Trouble has a way of stalking Paul Costa. But when the latest trouble comes in the form of a very dead Congressman with a knife in his ear, the same knife Paul was just using, the same Congressman Paul just neatly ejected from his bar, he knows trouble's not just passing through, it's come home to roost.

Paul had tried to retreat from life, and from pain, raising his young daughter, Marisol, alone after the death of his beloved wife. The former JAG attorney and Naval Officer needed roots, and time to heal, and his daughter needed a father who would be there for her, always, just as he promised her he would be. But being the prime suspect in a high-profile murder threatens to tear him from her. And that was something Paul Costa was not going to allow to happen, even if it means hunting down a killer whose already got Costa in his sights, and who knows the way to reach him is through Marisol.