If Professor Maxie Reddick is honest with herself, there's a very personal reason she pursued a career in criminology: the unsolved murder of her sister, Susan, nearly 30 years before, and her belief that the local police force let her family down. Now Maxie has been drafted in to help investigate a murder - nothing particularly unusual about that, except when a fingerprint at the scene provides a shocking and unexpected link to her sister's suspicious death. The link means that Maxie can't be involved in the official police investigation - but Susan's cold case is heating up, and there's no way Maxie is going to let go now, even if she has to stand up to the people who want to make sure the past stays frozen.