In the story, Raymond's search for a lost girl turns into a race as he discovers she is part of a black market human trafficking ring and has been forced to become a surrogate mother.

They identify the arm as that of Ashley's, but the leg is from an unidentified Jane Doe and is covered by radioactive sand, which is only found in Las Vegas.

In the meantime, Horatio calls Dr. Ray Langston, who deduces that the severed leg belongs to his own investigation of a missing girl, Samantha Matthews.

What is unexpected is the fact that the girls were dismembered by two different men: a professional "rock star" butcher and a model manager-turned-pimp who was associated with Ashley.

As it turns out, a mysterious crime syndicate working outside Miami called the "Zetas" had been funding these men, which leads Ray and Horatio to believe that this case is much bigger than they imagined.

In New York City an accident on an interstate highway involving a drunk driver and a big rig truck takes a turn for the worse when Det.

He admits that he gave Madeline to another trafficker, and she is revealed to be in the sleeper compartment of another big rig truck heading to Las Vegas.

At the same time, a local weather girl, Deedee, is found dead outside the Tangiers Hotel & Casino, dressed as a prostitute.

Searching the house, Ray finds a bloody mattress and a lock box filled with money, casino chips and driver's licenses, including Deedee's.

This leads the team to believe she used to belong to another pimp, Dmitri Sadesky, a Russian professor at nearby Western Las Vegas University (WLVU).