'NCIS' recap: 'One Book, Two Covers'

This week’s episode of NCIS gave us another look into Nick’s life working undercover. When the episode began, we saw Marine Corporal Kyle Campbell opening up a moving van to let someone on a dirt bike in before police cars could get them. However, before he can begin driving, Kyle is shot and killed.

At work before getting the case, Ellie is giving Nick a hard time for not responding to her invitation to paint her new place. When Gibbs interrupts about the case, he lets them know Tim and Alex already were on their way.

Once at the crime scene, the team focus on the body and evidence they can find. When Jimmy arrives with Ducky, he can tell the body was moved before they got there. Nick gets Gibbs attention and tells him he found dirt bike tracks and there are tracks for another vehicle. Ellie informs them a robbery had just taken place with the person taking off on a dirt bike. Nick has a feeling and tells them he’d like to see the security footage.

In Abby’s lab, she shows Nick and Gibbs the footage. When Nick spots the bike, he recalls that the bike belonged to him. He informs the team that he had worked undercover on a sting involving a gang known as the Rosewood Boyz. They had taken to robbing banks and he was tasked with stopping the leader since they were recruiting marines and sailors.

He had been able to get one member, Royce Layton, to turn on the leader, Mitch Monroe. Monroe was arrested while Layton was placed in witness protection. Down in autopsy, Jimmy finds a mysterious substance on Campbell’s body that looks like mud but is not actually mud. He takes it to Abby in an effort to have the sample identified.

Gibbs and Ellie interview Monroe, who claims he never killed his friends. He tells them he heard rumors someone was trying to start the gang back up. Knowing they are NCIS, he tells them to give Nick’s alias a message that he will one day be out of prison.

Nick informs Vance he does not want to sit on the sidelines of the case. Vance gives him an example of how someone on the bench can be influential to the main players in the game. After their talk, Nick tells him he is going to head home to get his case notes from his undercover work. Having nearly exposed himself one night while buzzed and wearing a wire, he took to writing information he needed in a notebook.

Alex goes to speak to the Officer in Charge about Campbell and learns that he had been a model marine before he began to change in recent months. She tells Alex he had recently broken up with a girlfriend and gets her information so Alex can speak to her.

When he gets home, Nick is surprised to see his old bike in his garage. As he pulls his weapon and slowly walks toward the garage, the bike explodes. In Abby’s lab, he learns the bike was detonated with a cell phone detonator. He is wary about being able to get information from it but she is not deterred. Abby tells Nick he is lucky to have survived but he knows that if the gang wanted him dead, they would have done so.

Nick goes through his notes, trying to find anything he can to help the case. The team is still trying to figure out how to connect Campbell with the gang. Alex comes in then to let them know Campbell’s girlfriend is on her way.

Gibbs and Ellie interview the young woman, who tells them Kyle had started gambling and began hanging around his friends who she only knew as the Rosewood Boyz. He had been in debt but was soon able to pay them off without telling her how. Having suspected he was cheating, she put a tracker on his car and found he had gone to Miller’s Motocross.

Gibbs, Tim and Alex head to the scene and the former is able to locate the Boyz. One of the guys tries to give Gibbs a hard time until another one stops him. In order to identify him without saying a word, Gibbs has Alex snap a photo of him. Alex and Tim wonder how he knew they were the gang and he tells them there was a rose on the bike.

Tim is having a hard time getting cooperation from both the Department of Justice and Marshall’s Service in finding Royce Layton. Having identified the man in Alex’s photo as Alonzo Marcel, the team begins to dig into his personal life. They look around for Nick but he has disappeared.

In his vehicle, we find Nick did have information on Alonzo but did not tell the team. He goes to a house in the middle of nowhere to see Royce. They have a discussion about how Nick had stopped coming to check on him. Nick informs him about the latest murder and how Alonzo appears to be the leader. Royce takes him out back where his pottery is and tells him Alonzo has a secret.

Abby informs Alex, Ellie and Gibbs she was able to track the cell phone that was used to call the phone that was used to detonate Nick’s bike. The cell was traced to a location where Alonzo lived. When the team arrives, they find Alonzo shot and killed in bed alongside his lover. They also had discovered the same bike helmet seen in the robbery footage.

While still at the scene, Nick gets a call from a robotic voice. The voice tells him that they have Campbell’s killer and now he will stop investigating or his secret will be revealed.

In the morgue, Gibbs is told the victims died in the same manner as Campbell. Jimmy also discovered the same substance on Alonzo’s boot that was also on Campbell. Gibbs and Nick head into the elevator where Gibbs stops it so they can talk. Nick reveals that in order to put Monroe away, he planted evidence so he would be arrested.

Abby tells Nick and Ellie the substance is pottery clay and while the girls are distracted, Nick breaks away from them. He makes a phone call to Royce asking what he wants.

Nick confronts Royce about the murders, finding out that Royce had been the leader of the gang even from witness protection. He tells Nick that in exchange for money, he will give Nick a recording he has of Nick telling him about the planted evidence. Nick has him look in the bag for a gift, which turns out to be handcuffs. Before Nick can arrest him, Royce hits him over the head and runs out of the house and to his dirt bike. Alex and Gibbs try to catch him by cae, but he is too fast. Soon, Nick catches up on his own dirt bike and stops Royce from fleeing further.

In the office by themselves, Gibbs informs Nick that he couldn’t understand anything on the audio file. He also did not have Abby look at it, much to Nick’s surprise. Gibbs tells him not to ever do what he did again and sends Nick home.

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