Sandy Walker works child abuse cases for the Los Angeles juvenile delinquent court as a defense attorney. Like her fellow attorneys, she has learned to distance herself from her clients, using the law as a shield to keep their crimes and their lives from touching her. Sandy fights a daily battle to keep her equilibrium in a madhouse of abuse and denial. But something or someone is trying to pry its way past the bottles of brandy, past the guilt and self-loathing, into her heart. Could it be Manuel, her young Mexican lover, all hard muscle and carefree manner? Or Francisco Gomez, the tall, good-looking police officer who suddenly wants to be part of her life? Or Malver Lopez, a young ward of the court who was victimized by one of Sandy's clients, and is in desperate need of a friend? Or perhaps the ghost of her abusive father, still haunting her dreams? Whatever it is, whoever it is, it wears a disguise of time-worn ritual, and a mantle of corrosive compassion-and it will change Sandy in ways she could never have imagined.