Late one night, fostered teen Anlya Paulson plummets to her death from the overpass above San Francisco's Stockton tunnel. But did she fall, or was she pushed? Rushing to produce a suspect, homicide inspectors focus on naive school teacher Greg Treadway. But by the time his murder trial is underway, lawyer Dismas Hardy, and his daughter, Rebecca, have unearthed some alternative harrowing possibilities: a missing stepfather, a roommate who ran an escort...

Dismas Hardy, lawyer/investigator, undertakes the defence of Jennifer Witt, accused of murdering her husband and their eight-year-old son as well as her first husband, who had died nine years earlier from an apparent drug overdose. While preparing his case, Hardy learns that both of Jennifer's husbands had physically abused her. But Jennifer refuses to allow a defence that presumes her guilt. She is not guilty, she claims. Hardy is now driven to seek...