On a blistering summer day, a bank robbery goes wrong, resulting in the deaths of all the hostages except Treva Williams. Pittsburgh psychologist and trauma expert Daniel Rinaldi is called in by the police to treat Treva. Soon an unforeseen series of events plunges the investigating officers, Sergeant Harry Polk, Detective Eleanor Lowrey, and Rinaldi into a vortex of mistaken identity, kidnapping, and surprising revelations about District Attorney Leland Sinclair's gubernatorial campaign. Is Sinclair somehow involved in the bank case?

Rinaldi's attention is diverted by the suicide of a young patient and his growing attraction to Eleanor, as the recently-divorced Harry Polk spirals into an alcohol-driven, self-destructive free-fall. Then sudden death threats against Sinclair fuel a new frenzy of accusations and political maneuvering, and Rinaldi begins to make connections. Soon, what he knows—or thinks he knows—will pull him toward a shocking and possibly lethal confrontation.