High school athlete Cyd Loughlin lives alone with her depressive father in South Carolina, perpetually longing to get away from it all. When her aunt, famous novelist Miranda Ruth, agrees to host her for a few weeks during the summer, Cyd jumps at the opportunity. While there, she falls for a girl in the neighborhood, even as she and her aunt gently challenge each other in the realms of sex and spirit.
In New York, people are slain and strangled to death brutally on the open street. All witnesses agree that the murderer was in a cop's uniform. Soon the police search and find a suspect in its own ranks: Jack Forrest, suspected of murdering his own wife and the rest of the unfortunate individuals to die by the Maniac Cop’s reign of terror. To prove his innocence, he investigates the case with his partner, Theresa Mallory.
