For the first time ever, Mozzie must turn for help to the FBI, via Neal, desperately worried when the person of his affection, waitress Gina De Stefano from a local diner, disappears. Mozzie uses cryptic clues, often references to book texts, left by Gina to find and rescue her. Neal got Peter also on the alert, and it turns out she has a boyfriend, petty thief Tommy Barnes, long on the FBI's radar, who works for a big fish, Colombian 'cigars' dealer Navarro, who actually abducted Gina to get Tommy to return what he stole. Neal concocts a convoluted plan to catch Navarro and liberate Gina, involving ID gay Devlin but compromised as Mozzie spooks Tommy.

Neal finds himself working with Sara Ellis an insurance investigator who has it for him. He and Peter are helping her find out who has possession of Japanese bonds. They believe that man named Mr. Black who they believe is a courier whom the one is possession of the bonds wants to move them. So they come up with a plan for Neal to take his place. When he meets the contact he gives Neal a gun and brings him to the apartment of Ellis, whom he has to kill. When they fake her death, she along with Peter and Neal try to find out who wants her dead.