Syrah Barberra returns to Perth with expectations of joining the legal practice of an old friend and becoming a proper mother to her first child. The friend has a different understanding and when offered a specialist position by the Police Commissioner, Evan Watkins, she's reluctant. Pregnant with her second child, she knows she will be available for only two or three months, but Evan is undeterred. He knows her skills and needs an outsider, a cleanskin, to clear up a corrupt mess on his patch. She takes the job, on the understanding that she will have a free hand, and that when her time draws close, she will be released from her obligations. What follows takes her back to her childhood and opens her eyes to the true nature of those she reveres the most.