Serious trouble is brewing in Brighton, California, a sprawling coastal community on the eastern edge of the Los Angeles Basin: Its Mayor has just been murdered, and the chief of police has resigned amid rumors of corruption in his department. Now, ex-police officer Joe Copp has been hired by an old friend, the current Brighton City administrator, to get to the bottom of the municipal mess.
Copp's investigation uncovers a trail of corpses and a tangled web of sex, drugs, and official corruption. Suddenly, Copp finds himself skating on thin ice, caught in a shoot-out with a deadly accurate SWAT team.