Law and Order: Criminal Intent: Lonelyville (Episode 137)

We open to a Ukranian woman, home with her child. She's being surveilled. She gets an email. "I need to see you tonight. 9 pm," it says. As she stares at it, her boyfriend walks in. She tells him she and the baby jump came in. He grabs her arm. "You are lying!" he says. "Change the baby."

Meanwhile, a middle-aged man sits at his computer, obviously jittery. We learn he's being honored tonight by the Audobon Society for saving some hawks.

The Ukranian woman's got a babysitter, and she heads out, bidding farewell to her son and promising him a special meal tomorrow. In a public bathroom, she changes into hooker clothes and puts makeup over the bruise on her arm.

Meanwhile, Mr. Audobon, at the bar, gets a text: "Can't make it tonight, sorry." As he orders another drink, the Ukranian woman and a friend approach him. They're obviously hookers, but he seems game for it.

He wakes up in the morning in a hotel room, the Ukranian woman intricately bound and dead beside him. Her friend is gone. A photograph of him lying next to the dead woman has been left in his briefcase. He grabs his clothes and shoes and runs out.

Falacci and Logan are inspecting the scene. She died by strangulation. Falacci calls it "erotic Japanese bondage," and notices that the hooker's earrings are far more expensive than the rest of her outfit. The hotel has security footage from the elevator, which shows the two women and Mr. Audubon making out in an elevator. They can't ID the second woman. They track the room to a Gerry Mitchell, who they then go to talk to. Gerry's not Mr. Audubon, and he notices his credit card's missing. His alibi: he was playing online video games. "You can check my game log," he says. The alibi actually checks out.

Meanwhile, Mr. Audobon is rendezvousing with another of his mistresses, but he's being trailed by the Ukranian woman's friend.

The ME tells them that the vic has old bruises all over her body -- probably from an abusive relationship -- and that she's given birth. They check missing persons, and that leads them to Anya -- the Ukranian woman's -- babysitter, who had reported her missing. She tells them Anya's husband, Nicos, was working at his diner the night Anya was killed. They verify that Nicos was abusive, and head to his diner to talk to him. He's not cooperative, so they arrest him, while Falacci shows an impressive mastery of Ukranian.

"I'm done with her," says Nicos, and then learns his wife is dead. He begins crying when he sees the pictures of her body. "You loved her. Why didn't you report her missing?" she asks. Nicos tells them Anya was here illegally. "You think I did this?" asks Nicos. "It was her boyfriend. She's always on the computer, hiding it from me." He says he was at his diner all night, then went home and stayed home. He admits he had a spy cam in the kitchen, and hands it over to the police to confirm his alibi.

On Anya's computer, we find the email traffic from C. Sherman, originating from a private school on the Upper East Side. We go to chat with C. Sherman, who admits he met her for drinks six weeks ago, at which point she asked for money, he declined, and he never saw him again. Falacci asks why he's sent emails to her more recently. "I didn't write these," he says. He was camping when some of them were sent, he says, out of wireless range. He met Anya, he says, on MarriedButSoLonely.com. Logan and Falacci use the footage from the elevator combined with photos on that website to track down their man, screenname Lonelyman.

The detectives enter a large, well-decorated home. Mr. Audubon, it turns out, is named Noah, and his wife comes down to greet the detectives. When they ask where he was on Monday night, she says he was writing. Falacci notices that the wife's bracelet is made by the same designer as the earrings they found on the body. Falacci asks about the earrings. "I owned them ... I just noticed they're missing," says the wife. Falacci shows the wife a picture of the dead girl, wearing the earrings. She freaks out. She tells them they keep a studio in the city, and the police go there. They find Noah with his mistress.

In the interrogation room, Noah plays dumb. They show him the picture of the dead girl with the earrings, and tell him that he's in the security video. He admits to being with the two women, and going to their hotel. He says he doesn't remember what happened after they made out in the elevator. When he woke up to the dead woman, "I bolted," he says. They arrest him for murder.

Logan and Falacci interview the bartender at the bar where Noah claims to have met the women. He confirms that he was there with a blonde Eastern European woman. He doesn't remember there being another woman.

Noah claims the bartender was lying. "He must be in on it!" They don't believe him. Noah thinks he's being blackmailed, because of the photo he found of himself with the dead girl when he woke up. Several hours later, he says, he got a phone call from a woman saying she had a video and wanted $200,000 cash. He says he told his mistress, Tammy, about the blackmail. He says he saved the photograph, and tells the detectives where to find it. They don't find the photo, but they do notice that the ropes on the hanging plants in Noah's studio match the ropes with which Anya was bound.

Back at HQ, they learn that Noah pulled $200,000 out of his money market account recently, and that his wife won't post his bail.

They interview Tammy, who confirms that she was at home with Noah, and quickly lawyers up. The lawyer whispers something to her, and then she tells him that she texted Noah to say she couldn't make it that night. She denies that Noah told her about the blackmail, but she does know about the missing money. She said the money was for them to get away and get a fresh start, to the tune of $200,000.

The detectives bring this news to Noah, who gets very upset. "She was right outside when I made the drop! This doesn't make any sense!" He says he's known Tammy for two months. They tell him about the ropes they found and the missing photo. Noah asks to call Tammy, and begs her to tell the truth. Tammy hangs up. Noah's in tears now. "I don't understand," he says.

Meanwhile, Tammy is in a car with the Mystery Brunette. "Noah sounded so upset," she says. "It's gonna be okay," says the brunette. She goes to unbutton Tammy's dress, and then they make out. Hot.

Back at the office, we get word that Noah killed himself in prison.

The ME tells us that Noah made three attempts to kill himself by hanging. The first two failed. "Guy couldn't even tie a knot," comments Logan, which doesn't fit at all with the killer, who tied a series of advanced knots around Anya's body. The detectives now consider that Tammy may be in on the framing.

They go to the speed-dating center where Tammy met Noah. They learn that she had "checked" both Noah and Gerry Mitchell. We go back to talk to Gerry, who admits he did meet Tammy during speed-dating. "She came over once," he says, "and then my credit card was gone. She was going to show the videotape to my wife!" he says.

The detectives develop a theory of the crime: Tammy and the Mystery Brunette learned Anya was cheating on Nicos. They videotaped her cheating, and used the footage to blackmail Anya into prostituting herself. They now believe Noah's story of another woman in the bar. "Newsflash: the bartenders being blackmailed, too."

They find the bartender in Central Park and confront him. He admits that he lied, and that there were two women at the bar. The second woman came back the next day and convinced him to lie to the cops. "My little daughter came home from preschool. Had an envelope. With a DVD in it." The DVD is of the bartender cheating on his wife. Watching the footage, Logan recognizes the face of the woman in the sack with the bartender. "Isn't that Tammy's lawyer?" he asks.

We learn that Leann Baker was fired from a top firm last year for sexual harrassment; she was hitting on her female secretary. "If we question Leann," says Logan, "she can claim lawyer/client privilege."

They bring in the bartender to look at a line-up. Tammy's in the line-up and her lawyer, Leanne, is present to watch. The bartender IDs Leanne. "She was with the other blonde and the writer," says the bartender as he identifies Tammy. "This is ridiculous," says Leann. "He was lying."

As they fingerprint Tammy, she continues to claim he wasn't in the bar, which we know is true. Her lawyer tells her to stop talking. As they bring Tammy to her cell, she begins to get more afraid. The detectives tell her she probably won't be able to post bail. You can tell she wants to turn. They keep at her. They pull out Noah's suicide note. "Mu-mu," it says (his nickname for her). "I tried to understand why you betrayed me. I know there must be a reason." Tammy recognizes the handwriting, and begins to realize that perhaps Noah didn't kill Anya. The detectives suggest that perhaps Tammy should get a new lawyer, but Tammy's ready to talk. "No one was supposed to die. They were gonna film Noah with the two of them," she says, "then send it to his wife."  

Leanne screams at Tammy that she was just supposed to sleep with Noah, not get him to fall in love. "He did love me!" she cries. "And he was the only one." Leanne tells her she's pathetic.

They put Leanne under arrest, too, and lead both the women to their cells.

Dick Wolf.