The tough private eye Patrick Kenzie was raised in a poor and dangerous neighborhood of Boston, and works with his partner and girlfriend Angie Gennaro generally tracking missing losers in debt. When the four year-old Amanda McCready is abducted from her apartment, her aunt Beatrice 'Bea' McCready calls the police and the press, and the case is highlighted with the spots by the media. Then Bea hires the reluctant Patrick to work in the case because he is not a cop and based on his great knowledge of their neighborhood. Meanwhile Capt. Jack Doyle, who lost his own daughter many years ago and is in charge of the investigation, assigns detectives Remy Bressant and Nick Pole to give the necessary support to Patrick. After interviewing the addicted low life mother of Amanda, Helene McCready, Patrick goes to a bar and discloses that Helene was on the streets with her boyfriend Skinny Ray Likanski dealing and using drugs on the day Amanda disappeared. Along his investigation, Patrick faces smalltime criminals, drug dealers, pedophiles and corruption, facing a moral issue to solve the case.
