Elementary - Reusable Murder Plans

Solid episode with Holmes' boxing skills on display, so let's hope to see those in practice. Not much character development for Watson, but abuse-heavy or drug-heavy episodes always give Holmes a chance to personally relate...

Mark Schafer / CBS ©2013 CBS Broadcasting, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Elementary "Poison Pen" (S02E04): Starting with Holmes boxing, 'fighting without mercy,' of which Watson disapproves. Holmes answers a call from a 'mistress' who turns out to be a dominatrix with a client who died, Titus Delancey. Watson chimes in with the statistic that the leading cause of death for men over 50 is a heart attack, but they determine the CEO was poisoned with an overdose of his heart medicine, nitroglycerine.

The duo tracks the latex suit Delancey was wearing to a specific sex shop where they find a picture of the man who purchase the XL suit. Upon questioning the purchaser, he admits to finding the Delancey dead, dressing him in the suit, and then calling the dominatrix to set-up the dead CEO in order to not pay out a severance of $150 million, as he would be considered amoral.

Holmes and Watson are introduced to the family's nanny, Ann Barker, who turns out to be Abigail Spencer, accused of killing her father with nitroglycerine when she was 15 years old. She's amazed Holmes recognized her after her plastic surgery, but apparently her voice gave her away. Holmes thinks the killer is trying to frame her, even though supposedly no one knew who she was.

Turns out, Holmes and Abigail had been penpals during the trial of her father's murder. Holmes was going by 'Shawn' at that time, so she didn't recognize him. Turns out, she actually gave Holmes enough information in the letters to know she did kill her father, but out of self-preservation. Holmes goes to see Abigail and gets a license plate number of someone who was following her, which turns out to be a private detective hired by Titus's wife (his children's step-mom). Upon questioning, her alibi is that she couldn't have killed her husband because at the time of the murder she was planning to kill her husband.

Watson questions Holmes and learns that Holmes was physically bullied and beaten as a boy in school and began writing Abigail because she was in a similar situation. The duo then questions Titus's older son, Graham, about a motive to kill his dad, and he reveals Titus and Abigail were fighting over a tablet days earlier. Holmes confronts Abigail, and, in trying to convince her he's a friend, reveals he knows she killed her father to which she has a negative reaction.

Searching for Titus's missing tablet, Watson and Detective Bell find it behind a fake air vent in his office and discover it contains videos of Titus sexually abusing his older son. Questioning Graham, they discover Graham was the one who had executed his step-mom's murder plan, just ahead of her. Abigail shows up and confesses in order to save Graham, feeling guilty over the fact that she missed what Titus was doing to Graham. Holmes offers to be a friend should Graham ever want to talk about his experience to someone versed in his situation.