Mickey Haller gets the text, "Call me ASAP - 187", and the California penal code for murder immediately gets his attention.

Suddenly, Mickey's not just trying to get his client off a murder charge, but there is a more personal connection: the victim was Gloria Dayton - his own former client, a prostitute he thought he had rescued and put on the straight and narrow. Far from saving her, Haller may have been her downfall.

Haunted by the ghosts of his own past, and with his own guilt or redemption on the line, he desperately needs to find out who Gloria really was and who, ultimately, was responsible for her death.