Detective-Sergeant Malcolm Ainslie, a former Catholic priest, is about to start his vacation when a call comes in from death row. Before serial killer Elroy Doil is taken to the electric chair, he wants to make a full confession to the cop who put him away. To close the books on additional murder cases in which Doil is a suspect, Ainslie drives four hundred miles to Florida State Prison.

 

Although Doil confesses to ten other homicides, he insists that he didn't commit the crime for which he will be executed the following day: the grisly slaying of a city commissioner and his wife. In his search for the real killer, Ainslie will discover that the upper levels of Miami's government—including some of his closest colleagues—are more corrupt and dangerous than he ever imagined.