Set in Belfast after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 2000. Cool Water is the story of the inter-twined relationship between the establishment and street criminals during this period. Donny Campbell is an infamous paramilitary figure, who is a reflection of a violent society. He is sexually repressed and vents his anger and sexual frustration in a cocktail of violence and warped depravity, ultimately hidden in a world where murder and immorality is almost a part of the norm. Donny finds a kindred spirit in Lord Roddy Harding, a man working in the highest echelons of Ulster and London society. Their relationship fractures when Donny becomes a liability as he becomes increasingly unstable and reckless. Harding through the guise of the British state despatches one of its prolific foot soldiers to kill Campbell and maintain a fragile peace through an assassination that will save his reputation and that of the Government.