Linden Cross has built her reputation defending the forgotten-too principled to climb, too stubborn to quit. So when she's handed the high-profile case of Gavin Trent, the golden son of a powerful senator, she assumes it's a long-overdue reward. But from the moment the files land on her desk, something feels off.

Key evidence disappears. Witnesses vanish. Surveillance footage is corrupted, and redacted pages arrive already stapled into silence. The deeper she digs, the more the system around her-judges, colleagues, even her own supervisor-urges her to let it go. But Linden doesn't let go.

Until a photo arrives in an unmarked envelope. A dead man. A warning. And a note that reads: This is what happens to people who get too close.

As courtroom battles turn to psychological warfare, Linden finds herself at the center of a conspiracy designed not just to bury the truth-but to bury her along with it. Is she being set up, or unraveling on her own?

And if she was never meant to win this case...

what was she meant to become?