Ruby Bozarth, a newcomer to Rosedale, Mississippi, is also fresh to the Mississippi Bar - and she faces an impossible task defending a college football star accused of murder. The victim is a young woman from one of the town's oldest families, and Rosedale's upper crust are howling for blood. Then news breaks of a second murder, and lurid, intertwining investigations unfold.

Ruby discovers that no one in Rosedale can be trusted, especially the twelve men and women on the jury. They may be hiding the biggest secret of all.