Since Sophia Bush’s exit from Chicago P.D., the big question has been how those closest to Erin Lindsay are coping with her loss. At the top of that list is her ex-boyfriend Jay Halstead. For awhile, it seemed as if he was doing well. But he says something in this week’s episode that makes us realize how deeply he feels the loss. “I think you just fill up whatever’s missing with something else.” In context, Halstead is referring to his time in combat, but it goes deeper than that. Halstead’s nightmares have returned, and they’ve become such that he sleeps where he can, when he can. When he isn’t working, he’s trolling the streets for the next case. Either he can’t go home, or he can’t sit still. Perhaps it’s both. Either way, Lindsay’s departure triggered something in him; something that may very well get him in trouble if he’s not careful.
Halstead is the first on scene in a shootout that turns out to be a Kidnapping for Ransom case. Based on the intel of a CI whose nephew was also kidnapped, Intelligence figures out that one of the kidnappers is an ex-Ranger. Given Halstead’s experience overseas, he decides to go under to infiltrate the crew. He knows all the right things to say, particularly how to connect with this guy through the trauma they shared. Unfortunately, he also has to get creative with his methods. The one thing Halstead doesn’t want to do is only option he has to get his contact Luis to let him in so quickly. It pains him to dangle drugs in front of a struggling Ranger, but Halstead has to put a young boy’s safety before everything else.
Here’s the problem with this particular kidnapping for ransom: it only works if the kidnapper thinks the money is coming. The children were being targeted because their parents were running drugs on the side to make extra cash, but it wasn’t exactly a boatload of money. With Denny Woods playing hardball with the department’s cash, Halstead has to work fast to outsmart Luis’s partners. Luckily, Halstead gets through to his new ‘partner’ in time. He knows deep down this is a good man, one who cannot carry the weight of another dead child. Unfortunately, Luis finds he cannot carry the weight of what he’s done anyways. Once he knows the child is safe, he puts himself in the line of fire, and dies in Halstead’s arms. This would be the right time for Halstead to say something to Luis’s sister, Camilla. Instead, he continues to lie about his identity and comforts her. When we heard Halstead was going to be getting into an unhealthy relationship, we couldn’t have predicted it would happen this way.
Halstead taking up with the sister of a dead CI, even momentarily, is hardly what Intelligence needs right now. Voight has no idea how deeply Denny is breathing down his neck, because Ruzek has refused to tell him. Yes, Ruzek is in a terrible situation of his own creation. In trying to protect his family, he compromised them, as well as his professional family. Now everyone is going to pay the price.
Could Denny Woods be the one to break Intelligence, or will Ruzek try to save his unit before it’s too late?
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