He's bored with divorce work, and starting to have serious second thoughts about having left the police force four years ago to start his own agency. Ripley's search has him retracing Jameson's steps, and eventually leads him to Emma's son, who has his more than a few of his own nasty secrets to protect. But it comes to nothing. Like almost everything else in the film, the ending is not so much ambiguous, as just plain unclear. It would have been nice to have a few definite answers, but it doesn't happen.
Characters show up, then never reappear.
Plot lines wander off, never to return. The pay-off never comes. And the film just looks wrong much of the time. They don't add to the story, they detract. A gratuitous scene in a burlesque house, where Jameson drinks, smokes and ogles the babes, supposed to set the mood, is so bad it's laughable.