So, Taste Buds? Life Savers Apparently.

Two beat cops are patrolling a neighborhood late at night. The older of the two is grumbling against their new commander, feeling he is working such a late shift so the commander could keep an eye on him. But he stops his grumbling when he spots something. They turn on their huge spotlight, revealing a guy stuffing a woman in a trunk. They chase him down but as he goes over a fence, he impales himself.

Meanwhile, Mac is doing some late night shopping. As he walks around the store, he gets an uneasy feeling. You know that feeling you have when you feel you’re being watched or followed? But as you take in your surroundings, there is no way that’s possible? That’s how Mac feels. But in the cereal aisle, he runs into a familiar face—Ella, the young woman whose mother killed her father in the last episode I recapped prior to the Messer-Monroe Baby revelation. She and Mac talk and joke for a bit as Ella reveals her postcards of people’s secrets will be published as a book (One of my life’s goals). She invites him for breakfast but he gets called to the scene we just saw.

Danny and Flack meet him there as they try to figure out what happened. No signs of rape or defensive wounds. Mac tells them to take the bodies to Sid as dead woman vic gets a text message from a restricted number: Is it done yet? Her life? Yes. The episode? Not even.

CREDITS!

When we come back, the bodies are being moved while a really cool song plays. I always love the music this show gets. Meanwhile, Danny investigates the car the dead woman vic was being shoved into. He finds some blood and the car’s registration. Mac comes over to tell Danny Flack ran the plates but Danny interrupts to say the car’s owner is Isabelle Vaught. So dead woman vic has a name! She was an up-and-coming designer. Meanwhile the blood wasn’t really blood, but some sort of vegetation but Danny doesn’t know how it go there as it wasn’t on either dead body. Flack tries to get the number of our mysterious text messenger from the phone company. Mac figures it was a dump site and wonders where the primary scene is.

New York! Sid goes over dead male vic’s body as well as Isabelle’s. He pulls trace off one and finds acid in another. He calls Hawkes to come see Isabelle. Her organs melted and liquefied. Both vics had a strange dinner according to their stomach contents. Oh, and dead man’s name is Tony. Sid reveals Isabelle drank 18 oz (at least) of sodium hydroxide (commonly found in drainer cleaner). Hawkes realizes that it wasn’t accidental but it was forced on her. They are confused. Who dumps a suicide victim’s body?

Angel brings Stella to Declan Rooney, dead from a snapped neck and broken fingers. It reminds Stella of the Rat Fisherman’s death. He had disappeared but Angel figures he’s back. The security cameras are fake and something is missing from the store.

Meanwhile, Adam tells Danny that he found dung under Isabelle’s fingernails. Danny offers to buy Adam a drink if he gets more information, but Adam tells him to save his money since children are expensive. As his dad reminded him constantly. He then gives a type for Danny and Lindsay to combine incomes, but we all know how the marriage proposal went down. Lindsay walks by and says she felt the baby kick. Umm, was it just me or wasn’t she still in her first trimester LAST WEEK? Now, she’s noticeably pregnant and the baby’s kicking, but not when Danny’s around.

Hey, anyone know if Anna Belknap’s pregnant again and that’s why this storyline came up?

And food! Lindsay uses the pregnant excuse to get Mac to put a few berries in his mouth. From his face, it’s not pleasant but it is the trace Danny found in the car. It’s the miracle treat that I remember from the Graham Norton show. You have it and it’ll make bitter foods taste sweet—which may explain why Isabelle drank the drain cleaner so readily. So Isabelle was murdered but why?

Danny, Hawkes and Flack find the remains of the party and the miracle fruit. Flack gets a call and finds out our text messenger is Quincy Feeney. He and Mac ask her why she texted her boyfriend with the message. Quincy says she idolized Isabelle but Tony panicked when he found her dead in the apartment. They thought she had a fatal allergic reaction and he didn’t want some so famous dying in his apartment. Mac asks for her boots, finding a squished berry on her boot—matching the trace. She helped move the body. Quincy felt that Tony was too drunk to drive. The plan was to dump the body, dump the car and then go back to the city.

Back at the apartment, Danny and Hawkes pack away a meal they can’t believe people ate. They find a blood trail to the bathroom, finding blood all over the sink. She probably threw up as the cleaner went to work. Danny finds half empty Drain-o. They figure Tony spiked Isabelle’s drink while the party raged on.

New York! Ella is waiting in Mac’s office. She knows something about Isabelle’s murder. She brings up a card designed like Isabelle’s purse, flips it over, and it reads: “I want her dead.” Spooky.

Runway! Models show off Isabelle’s bags. They talk to Isabelle’s partner or soon to be ex-partner. Isabelle was suing her but the partner owned the label. They show a partner a picture of the card but it strikes a nerve, even though she designs knowing who made it. Meanwhile, Hawkes finds the Drain-o cocktail was made in the blender. But it wasn’t from the drain cleaner as the sodium hydroxide was pure. Time to find which guest had access to chemicals!

Sid talks to Mac and Stella about Declan’s murder. She figures the Greek assassin wanted something in the pawn shop. Sid finds some trace which she runs to process. She scans the silver as Danny comes in. It matches the coin from Indiana Jones and the Amulet of Rudy Giuliani. Stella figures there are more coins and the Greek Assassin is trying to locate all of them, killing the people who stand in his way.

You know what? Both my heritages have been the enemy on this show. I’m half-Greek and look, we have an evil Greek assassin. I’m also half-Irish and the Irish Mafia broke into the crime lab in the season 3 finale.

New York! Stella and Angel talk to some obnoxious parolee. He is Stan and he’s a counterfeiter. They want him to design some coins in exchange for Stan’s brother to be moved to a closer prison.

Hawkes goes through an electronic device. Apparently, the device isn’t working properly (or the business partner doesn’t have any DNA). Mac goes for the device. Adam confirms there was elephant dung in a bag in Tony’s apartment, matching the elephant dung under Isabelle’s fingers. The dung matches that of the elephants in the Manhattan zoo. Seems the zookeepers sell the dung to a man named Colby who makes paper out of them. Lovely. Anyway, Colby was at Tony’s party. Adam goes for a high five but Danny wisely leaves him hanging.

Danny and Flack meet Colby. He was pulling a college prank on her as the first person he saw. It was to test the berries. Colby swears he didn’t kill Isabelle, they were occasional bed buddies. And he used to make the paper for Isabelle’s labels. Danny, meanwhile, spots sodium hydroxide and confiscates it. Lindsay goes over the card Ella brought over but can’t find any trace. Except for signs of Ella. A sketch was found underneath the purse. Mac runs a handwriting analysis using Ella’s statement. The card was a fake so Mac goes to confront her. And she is about to learn you don’t piss off Mac Taylor. Ella apologizes but reveals that she thought Mac cared about her. She has daddy issues, acting out for attention.

Danny tests the sodium hydroxide. He confirms a match and hauls Colby back into interrogation. Flack goes at him. Isabelle and Colby chatted it up constantly for two months. Then Isabelle cut him off but he phone stalked her. Colby admits that Isabelle broke up with him because he was cheating on her. Colby still swears that he didn’t kill Isabelle and reveals the ex-business partner was the woman he cheated on Isabelle with. He’s still denying it when Danny reveals Isabelle was killed with his sodium hydroxide.

Meanwhile, Mac finds out about Stella’s plans with Stan. And he doesn’t approve on grounds it compromises the lab’s integrity. He tells her to stand down. She fights back. He orders her to stand down. She leaves angry. And Danny comes in to tell Mac that Colby got a lawyer. Hawkes comes in with DNA news. Apparently, the blender used to make the Drain-o cocktail had traces of leaf that, if ingested, could mask DNA in saliva. And it’s find in Southeast Asia. The ex-business partner revealed she was from Thailand. Hmm…If you weren’t smelling a rat when Colby admitted she was his lover, this is definitely sounding the alarms. Motive, opportunity and means.

Guess who is in interrogation? With a snuff box full of those leaves and traces of sodium hydroxide. She killed Isabelle, who stood up for herself. And so she killed her.

Angel meets a Greek diplomat in a dinner and passes him an envelope. It has a coin in it. Looks like Stella’s plan is in effect despite Mac’s orders. As she and Stella drive off, Mac gets a call. It’s just crying and then Ella apologizes for something. He rushes to her apartment, kicks in the door, and finds a bloody knife. She cries she’s tired of being alone and reveals her wrists. She’s not dying; she did it the wrong way. It’s up the block, not across the street! And it’s sad I know that. Mac carries her out of the apartment as the camera focuses on a secret that says “I will make him love me.” Creepy.

I smell February sweeps set ups! An Ella kidnapping/crazy stalking Mac Taylor? Stella having an intense confrontation with the Greek Assassin? Messer-Monroe Baby? What do you think?