A body with no identification is found in a local reservoir, and a couple fall victim to a brutal killer in their own home. Frost is assigned a new, female, West Indian detective constable, Ronni Lonnegan, and gets off to a bad start with a few racially-insensitive remarks. He then reluctantly accepts the help of a psychological profiler, psychiatrist Pam Hartley, who he met at a conference. Meanwhile, there is an inspection of Denton Police underway, and Frost's old-fashioned methods are not endearing him to the inspector, so Supt Mullett is forced to give him more support than usual.

Background enquiries turn up two previous deaths, which appear related to the case. But their initial suspect, armed bank-robber Charlie Lehman, turns out to have died in prison over a year earlier. As they work to profile the killer they are hunting, Frost starts to get close to Hartley personally as well as professionally, though neither realises just how closely she is linked to the case until it is almost too late. Frost has a race against time to find where she is being held.