For eight years, some has been murdering women, following the same brutal ritual each time. The most recent victim doesn't fit the profile, but evidence links her to the others. Anna volunteers to go undercover to crack the case.

The discovery of the mutilated body of a young woman seems to echo that of the notorious unsolved Los Angeles 'Black Dahlia' murder of the 1940s.

Anna becomes involved romantically with the tabloid journalist covering the murder, and an anonymous phone call leads LBangton to an aristocratic ex-army surgeon as the chief suspect in the murders.

Whilst Roache admits to shooting Frank in a panic he denies killing Danny. Middle-class drop-out and user Julian D'Anton's prints are on Danny's car though Langton considers him too small-time to be a murderer. From a photograph Anna identifies Julia's ex-husband Collingwood as an international criminal and asks Sam Power to contact the FBI for details of his crimes in America,though Julia denies all knowledge,even after her accountant,Rushton,is found dead. Anna and Langton visit Julia's homely sister Helga and her husband Damian,an Oxford professor,at their remote farm though they claim to have had little contact with Julia and either of her husbands.

Langton suspects that the reasons he lost out on a promotion to commander is affirmative action and someone resurrecting the Fitzpatrick Case. He takes on the murder of a young actress in order to resolve these questions.