The body of Nadia Zarinski, an attractive young woman who worked for Senator Bruce Lerner - and who volunteered at Ford's - is discovered in the alley behind the theatre. Soon a pair of mismatched cops - young, studious Rick Klayman and gregarious veteran Moses "Mo" Johnson - start digging into the victim's life, and find themselves confronting an increasing cast of suspects.

There's Virginia Senator Lerner himself, rumored to have had a sexual relationship with Nadia - and half the women in D.C. under ninety...Clarice Emerson, producer/director of Ford's Theatre and ex-wife of the senator, whose nomination to the head of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is now threatened by the scandal...Jeremiah Lerner, her aimless, hot-tempered son, said to have been sleeping with Nadia when his famous father wasn't... Bernard Crowley, the theatre's controller, whose emotions overflow at the mention of the crime... faded British stage star Sydney Bancroft, desperate for recognition and a comeback, and armed with damning information about Clarise Emerson...and other complex characters from both sides of the footlights.