Little Angels - Recap

A male voice is heard asking a 14 year-old girl, Amanda, to tell him a
bit about herself. He asks if she has a boyfriend, and she says no. He
acts like he doesn't believe her, because he thinks he is. Her dad, Navy
Commander Jason Rehme, arrives home, and notes that Daniel is
videotaping his daughter in the hot tub, and he orders Daniel to leave,
now. When Daniel does so, the dad then sends Amanda to bed.

Amanda is awakened by a noise outside her window. She dresses and goes
outside, thinking it's Daniel, but he doesn't answer when she calls out.
When she sees a beer bottle on the table, she says "Daddy?" but still no
response. Somebody in black approaches from behind and places a plastic
bag over her head and face.

When she comes to, she is in a box, with duct tape over her mouth, which
she promptly removes. She checks her cell, and it has no signal. She
begins calling for help, rapidly becoming hysterical.

Callen and Hanna arrive at work, discussing Hanna's fear of clowns.
Kensi has a fear of back hair on men. Emminently shudder-worthy. She has
an alias at a dating site. Deeks finds it and proceeds to mock her
unmercifully. They all head upstairs when Eric gives them the whistle
signal to join Hetty.

Eric starts the meeting with a picture of Commander Jason Rehme. He is
responsible for designing the cryptograph logons used by the Department
of Naval Personnel with the highest security clearance. He literally
holds the keys to the Navy's classified kingdom in his head. Hetty tells
the group that Commander Jason Rehme is missing. He had an 0600 meeting
that he never showed up for. He hasn't answered any calls, texts, or
emails. Nell says that he'd be a prime target for both domestic and
international terrorists. Hanna notes that we have therefore been
compromised for about 1.5 hours. G asks for his last whereabouts, and
the team moves out.

G, Sam, Kensi and Marty arrive at the Rehme home. The front door is
locked, and they all pull their weapons. Deeks and Blye head around back
while G jimmies the door. Inside they find nothing unusual, but Kensi
comes in to let them know she found blood. They're checking into where
it leads, when Kensi says she found the commander. He's a wreck, and
holding one of his daughter's flip-flops. He thinks he upset her last
night, and went looking for her. She goes running on the trails in the
morning. He explains to the team about how things had unfolded the night
before, and how he handled it. Kensi asks for the boys name, and the
Commander tells them: Daniel Proeffer.

Hanna asked if Amanda's mom died, and Jason says four years ago, asking
how Sam knew that. Sam says divorcees don't leave pictures of their ex
all over the house. Jason says he just wanted to tell her he was sorry,
and Sam says he'll be able to do that as soon as they find her.

The Commander gets a message. Says it's from Amanda, but that's not her
email address. There's a web link, and Jason accesses it. He sees
Amanda, unconscious within a box. The lid is then hammered into place.
Sam flashes back to having been buried alive, himself.

FBI Senior Special Agent Lisa Rand wants to make sure the father isn't
in the house when they play a video. Three other girls were buried in
just such a manner two years ago, and they got the guy. Lucas Maragos.
He's doing life, but everything about the case is the same. Same blue
surgical gloves, duct tape across the mouth - everything. But since he's
serving three consecutive life sentences, Rand says we have a copycat.
Sam wants to know if the video was ever released to the public, and Rand
says they were used as evidence during the trial. G wonders if Maragos
had a partner, and Rand responds there was no evidence of such. She's
going to go over the records and see if any names pop up.

Sam flashes on his attempts to escape. He wasn't buried alone, there was
a fellow soldier in there with him named Lucas. Rand informs NCIS that
the FBI will take it from here. As they are leaving, Rehme approaches
them. He doesn't trust the FBI, he's Navy born and bred. He asks if
there is any way that NCIS can stay on the case. G tells him it's
outside their jurisdiction. Rehme says he lost his wife, he couldn't
bear to lose his child as well. When G starts to reiterate that they
can't, Sam cuts him off and tells Rehme they will see what they can do.

Sam asks Hetty if he can stay on the case. She tells him the same thing
G said, but he disagrees. Rehme is the gatekeeper for all of the Navy's
classified information, and NCIS is Navy. He believes that while the FBI
is chasing the killer, Commander Rehme could be blackmailed. Hetty says
it's an interesting thought. Sam says he's taking a leave of absence,
and starts to walk away. Hetty asks him not to turn his back on her, she
would never do that to him. She then says "find her."

Eric says the park where Amanda may be buried is huge, finding her would
be comparable to the old needle/haystack scenario. And because her body
temperature is dropping, infrared isn't a solution, either. The team
decides to go over Amanda's video again, in comparison to the videos of
the other three girls. They are struck by how exactly alike the four are.

Nell shows them a black Chevy Malibu leaving the park at 4:30 a.m. The
vehicle has no plates, but is sporting unrepaired damage to the driver's
side rear quarter panel. Because it's a relatively new vehicle, G
figures they would have made an insurance claim. Eric turns up two
matches in the LA area. The match turns up as a leased vehicle to Galea
shipping, a Greek company that operates out of the Port of LA. The
President of the company is Andre Maragos, brother of Lucas. Deeks gets
sent out to the penitentiary where Lucas is incarcerated, to see if he
can get any answers.

Eric states that FBI files indicate that all the boxes were buried at
the same depth, and that their dimensions were exactly the same. By
calculating remaining oxygen, Eric believes that Amanda has about nine
hours to live. Sam sets an alarm on his cell, and asks that there be a
countdown timer on the big screen and all the screens in the office,
along with a picture of Amanda. He wants everybody to keep her foremost
in their minds.

G, Sam and Kensi get out of the car, and G calls Eric to ask if they got
anything off the security camera. He said no go, it's closed circuit and
the alarm company indicates no recorders. G introduces himself to
security, and Sam quietly tells Kensi to look around, see if she can
find the Malibu. G and Sam follow the guard in to speak with Andre
Maragos. He asks what this is about, and they ask about the Malibu. He
denies knowing of any such vehicle. They tell him it's leased to his
company, and he says they lease 50 cars. Sam's phone rings, and it's
Kensi announcing she found the Malibu.

When they arrive at the garage, Maragos asks Kensi how she got in there,
as the garage was locked. Mr. and Mrs. Maragos tell the agents that
Jennifer, their personal assistant, drives this car. They are asked
where Jennifer is now, and the answer is backpacking in Alaska.

G finds a picture of Andre and Lucas and asks him if they went to camp
together. They did, but Andre states that Lucas is mentally ill. Sam
asks specifically which camp, and it's the one in the National Forest
that butts up against the Rehme home.

Lucas meets with Deeks. He tells Deeks he didn't kill those girls. Now
that another one has gone missing, he may gain his freedom. Marty asks
if Andre is his partner, did they work as a team. Lucas says no. He
thinks Andre did it. The DNA says Lucas did it, but he says nobody
checked Andre's DNA. Lucas offers to help NCIS if they help get him out
of there.

Andre is offering any help he can to G. When asked where he was last
night, he was home with his wife. Sam calls Kensi and tells her that
Andre claims he was home with the wife last night. She says she'll see
what she can do, and goes to question the wife. She says he was home
last night, and he didn't do it. Kensi says she doesn't think he did,
either. But she bets he wasn't home last night, and that his wife would
like to know where he was. Kensi asks again, and the wife doesn't
answer; but that's Kensi's answer, and she relays it to Sam.

Sam goes in and gives the information to Kensi, When Andre hears that
his wife gave him up, he claims he was at work, and now he wants a
lawyer. Conversation over.

Eric confirms that Andre was at work all night, but Sam doesn't buy it.
His cell phone being there doesn't mean he was there. Sam wants
witnesses or video confirmation. G says Andre's attorney has gone before
the judge to get him out. Sam fears that Andre is a flight risk. If he
gets out and runs to a country with no reciprocity, they may never see
him again.

G goes to talk to Hetty about why they're on the case. He says he
accepts Sam's privacy, but he needs to know what's going on. She gives
him a document which he silently reads. Hetty advises G to stay close to
Sam.

Eric and Sam discover that Andre's car and phone stayed at work, but he
didn't. He took a company car - but not the Malibu.

Deeks calls and tells Sam he needs to be at the site where they are
digging up the animal skeletons Lucas says Andre tortured and killed.
Sam asks if there are any other sites, and Lucas refers him back to
Andre. Sam uncuffs Lucas and takes him for a walk. Sam tells him he
either shows him where there's another site, or he'll tell everyone how
Lucas went for his gun and he was forced to defend himself. Lucas sees
the error of his ways and says there are a few more sites. They hear the
shovel hit a box, and they start digging faster. The box is opened, but
it's the missing victim of the girls he went to prison for killing.

Lucas and Andre come face-to-face. Andre says Lucas is destroying his
life, and Lucas retorts that he could say the same. Rand shows up and
tells the brothers that if Amanda is found dead, it's going to
constitute special circumstances, which translates to the death penalty.
Lucas tells Andre he knows his dark side; he know what he's capable of.
This time he can't pin it on Lucas, because Lucas was in prison.

Rand informs Andre that she got a court order to get a DNA sample from
Andre and compare it to the DNA found on the bodies of the first girls.
Andre insists that Lucas must have a partner, he hand-delivered his last
victim to NCIS. They ask him where he was last night, since they know he
left work.

Rehme shows up, asking which one did it. Sam tells him they don't know,
could be neither of them. He asks how long his daughter has to live, and
Sam says they estimate she has about six hours of oxygen left. Deeks
tells Sam that Andre's lawyer just showed up with an order for release.
He states that a woman has testified that she is Mr. Maragos' mistress.
In light of her testimony that Andre was with her last night, the judge
has ordered him released.

Sam says he's leaving to find Amanda. G follows him. He asks Sam what
happened in Bosnia. Sam says that if G spoke to Hetty, then he knows.
Sam fills him in on how things unfolded there. Sam recounts getting a
tube out so he can get air. When he lights the last match, he sees that
the man in there with him had died. The conversation is interrupted by
Eric announcing a flight plan out of Burbank; Andre Maragos is trying to
leave the country.

Sam tells Eric to tell them to stop, but Eric tells him air traffic
control has already attempted to stop him numerous times. Sam shoots out
the front tires of the plane before it can take off, and the pilot is
ordered to shut it down. They keep their guns drawn. Andre had his
entire family on the plane with him. In questioning, he claims
repeatedly that he was free to leave the country. Sam asks him why he
offered his pilot $1,000,000 to keep going, and get him to Venezuela.
Once again he blamed his brother. Sam puts his hand around the nape of
Andre's neck and whispers in his ear that he's not buying it.

Sam is called out of the room because they have something. The DNA is a
rock-solid match for Lucas, and not Andre. They also have proof that he
was with his mistress last night, as the couple made a video. There was
a date and time stamp on the news that clearly proves the video was
created that night. This brings them back to ground zero, because Andre
was all they had.

Sam notices that in the video, the kidnapper removed the blue glove. He
wants to make it look like a piece of evidence was left behind. He asks
Eric to digitally make it happen. They'll then show the picture to Andre
and Lucas, and see if a partner comes out of the woodwork. Nell says
that whoever did it is going to return to the scene of the crime. And
since they'll have the park staked out, they hope to find Amanda. Eric
and Nell go to work creating the video. They show the video to Andre and
Lucas. The boys walk in at Andre's, and his wife sends them back out again.

Kensi put GPS on the Malibu, and it's headed for the western part of the
park. Eric wants recent photos from the camp in the park, and Nell goes
looking. G and Sam arrive at the black Malibu. Eric tells them that he
stopped moving 100 yards west of them, and they follow him in. There
were two of them, Sam and G give chase. Nell finds that Amanda went to
the camp. When they take down the runners, they are Andre's sons. Sam
and G dig up the box while Sam flashes on being rescued. Sam gives
Amanda mouth-to-mouth, and she starts breathing.

Rand tells G good job. Sam gives Amanda the dog tags of his dead buddy,
for good luck. She runs into her father's arms. Sam walks away, smiling.

The boys said they wanted to "know what killing felt like."

G tells Sam that he sat in poison oak out there. Sam says he didn't, but
Hetty says he did. She offers to give him a good thick slathering of
calamine lotion, promising not to look while he removes his pants. When
Hetty turns around, she's alone in the office.

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