Laurie Shoat, a young mother, struggling with post-partum depression, is found dead and her baby is missing. The police assume it was a murder-suicide, but her husband Jack isn't convinced. He believes that his baby may still be alive and begins a search to clear his wife's name and to find the infant.

Tracy Fleming is a widowed police officer, with a young son, who has risen to the role of plainclothes operative. After six women have been raped and killed, Fleming agrees to go undercover in an effort to make herself a target for the killer. The climax places her in a life-and-death struggle with the killer.

The son of famous detective Sam Spade carries on the family tradition of getting involved with the Maltese Falcon - and with the people who will stop at nothing, including murder, to get it.