Kate Francis is alone in her belief that her mom was murdered. Sheriff Reed Clemens found Joanne Francis' twisted, broken body, down a thirty foot bluff in the badlands of South Dakota. Her death was deemed an accident. In June of that same year at Elderwood High School, Kate joined thirty eight other students receiving their diplomas. While those friends celebrated their new found freedom, Kate stepped onto a Greyhound bus headed for Seattle, Washington with no explanation to anyone. She leaves behind her blind brother, Kevin, self-absorbed sister, Cheri, and their father to cope with the grief at the loss of mom and wife. Kate takes a part time job at the Ugly Mug Café not far from the University of Washington. After getting scholarships and loans to pay for her education, she struggles to scrape together money for each semester's tuition. For the next five years she immerses herself into the Criminal Justice Program. Kate wants to be prepared to face her mother's killer. Just months before Kate starts her final semester at the UW in criminal justice, she receives a distressing call. The man she knows killed her mom died of a heart attack. The next day Kate is on a flight back to Rapid City, South Dakota. While trying to find clues to her mom's death, Kate is exasperated by the fact that the sheriff is always at hand. She is also frustrated by the lack of support from Kevin. In the face of many obstacles, Kate is still unwavering in her need to prove her mom's death was murder. But the more she learns the more she has to consider. Is there more to her mom's murder than she had supposed?