The book begins with Kera, a nurse in a Planned Parenthood clinic. She is treating a young woman she believes is much younger than she claims for genital warts. She tries to discuss birth control with the young woman because it is clear she is having sex, but the young woman abruptly refuses and leaves the clinic.

Almost immediately after this, a bomb goes off in front of the clinic, injuring Kera and killing a young woman who was in the waiting room.

This quick-paced opening to the novel gets the reader off to a running start. The bombing is not a mystery to the reader, as the woman responsible for it is one of the characters with whom the book spends time. What is a mystery is that the young woman who left the clinic just before the bomb turns up dead the next day. Her body nude, left in a dumpster.

Detective Wade Jackson, the father of a 14 year old daughter, first handles the bombing of the clinic, but is quickly pulled off that case to handle the murder. The young woman turns out to be a 14 year old who was his daughter's best friend for many years.

Is the murder connected to the clinic bombing? Or are the cases completely separate? Kera finds herself unable to help the detective much in the beginning because of the privacy issues with her work at the clinic. But that changes when she stumbles upon an on-line chat room and she realizes that the dead girl was a part of a group of teenagers who were having sex - and lots of it - and all of it unprotected.

Complicating matters further is an extreme religious group that is determined to close down the "immoral" clinic providing abortions, all the while not realizing what is going on with their own children.

This is a well-written mystery, and both Detective Jackson and Kera are compelling characters. Their struggle to find the answers and do what is right for both the dead and the living makes for a really fine book.