When Sydney Burke is almost strangled by a serial killer with a penchant for poetry, she becomes the focus of a certain FBI agent named Joe Ross, who's hunting for the serial killer. Sydney is a stringer—a freelance journalist who races to newsworthy scenes to get video to put on the air for a fee. She unwillingly becomes a target for the serial killer who wants something from her. Between dealing with a crazy ex-boyfriend, paying off gambling debts to a pimp, and staying away from a congressman with Alzheimer's in a quest for her identity, Sydney has to find the killer and escape the city before she becomes the next victim of his bad poetry and a gun to the head.