On Law & Order: SVU season 25 episode 3, the SVU squad is baffled as a woman walks into the squad room and reports she's raped someone, but her story leads to another conclusion. As SVU works the case, they have to do so without Olivia (Mariska Hargitay) who is called into a family emergency by Maddie's mom Eileen Flynn (Leslie Fray).
Here's what happened.
A change of pace
Dr. Ray Goldberg (David Krumholtz) and his wife Denise (Gabrielle Miller) are in their kitchen when Denise asks Ray to pick up some sample tiles for their home renovation after work. He claims he can't as his friend Andy (Jeffrey Mark Cusumano) is in town visiting and he's going to hang out with him. Although she is supportive of him hanging out with his friend, she still sways him into picking up the tiles.
When Ray gets to his medical offices in the city, he asks his nurse Anna (Zoe Jensen) about a "cool" place to take Andy for the evening, so she sets Ray up with a VIP booth at the club, Galapagos. Unfortunately, Andy flakes last minute, but that doesn't deter Ray, who wants to have a night out on the town.
Arriving at Galapagos, Ray finds Reese (Quinn Spivey) and Duvall (Ian Colletti) sitting at his table. He ultimately lets the younger men stay in his section and even orders a bottle of vodka for the table, missing the sinister grin the men get on their faces.
The next day, Ray wakes up in an abandoned apartment that has trash everywhere. He's clearly dazed and confused walking out of the building, only managing to put on pants and his coat, but no shoes.
A victim or a suspect?
At the SVU squad room, Tess (Audrey Hare) arrives and states she wants to report a rape, but shocks the officers when she says she was the rapist. Olivia takes her to a conference room to hear more. Tess claims to be an escort and the night prior she got an outcall about a job and met Reese and Duvall. She winds up having consensual sex with both of them who were high and paid cash upfront.
As Tess wrapped up and was leaving, she passed by Ray in a room and alleges he looked like he didn't belong. That's when Reese and Duvall attempted to pay her to have sex with Ray, but she rejected the idea as he appeared "totally out of it." The boys didn't take no for an answer, and she claims a gun was put to her head and she was forced to have sex with Ray.
Hearing this story, Olivia tells Tess she actually was raped in this scenario.
Maddie's family faces another crisis
Before Olivia has a chance to work the case, she receives an emergency call from Maddie's mom Eileen (reminder, Maddie is the missing girl from the season 25 premiere). Olivia has new SVU recruit Officer Gomez (Edie Salas Miller) drive her to the hospital.
There, Eileen shares her husband went into Maddie's room and attempted to hang himself with a belt in her closet. Eileen was only narrowly able to find him in time and call for help. The news prompts Olivia to take a personal day to help Eileen with this new family crisis. Ultimately, Eileen's husband is physically okay and on his way to recovery.
All roads lead back to the scene of the crime
Fin (Ice T), Bruno (Kevin Kane) and Velasco (Octavio Pisano) follow leads to get to the bottom of what happened to Tess. After she recalls the address of the crime, SVU tracks down a rideshare account that an intoxicated Ray paid for to get him and the young men there.
The detectives confront Ray about the possibility he was sexually assaulted, but he doesn't know what they are talking about and doesn't remember much about what happened the day prior. Although it takes quite a bit of convincing, Ray eventually agrees to walk Fin and Bruno through last night the best he can remember, referencing the credit card charges from the evening.
Fin, Bruno and Ray go to a bodega where Ray spent $12,000, purchasing all of the scratch-off lottery tickets and hard seltzers. Camera footage from the store shows Ray with Reese and Duvall, which sparks Ray's memory about the VIP booth at Galapagos.
When the detectives and Ray go to the club, a waitress recalls Ray was a big tipper but is initially less forthcoming about Reese and Duvall. After a threat from Fin, she shares that before Ray arrived at the club the younger men ordered drinks. The SVU detectives use receipts from the bar to eventually track down the suspects.
At the station, Reese and Duvall are adamant they did nothing wrong. Not only did they not pull a gun on Tess, but Ray approached them about having a good time so they did what they could to make sure he had the time of his life. Carisi (Peter Scanavino) doesn't have enough to prosecute, since Ray doesn't remember anything to corroborate Tess' version of events.
Wanting to salvage the case, SVU eventually convinces Ray to call Reese and Duvall to set up an in-person meeting so Ray can pretend to apologize. The idea is that Ray wears a wire and gets the guys to talk about what happened.
Ray meets with Reese and Duvall at Galapagos and the three men start talking about the night and the police department's investigation. As Ray is getting somewhere, his wife shows up, almost ruining things. However, Ray pulls her to the side and informs her he's undercover and trying to help the police, which prompts her to leave.
In the end, Ray gets the guys to confess to pulling a starter pistol on Tess to force her to have sex with Ray. The two men are arrested and eventually take plea deals.
New episodes of Law & Order: SVU debut on Thursdays at 9 pm ET/PT on NBC. Episodes become available the next day on Peacock.
