Miami attorney Jack Swyteck doesn't talk about it much‚ but his father was once the governor of Florida. They haven't always been close‚ but earlier rifts have healed‚ and when Harry Swyteck asks for Jack's help‚ he gets it.
Harry's friend‚ the vice president of the United States‚ was out hunting alligators in the Everglades when something went wrong and he ended up dead. Now the president wants Harry to take the job and Harry asks Jack to be his lawyer. Suddenly Jack finds himself off his home turf and in the middle of a very complicated murder investigation‚ with tendrils trailing back almost fifty years.