While driving home after a long day, Detective Bell is shot at and forced off the road. He isn't able to get a good look at the shooter, but he recognizes the car as belonging to a recently paroled drug lord who had previously vowed to get back at him. Sherlock helps Bell in what he believes will be an open-and-shut case, but things take a turn when the drug lord turns up dead and all evidence points to Bell as the number one suspect. Bell also struggles to reconnect with his brother, an ex-con who wants to use his underworld connections in order to help. Sherlock encourages Joan to learn self-defense, eventually admitting to her that he knows she is no longer his official sober companion. He offers to let her stay on as his partner.