A teenage girl is found, brutally murdered in her squalid flat. Her mother is devastated. She gave her child up to the care system, only to lose her again, and is convinced that the drug-pusher boyfriend is to blame. DC Rachel Bailey has dragged herself up from a deprived childhood and joined the Manchester Police. Rachel's boss thinks her new recruit has bags of raw talent but straight-laced DC Janet Scott, her reluctant partner, has doubts. Together Scott and Bailey must hunt a killer, but a life fighting crime can be no life at all... A prequel to the hit TV series Scott and Bailey, this is a chillingly authentic story of murder and hunting killers on the mean streets of Manchester.