- Brenda uses her niece Charlie without her knowledge to uncover a motive after a schoolyard shooter kills one teenager and leaves another seriously wounded.
- Brenda and the Major Crimes team investigate a schoolyard shooting that may have been a drug deal gone bad. A young Hispanic lad, Tomas DeLeon, is killed and an innocent bystander, another boy named Jake Burrell, is seriously wounded. A large amount of marijuana is found at the scene. From the fancy SUV he was driving, there is little doubt that DeLeon was the dealer; however, in reviewing the physical evidence, the police revise their theory about who was the intended victim. Brenda may have stepped over the line when she uses her visiting niece Charlie to get information from Jake. Meanwhile, Provenza makes a potentially life altering decision.—garykmcd
- Brenda drives sullen Charlie. She's peeved at her aunt for taking her iPod and cell phone. Brenda waits to hear her apologize for the pot brownie incident. Charlie gives a lame attempt.
Then they notice teenagers running by them. Charlie asks one what's going on. Someone's shooting in the parking lot. Brenda parks and tells Charlie to keep her head down and stay in the car. Brenda gets out and calmly walks toward the school with her gun drawn as students run by her.
She finds one boy dead in the parking lot and another bleeding under a car. He sees her and asks for help. His name's Jake and he's shot in the gut. She gives him her sweater to press against the wound. Brenda stands up to look for the ambulance and hears someone behind her. She whirls around, pointing her gun. It's Charlie. Then two officers are upon them, guns drawn. She identifies herself and calls the team as Charlie looks at bleeding Jake.
Later with the ambulance there, Brenda tells a deputy to bring Charlie and to follow them in her car to the hospital.
At the hospital, Jake asks for his mom and Brenda promises to be there when he wakes up.
Flynn and Provenza are with Charlie in the waiting room. She wants to know how Jake is doing, but Brenda moves away from her niece. Proflynnza tells Brenda that the victim, Tomas, had a backpack full of pot. Charlie hears this and Brenda shoots her a look.
The only person witnesses saw with a gun was Brenda.
Brenda looks around and doesn't see her niece. After a few seconds, she comes back, saying she had to go to the bathroom. Brenda barks at her that she doesn't care and she told her to stay put, just like when she told her to stay in the car. She says she could have shot her. She cuts Charlie off, telling her not to interrupt.
Brenda tells Charlie she gets to wait for Jake to wake up, and to think about someone other than herself.
Back at the station, they learn that Tomas' older brother was in a gang, but Tomas wasn't. They found five .9 mm casings, spaced apart. The shooter was running, or in a car. Brenda wants Tomas' older brother Oscar there for the notification.
She talks to his parents and the brother. His mom says the backpack wasn't his. Brenda hasn't told them he's dead yet. They say he had a job in a coffee shop. They ID his car, and she tells them he bought it with cash. The parents insist they have the wrong person as Brenda stares down Oscar. Then she tells them he was killed. His mom immediately jumps up and starts hitting Oscar, saying he should have been the one who died and he got Tomas killed.
Oscar leaves. Sanchez steps in front of him to stop him with his death stare, but Brenda tells him to let him leave.
In the car, Fritz questions the wisdom of leaving Charlie in the ER by herself after she saw shooting victims. Brenda explains she wanted Charlie to see what happens when a drug deal goes bad.
They arrive at the hospital, to find Jake out of surgery and talking to his "sister," a nurse says. It's Charlie. He asks her to come back, she says yes, but she has to check the schedule. In the hallway, Brenda asks for clarification. Charlie told the nurses she was his sister because they only let family in and Jake knew she wasn't, so she said she was a youth volunteer. "Oh, you two are so related," Fritz laughs ruefully at Brenda.
Brenda talks to Jake. He says Tomas was shot first. She tells him she's not interested in whether he bought drugs. He says he never saw the shooter's face, he just saw someone walking away. He begs her not to tell his mom. She lies and says she talked to her (a flight attendant) and she's coming as fast as she can (from Hanoi). Jake takes Brenda's hand.
Later, a doctor tells her if Jake makes it through the next night, he's got a chance. They didn't find any bullets, only shrapnel. The bullet hit something before it entered his body.
Brenda calls Tao.
Tao and Sanchez show Provenza why there was shrapnel -- the bullets bounced off the pavement before hitting Jake. The shooter was aiming for him under the car. The final bullet went over Jake on the ground and into the car's fake gas tank, where it hit a brick of weed.
Provenza boils it down for Brenda: Jake was the target.
Brenda visits Buzz, asking if he can put a camera and mike in an ICU without being noticed. But she doesn't plan to interview him again.
Brenda gives Charlie her iPod back so she can make the playlist she promised him.
At the hospital, Charlie and Jake share ear buds and listen to her playlist. He asks how long she can stay. The team watches the video feed from another room. Provenza pulls out an engagement ring and shows Flynn. He's going to ask Lauren. Flynn slaps on a blood pressure cuff.
Jake tells Charlie he hopes his mom doesn't find out about the weed. She doesn't get why adults care so much about weed. Jake clumsily asks Charlie if she has a boyfriend and they swap stories about recent break-ups and how relationships change once you start hooking up. Brenda glowers as Charlie tells about doing it in her parents' bedroom. Then Jake tells Charlie his ex-girlfriend Vanessa is pregnant and she dumped him. She didn't want her dad to find out. He says her dad told him if he ever saw Jake, he'd kill him.
Brenda plays that part of the tape for Pope while Taylor tells him about Tomas' older drug dealing brother. Brenda argues pregnant girlfriend is a better motive, but Pope points out she can't use anything on the DVD because she got it illegally. Brenda isn't worried, she thinks she has a great source.
Brenda comes home to find Fritz and Charlie enjoying another dinner prepared by the teen (no weed this time). Brenda starts asking Charlie about her talk with Jake, but Charlie isn't offering anything. She tells Charlie she thinks Jake was the target, but Charlie says she doesn't know a reason anyone would want to kill him.
Then Brenda mentions his girlfriend Vanessa and Charlie knows her aunt spied on her. Fritz doesn't approve. Brenda has a prepared statement for Charlie to sign about what Jake says. She threatens to send the DVD to her parents if she doesn't, then offers her her cell phone back if she does. Charlie calls her the most horrible person she's ever met. Fritz doesn't seem inclined to argue. Brenda says she's trying to protect Jake. Charlie signs, but says no one believes that, including Brenda. "Including me," Fritz adds as he gets up and leaves.
It's the middle of the night when Charlie comes into Brenda's room saying they have to get to the hospital, she called Jake and told him who she was and what Brenda did and the nurses said he had a bad fever. Charlie wants to go to the hospital, but Brenda promises she'll let her know how he's doing when she gets there. Fritz says he'll wait up with her.
At the hospital, the doctor says Jake spoke with his mother half an hour ago, but she's still three hours away. She says Jake's never going to last that long. Provenza reminds her to get his permission to use the tape if she can.
Brenda sits at Jake's bedside with her tape recorder on. At first, he thinks Brenda is his mom. He asks for Charlie. She asks permission to tape him and asks if he remembers anything else about the shooting. He saw the shooter's feet, in tan hiking boots. He asks if Brenda has talked to his mom. Brenda says yes and tells him his mom knows about his problems with Vanessa and she still loves him, so there's nothing to worry about. Brenda gets her last name.
Provenza steps out to call someone to look up Vanessa.
A while later, Jake wakes up and again thinks Brenda is his mom. She doesn't correct him, telling him she loves him no matter what. He breathes uncomfortably a few times and then stops. He's gone. Brenda lets go of his hand and cries.
Provenza says they found someone with Vanessa's last name among the interview cards from the scene. They're getting a warrant. He tells her to take a minute, he'll go wait for Jake's mom.
At Vanessa's house, the team surrounds the house. The dad answers. When Brenda mentions Jake's name, he tells her to come inside and talk to his daughter. He asks if Jake has raped someone else. Brenda asks pregnant Vanessa if that's what happened. The dad says that's what Vanessa told him and her brother. Brenda asks where his gun is. He tells her and she retrieves it. Brenda lets the team in for the search. When the dad objects, Brenda dares him to give her a reason to take him and his pregnant daughter downtown in front of the neighbors. Flynn goes to check on his son, Alex.
The dad says he was at work during the shooting and his son was home. But Brenda takes out the witness card, with his son's name on it. He was interviewed at the scene. They find the tan hiking boots in his room. Brenda tells the dad and Vanessa that Jake was shot and just died. Alex slips by as they're talking. Tao sees him outside and Sanchez chases after him. He and Gabriel tackle him out front.
Brenda tells the dad and Vanessa that Alex is being arrested for murder. Vanessa turns on her dad and says it's his fault for getting Alex so mad. But Brenda says if she'd told the truth, Jake would still be alive. She cools down and walks off as Vanessa sobs, saying she has to make a notification.
At home, Brenda finds Fritz and Charlie waiting anxiously on the couch. She tells them she made an arrest, thanks to Charlie. She takes a deep breath, and starts to explain that with gunshot wounds, there's always a chance of infection... Charlie guesses that he dies. Charlie starts crying, upset that Brenda didn't let her say good-bye. Carefully, she says Jake had a short amount of time and she had to decide between letting Charlie say good bye and finding out who killed him. She hopes she made the right decision. She apologizes for putting her niece in that position. She tells Charlie that he asked about her, he knew she was his friend.
Fritz wraps Charlie in a hug as she cries. Brenda watches helplessly. Fritz takes her hand.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content