'Law & Order: SVU': Another Link in the Chain (VIDEO)

Investigating a grizzly murder is bad enough on its own. But what if that single crime leads to a much greater mystery? That's the situation on 'Law & Order: SVU' (Wed., 9PM ET on NBC).

[Warning: Spoiler alert.]

A young woman named Samantha is raped and murdered; her body is left in an industrial laundry facility. Now Detectives Benson and Stabler (Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni) must track down her killer. But when a string of clues leads them to an anonymous house in New York City, they get a lot more than they bargained for.

The detectives stop Jason Gamble (Joseph Sikora) outside his house, just to ask a few questions. He's not the suspect they're looking for. But when Jason goes inside to get a piece of info for the cops, he suddenly locks the door on them. That's rude, but what happens next is a lot worse.

Jason opens fire at the cops, shooting through the wooden door. Stabler smashes the door down and grabs the young man. Benson finds a small box containing a bracelet made by Samantha. But then she finds another bracelet, and a broach, an engagement ring ... and a woman's handkerchief. Not all of the objects can belong to Samantha. It seems that the cops have a serial killer on their hands.

Like the individual links on the women's bracelets, the first crime is part of much larger chain of events. But where will it all lead?