After a childhood friend is shot down while attempting to atone for past sins, Scudder is drawn into a murder investigation that threatens to upset his path toward recovery--and get him killed in the process.

Matthew Scudder is finally leading a comfortable life, one of stability and respectability- even the New York streets don't look so mean anymore. He's married to a woman he loves, and wonder of wonders, he's actually gotten around to becoming an officially licensed private investigator. Then all hell breaks loose. Matthew' s best friend from Hell's Kitchen asks for his help, and Scudder' s world is suddenly turned...

Matt Scudder is an ex-NYPD cop who now works as an unlicensed private investigator operating just outside the law. When Scudder agrees to help a heroin trafficker hunt down the men who kidnapped and then brutally murdered his wife, the PI learns that this is not the first time these men have committed this sort of twisted crime, nor will it be the last. Blurring the lines between right and wrong, Scudder races to track the deviants through the backstreets...