The episode opens with a young girl being chased through the woods, captured, and carried away. The girl is Agent Lee’s daughter Amanda, who is being held hostage as leverage for Agent Lee’s cooperation in stealing top-secret military information.
Agent Lee, who we now know to be the mole inside NCIS, meets her contact in a coffee shop and passes him a flash drive. The team attempt to pursue him as he leaves, but Lee interferes, professing to be fearful for Amanda’s safety if her contact discovers he’s being tailed.
Tony and Ziva investigate the scene of the child’s abduction. They find a farmhouse nearby, and inside they find a child’s room, hidden behind a false wall. They also find a dead kidnapper and the child’s tally of days, marked with ketsup. Forensics from the farmhouse yields fingerprints that point to an identity that has been erased from the system, and a stray hair from an unknown woman.
Ducky profiles the blackmailer as a slow and deliberate man, planning ahead for change of seasons and change of plans, someone who won’t show is cards until he believes he has a winning hand.
Another day, another coffee shop drop. Gibbs apprehends the pickup guy, who identifies himself as a former NSA analyst who lost his security clearance for mishandling information. He says the blackmailer has been holding his wife hostage for over a year, sending him hair clippings as proof of life.
DNA results prove that the little girl is not Lee’s daughter. Lee admits that Amanda is her adopted sister, whom she has raised as her own daughter since the death of their parents.
To flush out the kidnapper/blackmailer, Gibbs wants to use the top-secret military plans, code-named Domino, as bait. Vance says no. Gibbs proceeds with a planned drop just as Vance discovers that the read Domino has been hacked and downloaded from McGee's workstation. As Gibbs monitors the operation in progress, Tony and Ziva investigate an address, where they find a high-tech Internet hub and the little girl, who has been sedated and wired into a self-destruct mechanism. Meanwhile, Gibb's operation goes sour....
This episode concludes this season's story arc and maintains a high level of tension throughout, culminating with a big bang at the end. Liza Lapira (as NCIS Special Agent Michelle Lee) does a fine job of keeping us guessing. Is she for real, or is she playing them? Should we feel sympathy for her on the loss of her daughter, or is the child even related to her at all?
The story moves quickly in this episode, with little time for character side stories. But there's something you've just got to love about NCIS: The writers are so very good at explaining things when they need to be explained, and explaining them in detail without boring the viewer to death. And the actors excel at making even the most technical of details sound conversational.
Tony’s movie references in this episode include North By Northwest and Raiders Of The Lost Ark. Did miss any? If so, let me know in the comments.