- Josef's home is attacked by a professional killer. Mick searches for the person who hired him, realizing that the contractor knew Josef was a vampire. Meanwhile Coraline lies in a hospital near death.
- The stake missed Coraline/Morgan's heart, but it punctured the lung and tore the pericardium. Coraline now lies unconscious in the hospital. Even worse, the wound has become infected. When Morgan was asked about the event that caused the wound, all the emergency room doctor could get out of her was that it was an "accident." Of course, Mick and Beth aren't talking either. The one time Coraline does become conscious, Mick asks her how she managed to become human again. She replies only that she did it for him, then she passes out again. When no one is looking, Mick draws a syringeful of her blood. Meanwhile, a continent away in New York, Ralf Martan has been hired by wealthy real-estate developer John Whitley to kill Josef. Ralf recommends a single long-range bullet to the head, but Whitley, elderly and close to death, insists that it must be done by fire.
Tonight is poker night for Josef and his two vampire buddies, Dan and Tim. Mick is supposed to be the fourth, but he isn't there tonight because he has been spending his time at the hospital. Just as Josef wins all the vials of blood in the kitty with "two pairs of fives," automatic rifle bullets come crashing through the plate glass windows, followed by two incendiary bombs. The entire penthouse explodes into flames. When he hears about the fire, Mick hurries over to Josef's apartment. He learns from Tom, the head of Josef's security systems, that no remains -- only ashes -- were found so far. Tom also tells Mick that part of the security system included infrared surveillance cameras. Watching the recording, Mick learns that the heat signature shows the assassin was human, that he posed as a janitor, and that the bombs were military grade.
When Mick returns to his apartment, he finds Beth waiting for him outside the front door. When they go inside, who do they find there but Josef. As they gape at Josef incredulously, Josef says, "Are you just going to stand there all day, or are you going to help me find out who killed me?" Mick orders Josef to lay low at his apartment while he and Beth try to hack military files in hopes of identifying the assassin. Unfortunately, Josef's computer maestro, Rider England, is currently "on sabbatical" in South America for doing just that. Beth suggests that her friend Sam at BuzzWire might be of some help. Sam turns out to be little more than a gorgeous girl freshly out of her teens, but she's up to the challenge. Within minutes, Sam has used facial recognition software cross-matched with the Pentagon's ID database to identify the janitor as Ralf Martan, Green Beret, Special Ops, Darkwatch, Afghanistan, an all-around mercenary, born to kill.
Unfortunately, Josef is not the ideal house guest. When Mick returns to his apartment, he finds Josef having a party with three human females. "I couldn't go out," Josef explains, "so I ordered in." When Mick goes to bed, Josef decides to pay a visit to his demolished apartment to retrieve some money and other things from his hidden fireproof safe. He manages to sneak in and out of his penthouse, being seen only by Tom, who promises to tell no one that Josef is still alive. Untrue to his word, Tom immediately contacts Ralf, who rushes over, puts a bullet through Tom's head, and then heads for Josef's penthouse, where Josef is still rummaging through the debris. Fortunately, Mick woke up and noticed Josef's absence. Just as Ralf is about to put a bullet through Josef's head, Mick kicks the gun out of Ralf's hand and hangs him over the terrace railing so he can get a good look at the traffic some dozen stories below. Ralf identifies his employer as John Whitley. Mick turns Ralf over to the police as Josef's possible assassin. Josef denies knowing a John Whitley and then promptly disappears.
Beth gets Whitley's address off the internet, and she and Mick fly to New York on the chance that Josef may be headed there to kill Whitley. Just as Beth finishes packing her suitcase and is waiting for Mick to pick her up, Josh drops in. When Josh finds out that Beth is flying to New York with Mick, he drops the bomb that it just isn't working between Beth and him. Josh challenges Beth to look him in the eye and tell him that she doesn't have feelings for Mick. Before Beth can say anything, however, Mick knocks on the door.
Meanwhile, Ralf has escaped from police custody and returned to New York. He sneaks into Whitley's apartment and threatens to put air in his IV unless Whitley tells him about Josef and how to kill him. Several hours later, Mick and Beth gain entrance to Whitley's house via the fire escape and ask him why he hired a hitman to kill Josef. Whitley explains that Josef, who went by the name Charles Fitzgerald back in 1955, murdered Whitley's daughter Sarah. To better explain their relationship, Whitley lets Beth and Mick read Sarah's diary, and they learn about Sarah's love for Charles/Josef.
Beth gets a call from Sam, who has tracked down the limo that picked up Josef at the airport and gives her the address where he was taken. They hightail it to that address, but the woman answering the door denies that anyone was dropped off there, until Josef appears behind her and invites Beth and Mick to come inside, not knowing that Ralf is watching. Once inside, Josef opens a door to reveal a young girl asleep in a bed. It is Sarah Whitley, still looking 21-years old. Josef very emotionally tells them how they fell in love and how Sarah talked him into turning her. He did everything properly -- drained her and then fed her his blood -- but she got lost somewhere inbetween and has been in a coma since 1955. Josef has been secretly caring for her ever since.
Suddenly, the bedroom window shatters and Ralf leaps through it. Mick knocks Beth to the floor while Ralf shoots two bullets in Josef's back and then forces a stake through his chest. While Beth cowers and Josef lies pinned to the floor, Mick beats up Ralf, eventually breaking his neck. After removing the stake and bullets from Josef's body, Mick and Beth prepare to leave. But Beth first gives Sarah's journal to Josef. "You should have this," she says. "She really loved you." When they go outside to hail a taxi, Mick suggests that he and Beth do the town, but Beth decides to return to L.A. and straighten out whatever she can with Josh.
Back at the hospital in L.A., Coraline's vital signs have begun to look weird. Instead of spiking from her chest infection, her temperature has actually dropped two degrees in the past six hours. When the nurse goes in to take her temperature again, Coraline looks longingly at the nurse's neck and her eyeteeth begin to erupt. Later, as the nurse sits at her desk, she sees Coraline's EKG suddenly flatline and calls a code blue. When the crash team gets to Coraline's room, they find her bed empty. [Full synopsis by BJ Kuehl]
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