Flower Net

In Bei Hai Park, Beijing, an elderly man named Wing Yun and his granddaughter discover the body of a young white man frozen in the lake. Inspector Liu Hulan of the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) arrives to investigate. The pathologist, Fong, finds no immediate cause of death but notes the victim is underdressed for the weather and has pink-tinged ice in his mouth and nostrils. The American ambassador, Bill Watson, and his wife, Elizabeth, identify the body as their son, Billy. Ambassador Watson insists the death was an accident and demands the body be released without an autopsy, but Hulan refuses, determined to uncover the truth.

Ten days later in Los Angeles, Assistant U.S. Attorney David Stark, who specializes in prosecuting Chinese organized crime, is alerted by FBI agents Jack Campbell and Noel Gardner that a freighter, the China Peony, has drifted into U.S. waters. The ship is suspected of smuggling illegal immigrants for the Rising Phoenix triad. Aboard the vessel, they find hundreds of dehydrated immigrants and learn the crew has abandoned ship. An immigrant named Zhao Lingyuan explains the crew fled during a storm. While helping to secure the ship, David discovers a decomposing body hidden inside a water tank in the hold.

The China Peony is towed to Terminal Island, and most of its 523 immigrants are quickly deported. An autopsy on the body from the ship reveals the victim was a young Chinese man who was tortured and poisoned with a rare organic toxin that destroyed his internal organs. The ship’s point of origin, Tianjin, is unusual for immigrant smuggling. In exchange for a green card, Zhao identifies the victim as Guang Henglai, the son of a powerful Chinese official, Guang Mingyun. Known as a “Red Prince,” Guang Henglai was found in the immigrants’ drinking water tank early in the voyage. The crew abandoned ship after discovering the body, and Zhao warns David that investigating the death is dangerous.

Back in Beijing, Hulan is summoned by her superior, Section Chief Zai, and Vice Minister Liu of the MPS. Liu reveals that Guang Henglai’s death is being linked to Billy Watson’s. He announces an unprecedented joint U.S.-China investigation and reassigns Hulan to the case, partnering her with David Stark. Zai later privately notes to Hulan that Vice Minister Liu must be familiar with her personal file to have known of her past connection to David.

In Los Angeles, Patrick O’Kelly from the State Department briefs David on Guang Mingyun’s power and gives him an official invitation to Beijing. David arrives and is met by his assigned minder, MPS investigator Peter Sun. At the ministry, David is stunned to be reunited with Hulan, his former lover from twelve years prior. They compare notes, discovering the link between the murders: both victims had a strange residue in their lungs, and their teeth and fingernails had turned black. Later, Hulan visits her catatonic mother, Jiang Jinli, and has a tense dinner with Vice Minister Liu.

David and Hulan’s investigation begins with contradictory interviews. Ambassador Watson is hostile and denies that his son knew Guang Henglai. In contrast, Guang Mingyun is gracious and reveals that Billy and Henglai were best friends and business partners. He gives them his son’s passport and allows them to search his apartment, where they find multiple U.S. bankbooks and photos of Henglai with other “princelings” at a nightclub called Rumours Disco. Hulan takes David to Bei Hai Park, where she warns him they are under constant surveillance. At Rumours, Henglai’s friends confirm the victims were partners and direct them to the Black Earth Inn, a restaurant frequented by an older, more powerful generation.

At the Black Earth Inn, a Cultural Revolution-themed restaurant, they encounter former colleagues from their time at an American law firm, who not only provide a lead on a man named Cao Hua but also reveal unsettling details about Hulan's past during the Cultural Revolution. When David and Hulan go to Cao Hua’s apartment, they find him brutally murdered. His intestines have been arranged to form the Chinese character for “flavor,” a clear warning. They find Cao’s passport and bankbooks, which show similar travel and financial patterns to Henglai’s, as well as Panda Brand herbal remedies. Suspecting a unique poison, they consult Dr. Du at the Chinese Herbal Medicine Institute, who identifies the symptoms in the first two victims as consistent with poisoning by ban mao, or Spanish fly, a highly toxic beetle.

The investigation moves to Los Angeles, where David, Hulan, and Peter join the FBI team. In Chinatown, they find Zhao working in a sweatshop, a virtual prisoner of the Rising Phoenix. David asks Noel Gardner to place Zhao under surveillance. At USC, they discover Billy Watson dropped out two years earlier. A call to Montana reveals Billy and Henglai often partied with local cowboys at the Watson family ranch. David and Hulan conclude that the key to the conspiracy is an unknown product the boys were selling.

At LAX, the team intercepts two couriers arriving from Beijing. After a chase, David captures one of them, and a search of their luggage reveals vials of dried bear bile, an illegal and extremely valuable medicinal product. AUSA Laurie Martin, a wildlife smuggling expert, explains the massive profits in the trade and its links to organized crime, including militias in Montana who poach bears. Hulan connects the evidence to Panda Brand, one of Guang Mingyun’s companies. They decide to use Zhao as an undercover operative to deliver the confiscated bile.

Posing as a courier, Zhao delivers the bile to Spencer Lee, a Rising Phoenix lieutenant. Over a wire, the team hears Lee confirm the bile comes from farms in Sichuan Province and imply a connection to Guang Mingyun. The team raids the house and arrests Lee. That night, a mysterious caller summons David and Hulan to a Chinatown café, where they find Zhao’s dismembered body and Noel Gardner’s body steamed in a dumpling steamer. Spencer Lee is released on bail, escapes surveillance, and flies to Beijing. Hulan arranges for his arrest upon arrival. Convinced Lee is a patsy, David defies his superiors and returns to Beijing with Hulan and Peter.

In Beijing, they witness Spencer Lee’s swift trial and death sentence. They learn more about illegal bear farms in Sichuan from Dr. Du. Elizabeth Watson unwittingly reveals that her husband was helping the boys with a bear-hunting business in Montana and has gone to Chengdu. Guang Mingyun admits his son was stealing bear bile from his company and agrees to testify to save Lee. They rush to stop the execution, and during the public “death ride,” Lee shouts out account numbers that expose the Rising Phoenix’s financial network before he is killed. Immediately after, a car bomb intended for David and Hulan explodes, killing Peter. An elderly witness identifies the bomb as an old Civil War design. Realizing they are targets, David and Hulan evade MPS surveillance and fly to Chengdu under aliases. There, at the horrific Long Hills Bear Farm, they are confronted by the mastermind: Hulan’s father, Vice Minister Liu.

Liu confesses to orchestrating the smuggling ring with Ambassador Watson and the boys. When they tried to cheat him, he murdered them with ban mao. He admits to arranging the other deaths and planting the car bomb. As he is about to kill them, Section Chief Zai intervenes, having followed them. Zai reveals the long-hidden truth of Hulan’s past: during the Cultural Revolution, her mother was crippled due to Liu’s own corruption, and Zai orchestrated Hulan’s public denunciation of her father to save his life. Shattered, Liu commits suicide. While David recovers from a gunshot wound, Deng Xiaoping dies, and they learn Elizabeth Watson murdered her husband. David returns to the U.S. with a disk from Guang Mingyun exposing an illegal nuclear trigger trade, leading to high-level arrests. He also uses Lee’s information to indict the Rising Phoenix’s leader. Campbell admits the U.S. government used the murder investigation as a pawn to support Guang Mingyun against his rivals.