stetler interrupts, wanting to talk to Horatio. While he was in New York he had to postpone a court appearence on a personal matter. Horatio is a suspect in a homicide investigation and Stetler wants to know what is going on. Horatio tells him that he tried to save his mother's life when she was being attacked, and ended up killing the attacker but failing to save his mother. He doesn't know why the New York D.A. is going after him over it and neither does Stetler.

Calleigh is at the firing range, trying to determine if the nail gun they found was the one that killed Brenda. Wolfe walks in and Calleigh turns around, inadvertently pointing the nail gun at his face. That's what he gets for sneaking up on her like that. She lets him give the nail gun a try and hands him a pair of protective glasses. Wolfe scoffs at the idea of them stopping a nail but puts them on and tries to fire the nail gun. It doesn't work. He turns the gun around and looks closer at the barrel, trying to figure out what's wrong. Calleigh takes the gun from him before he manages to depress the safety catch. Wolfe points out that with a safety catch like that you would have to press the nail gun against someone to shoot them, but the nails were sticking out of Brenda so they were airborn. This is not the nail gun used to kill her.

Calleigh and Wolfe get ready to return to the crime scene to look for the murder weapon when they run into Delko. Wolfe is annoyed that he doesn't arrive until now and says it must be nice to work on "Delko time". Delko is obviously annoyed too and says he had something he needed to take care of, but he's there now. Too little too late in Wolfe's opinion. Delko snarls that Wolfe can't even begin to understand what he's going through. Calleigh steps in and ends the fight before it can begin for real. Wolfe and Delko stare at each other before Wolfe leaves with Calleigh, accusing her of always taking Delko's side. She sighs and tells him Delko always claims she takes Wolfe's side.

At the Hall residence they have little luck finding a nail gun. Odd, since a construction site should have more than one. Wolfe checks the on-site office but doesn't find anything. They check the dumpster and find burned clothes. They are too small to belong to Brenda, they must belong to Charlene.

Wolfe talks to Charlene who confirms that the clothes are hers. Brenda burned them, along with everything else in her closet, two days ago. She told Charlene she didn't put Gary through law school so that he could fill Charlene's closet, and called her a whore. Charlene used to be Gary's secretary, and Brenda could not stand being dumped for her. Charlene tells Wolfe that the relationship between Gary and Brenda was over long before she entered the picture; all she had to do to "steal" him was to be a friend.

The DNA found under Brenda's finger nails belonged to a male. Horatio brings in Gary and gets a swab to see if the DNA is his. Gary admits that he saw Brenda the day before. Horatio remarks that Gary didn't exactly take the high road with his divorce, he cut her off financially and tied up every divorce lawyer in the city. Gary says he did that to get her to sign the divorce papers so Gary could marry Charlene. Once the papers were signed Brenda would get her money. He went over to her apartment the day before to get her to sign the papers. It got physical, but not like the CSI think. Brenda responded to his demands by initiating rough sex, which is why she had bruises, cuts and his DNA on her. Gary remarks that ex sex is the best kind, and if she had always been like that he probably wouldn't have left her. Horatio finds that disgusting and laments that there's no swab to confirm Gary is human.

Wolfe and Calleigh go to Brenda's apartment and find plenty of signs of struggle but none of sex. Calleigh thinks Gary is lying; Wolfe however thinks he's telling the truth. They could have used a condom, and it wouldn't be the first time someone pushed things off the dinner table to get laid. The conversation makes Calleigh uncomfortable. Wolfe turns it back to safer topics by pointing out that there are no divorce papers there. Calleigh plays the message on the answering machine. It's Gary, telling Brenda that he's sick of all this and wants her to come over and settle it once and for all.

Wolfe talks to Gary and tells him they found no evidence of sex, only of fight, and that there are no divorce papers there. Gary says she flushed them down the toilet. Wolfe plays him the message they found. Gary admits he's said some crazy things to her on the machine, but at the time that call was made from his house he was not at home. He was with Lukas at his baseball game. Horatio returns to the scene of the crime and talks to Lukas. Lukas confirms that his dad was at the game, however he always leaves early.

Dan has digitalised the analog tape from the answering machine. He points out to Calleigh that there's a pop heard four times. Those pops appear on digital media when it plays an analog tape composed of different recordings. In other words, the threat from Gary is actually five different phone calls which someone has pieced together. Dan remarks that someone went to a lot of trouble to set Gary up.

Calleigh brings Charlene in, since she is the only person without an alibi. She thinks Charlene might have killed Brenda since she was afraid Gary might be getting back together with her. Charlene thinks that's ridiculous. Brenda had been pestering them for months, yelling at them from the street and throwing things at the windows. Charlene didn't kill Brenda, and the fact is anyone could have had access to their house with the renovation ongoing. She allows Calleigh to send someone over to test their phones for finger prints.

That someone is Wolfe. He gets the prints and scans them to send them over to the lab. The prints belong to Karl Lampley, one of the construction workers, who just happens to have a previous conviction for second degree murder. Wolfe decides to look inside Karl's trailer to see if he can find anything. He opens a cabinet and is startled by some blueprints falling out on him. He lets them lie and moves on to the restroom. He opens the door and a second later he is lying on the floor with a nail sticking out of his eye. In a moment of calm before the storm he reaches for his radio and calls for help. Delko is nearby and is shocked to hear the call.

With his gun drawn Delko rushes out to the construction site, calling out to Wolfe. He finds him in the trailer, fighting to keep it together. Delko decides they can't wait for the ambulance and gets him on his feet. He throws Wolfe's arm around his shoulder to help him walk. They hurry towards Delko's car as other policemen arrive. Delko tells them to secure the scene while he takes Wolfe to the hospital, and we're back where the episode began. The initial shock has worn off and Wolfe can't keep it together anymore.

Horatio is clearly upset with Delko for never showing up to work like he was supposed to. Delko claims they only tried calling him once before calling in Wolfe but that doesn't matter to Horatio. They only called Delko once because this has happened before and Horatio does not like it. The fact that Delko has a lot of things going on doesn't matter either; they all have lives outside work. But this is neither the time nor the place to discuss this further. Horatio leaves to question Karl, leaving Delko behind. He's obviously not wanted at the moment.

Horatio talks to Karl, and is in no mood to deal with crooks trying to wiggle their way out of guilt. They find a lot of money on Karl, money they assume was the fee for murdering Brenda. Horatio sends Delko to do the work nobody wants to do; process the scene where Wolfe was attacked.

At the hospital Alexx has come to sit with Wolfe. He tries to act like he doesn't need her there but she knows better and won't have it. She holds his hand as the doctor removes the nail. He is lucky; there's no brain damage and at the moment it seems as if the eye is fine. Wolfe isn't calmed much by that; it feels like the nail is still in there. Alexx assures him that it will only feel that way for a short moment. He gives her a smile, obviously comforted by her presence.

Delko finds the nail gun that shot Wolfe, and probably Brenda as well. He is filled with guilt that Wolfe is in the hospital because of him being absent so often. Tripp joins him and Delko tells him he's found some kind of adhesive on the nail gun. Tripp in return tells Delko that the nail gun was not there when they checked the trailer earlier. Someone put it there between the beginning of the investigation and Wolfe's attack. There is a cash wrapper from Miami Shores Savings in the trash can; it leads them back to Gary.

The cash wrapper came from the money Karl had on him, and it was withdrawn from Gary's account. However Gary didn't make the withdrawl, and Charlene doesn't have access to it. The only one except for Gary who can withdraw money from it is Lukas. Delko gets images from the security cameras at the bank, showing Lukas getting the money. He admits to having gotten the money, but he didn't give it to Karl. He gave it to his mother.

Delko and Horatio talk to Karl who admits that Brenda gave him the money to kill Gary. Karl was supposed to go in through the back door at nine, when Gary was alone at home. Only when Karl got there Gary wasn't home. Brenda was there however. She wanted him to kill her, not Gary. Her plan was for Karl to kill her and Gary to take the fall. That's why she engaged in rough sex with him; to get bruises and his DNA. Karl refused to play along and left.

In order to find the killer Horatio says they need all the evidence. Delko doesn't follow; what's missing? Horatio tells him that the visiting hours at the hospital end at eight. Delko should go visit Wolfe, and bring the nail back with him.

Outside the hospital Delko runs into a young woman, Marisol. He wants to know why she's there and she tells him she has a doctor's appointment. She didn't say anything that morning because she didn't want him to worry. She doesn't need Delko to go with her; he can't spend all his time with her. Calleigh walks out and spots the pair. She wonders who this woman is to Delko, and if she has any part in his common absensce lately. Marisol leaves and Calleigh walks up to him, but he doesn't want to tell her anything. She has gotten the nail already; once again someone has done Delko's job for him. She tells him that whatever he has going on with that girl he needs to do it on his own time before he loses his job and the respect of his co-workers.

Calleigh confirms that the nail gun Delko found was the one used to shoot both Wolfe and Brenda. Boa Vista comes in and asks about Wolfe, clearly worried. She has the results from the adhesive found on the gun. It comes from Lukas' baseball glove.

Horatio gets Lukas to tell him what happened. Lukas came home from his game and heard his mother talking to Karl about killing Gary. Lukas was shocked to hear his mother talk about killing his father. He picked up the nail gun and told her he would not let her kill him. She replied that if he didn't want that to happen he would have to kill her. She manipulated Lukas into shooting her with the nail gun.

That still leaves the problem of who shot Wolfe? Horatio has a hunch. He brings Charlene in and she admits that she shot Wolfe, and that she knows Lukas shot Brenda. She found the nail gun in his closet and wanted to protect him so she went to hide it in Karl's trailer, hoping nobody would find it once the contracters moved on to their next job. Only when she got there she heard someone coming and she rushed into the restroom to hide. When Wolfe opened the door she thought he was Karl and she shot him. When she realised her mistake she panicked and ran. Horatio has no sympathy for her. She left his CSI to die. She is going to jail.

Back at the hospital Wolfe is being released. Delko is waiting for him. He wants to give Wolfe a ride home, but Wolfe doesn't want any favors from him. He wants Delko to admit that his behaviour in the past couple of weeks is wrong. Delko admits that it's all his fault and he's sorry. No matter what he's going through he should have done his job and not left it to Wolfe. Since he's admitting his mistake Wolfe let's him off the hook, saying he should have been more careful and not gone in without his gun drawn and someone to back him up. Delko has made a lot of mistakes but that doesn't mean Wolfe can't make some of his own. He thanks Delko for the wild ride to the hospital. The two of them walk out to Delko's car, and Delko tells Wolfe not to make any more comments about "Delko time". Wolfe agrees to that and they make peace with each other.