A young woman (Emily) gets a knock on the door, and when she answers it's a man telling her he needs to charge up his phone for an important call. She tells him no, and he leaves. Upon hearing another knock at the door, she believes it's the same man and goes to tell him off only to be grabbed and chloroformed before being stuffed into a suitcase. As we see the kidnapper dragging the suitcase down the street, he walks by the cellphone man, who has managed to get a charge from a taxi driver.
Watson and Holmes are at a rehab meeting where Holmes has just finished recounting a tale about a case he solved. Watson is annoyed that he doesn't seem to be taking the meetings seriously, and upon returning to the brownstone heads up to her bedroom. Upon arriving, she notices there is an open suitcase on her bed, and then is surprised by a man in only a towel (which he is currently wearing around his shoulders) coming out of the shower. Sherlock offhandedly explains to her that he is Rhys Kinlan, Sherlock's former drug dealer who came to him for help. Kinlan shows them a video he received of his daughter being tied to a chair, with a distorted voice threatening to kill her if he does not receive 2.2 million dollars... The exact amount that Rhys admitted to stealing from the Cartel.
Sherlock deduces that the kidnapper had previously visited a Dominican nightclub, and upon investigating sees a man (Xande Diaz) and follows him into the bathroom. He tells Diaz he knows he is an undercover DEA Agent, based off how Diaz had positioned himself in front of a reflective surface to subtly observe the room, and also how all his tattoos are faded the same, meaning he got them at the same time. Diaz initially denies it, at which point Holmes threatens to out him to the gangsters seated in a private booth. Diaz promptly assaults Holmes on the dance floor, lying to the gangsters that Holmes had stolen his wallet. He then uses the cover of the fight to confirm to Holmes that he is an agent, and tells him the Dominicans didn't kidnap Emily.
After reading Emily's twitter feed, Holmes notices that she has been writing checks to her stepfather Derrick Hughes, a man who Kinlan says already has a lot of money. Upon investigating, they realize that Hughes lost all his money in the real estate crash of 2008 and is reduced to squatting in abandoned buildings - he's innocent.
Soon afterwards Holmes, Watson and Kinlan receive a threatening phone call demanding to know why Kinlan involved someone outside the situation, and sends the trio a box containing one of Emily's fingers. Holmes confirms the finger is Emily's, noticing it also has a burn mark from a radiator and leftover Ethiopian food under the nail. He attempts to narrow down the search to buildings within a certain distance of Ethiopian restaurants, but is stymied by the sheer number of possibilities. Frustrated by the lack of progress and fearing for his daughter's safety, Rhys goes out and brings back a baggie of cocaine and offers it to Holmes, saying that he feels Holmes is a "ghost" of who he used to be and cites a Locked Room Mystery that Holmes had effortlessly solved while high, saying he wants that Holmes back. Holmes promptly lashes out and throws Rhys into a chair, practically strangling the man before storming out when Watson breaks up the fight, returning later and saying that his father will loan them the money and that after the case is finished he never wants to see or hear from Rhys again.
The next day, while attempting to make the drop, Holmes notices a group of painters who upon spotting him start shouting "braggart" in Dominican and attempting to kill him. At the same time, Diaz arrives at the brownstone, bluffs his way in and takes Watson and Rhys hostage, revealing himself as the kidnapper. He calls Holmes and tells him that he has told the Dominicans chasing Holmes that he is from a rival gang and insinuates he will harm Watson and Rhys if Holmes doesn't follow his instructions. While they are talking, Rhys tells Watson that he has a pocketknife that he will use to cut the cords and let Joan escape while he takes out Diaz, but she ends up coming to his rescue and knocking out Diaz.
Diaz is arrested and confesses to the crime, and Emily and Rhys are reunited in hospital. Holmes is impressed by Watson's bravery, and tells her he wants to go to one of the rehab meetings to tell them the story.
Tropes:
- Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Rhys fully owns that his criminal ways are to blame for Emily being kidnapped and abused, which means he is shocked, in the best possible way, when she runs into his hospital room after her ordeal and hugs him, calling him "Daddy."
- Badass Boast: Holmes reflectively says that they have just over 48 hours to find Emily before the ransom is due... then calls that "luxury... twice the time I'll need."
- Berserk Button: When Rhys tempts Sherlock to take cocaine to help with the case, he throws him into a chair, prctically strangling him in rage for even suggesting such a thing.
- Bound and Gagged: Emily, while Rhys and Joan end up tied up as well with zip ties.
- Dirty Cop: Diaz (a DEA agent) is the bad guy.
- Dissonant Serenity: Watson remarks that Rhys seems remarkably "Zen" for a man whose daughter has been kidnapped. He smiles and says he wouldn't be, if he didn't have unshakeable faith in Sherlock's ability to find and save her.
- Finger in the Mail: This trope is played completely straight when Sherlock receives Emily's finger. He's actually able to find several clues about where she's being held from the food under the nail and the marks on the skin.
- Fingore: The above-mentioned finger also has a burn on it from a radiator that Emily had been chained to.
- The Gambling Addict: Rhys stole $2.2 million from his Dominican employers and disappeared with it. When Holmes asks him how much is left to pay Emily's ransom, he admits that "if drugs were [Holmes's] weakness, cards were mine", and he has maybe 2 grand left.
- Godzilla Threshold: With almost no time left before the ransom is due, Sherlock makes the ultimate sacrifice: he calls his father and asks him to loan Sherlock the money, in exchange for favors to be called in in the future.
- Hassle-Free Hotwire: Subverted when Holmes has a little trouble starting a van this way. Then again, he is escaping from an ambush while simultaneously talking on the phone with Watson, who's under attack at the same moment.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Rhys attempts this, cutting through his and Joan's restraints and urging her to flee while he takes on Diaz in an attempt to "do something right for once". While he gets shot twice, he ends up surviving (thanks to Joan knocking out the assailant).
- Higher Understanding Through Drugs: Played With. Rhys theorizes that drugs gave Holmes the extra "edge" he needed to be a great detective. Holmes doesn't contradict him, meaning he is wondering if Rhys might be right, but he gives a hard "no" when Rhys, growing desperate to save Emily, encourages him to imbibe cocaine to "get yourself together."
- Hostage Video: The kidnapper sends Rhys a video of Emily, Bound and Gagged and plainly terrified, with his ransom demand.
- Lawman Gone Bad: An undercover DEA agent who tries to make some money on the side by kidnapping the daughter of Holmes' old drug dealer.
- Naked People Are Funny: Watson is discombobulated to come home and see a strange duffel bag sitting on her bed, and even more discombobulated when Rhys emerges from the bathroom in a cloud of steam, wearing only a towel... draped around his neck.
- Race Against the Clock: When Rhys meets Holmes in New York, they have only a little over 48 hours to pay Emily's ransom.
- Gregson also tells Diaz that this is the only thing he has to trade, because Holmes has narrowed down the search area enough to make it certain that Emily will be found, but because Diaz cut her finger off and she needs to be found quickly, confessing to the kidnapping and giving up her location is his only chance to cut a deal.
- Rewatch Bonus: Diaz tells Holmes that the Dominicans didn't take Emily, which is true... Because he's the kidnapper. Also, the kidnapper's anger over Holmes doesn't initially make any sense - how would they have even known Holmes was involved? Simple, Diaz saw Holmes with Rhys in the club and Holmes threatened his cover (even if he wasn't aware then that Diaz was the kidnapper).
- Shout-Out: To the classic Sherlock Holmes canon, when Holmes refers Watson to a monograph he's written identifying 243 different types of tobacco ash.
- Title Drop: About five minutes into the episode Sherlock refers to Rhys as a trigger, and Joan gives us the Title Drop.
- Took a Level in Badass: Joan smacks Diaz upside the head with Angusnote , knocking him out and saving Rhys' life.
- Understatement: When Rhys identifies a Dominican man as the former capo for the U.K. branch of the gang:Watson: Is he the one you stole from?
Rhys: Well, technically, I stole from all of them, but yeah, he'd be pretty upset with me. - We Used to Be Friends: This is Holmes' reaction when his former drug dealer Rhys offers him some cocaine, believing that it'll help Holmes find Rhys' kidnapped daughter, citing a Locked Room Mystery that Holmes had solved within seconds after getting high (he also accused Holmes of not working at his best, saying he was a "shadow" of his former self).
