In the first week of a Chicago October, Jeri Erikson's three-year-old is abducted. When she recovers from the shock, she vows to move heaven and earth to get him back. With information that he's being held deep in tropical Mexico, she embarks on a treacherous journey that leads to her implication in a double murder. When both her former lover and a fellow researcher are killed the same way, suspicion falls on her most trusted friends as well as herself.

The crisis increasingly draws attention from all corners, including two crime families, the state police, and a federal administration frantic to avoid an international incident and trouble with US politicians intent on their Wars against Drugs and Terror. A goat must be found, even if it's the wrong one.

The innocent have little time to uncover the killer before they're thrown into a dungeon, possibly tortured, perhaps for the rest of their lives. How can Jeri extricate her son from a powerful cartel family? And how can her friends be cleared before it's too late?