Young Ruth watches her mother Lou deliver Ms. Mina's premature baby on a snow day, inspiring her future career.

Ruth, now a labor nurse, is assigned to care for newborn Davis Bauer at Mercy-West Haven Hospital.

Turk Bauer demands Ruth be removed from caring for his son, citing his white supremacist beliefs.

An emergency C-section pulls other nurses away, leaving Ruth alone with Davis, who then stops breathing.

Davis Bauer dies despite resuscitation efforts, with his parents Turk and Brittany present in the room.

Turk files a police report against Ruth and she is formally charged with murdering Davis.

Ruth's nursing license is revoked and she is escorted from the hospital by security.

Police break down Ruth's door in the middle of the night and arrest her for murder.

Kennedy McQuarrie is assigned as Ruth's public defender at the arraignment and secures her release on bail.

Kennedy convinces her boss to let her take Ruth's murder case, making it her first felony trial.

Ruth and Kennedy repeatedly clash over Kennedy's decision to keep race out of the courtroom defense.

Kennedy discovers that Davis had an undiagnosed metabolic condition called MCADD that could have caused his death.

The trial opens with clashing crowds outside the courthouse as Odette frames the case as a patients' rights issue.

Turk loses control during Kennedy's cross-examination, calls her a race traitor, and lunges at her throat.

Judge Thunder grants Kennedy's earlier motion for acquittal and Ruth is found not guilty.

A Black labor nurse named Ruth Jefferson is barred from caring for a white supremacist's newborn son, and when the baby dies, she is charged with murder. Ruth loses her job and her nursing license before police arrest her in the middle of the night, leaving her teenage son Edison alone. A public defender named Kennedy McQuarrie takes on the case and clashes repeatedly with Ruth over whether to address race openly in the courtroom. As the trial unfolds, Kennedy uncovers a key medical finding—an undiagnosed condition called MCADD—that could have caused the baby's death regardless of anyone's actions. The prosecution's star witness, Turk Bauer, destroys the state's case when he loses control and lunges at Kennedy on the stand. The judge ultimately grants a motion for acquittal, vindicating Ruth after an ordeal rooted entirely in racial injustice.

The central story of race, murder, and justice.

Ruth detects a slight heart murmur in newborn Davis during his examination and flags it for follow-up.

A hot-pink Post-it note is placed on Davis's file barring all African American personnel from his care.

Ruth makes a joke about sterilizing Davis while preparing him for his circumcision procedure.

Ruth performs chest compressions on Davis as the emergency medical team rushes in to attempt resuscitation.

After everyone leaves, Ruth descends to the hospital morgue alone and holds Davis's body.

Ruth meets with hospital lawyer Carla Luongo and chooses to say she never touched Davis.

Ruth visits her mother Lou at the Hallowell house and begins to doubt her own perceptions of racism.

Ruth is interrogated by detectives MacDougall and Leong in a windowless room before requesting a lawyer.

Turk spits on Ruth during the arraignment proceedings and is escorted forcibly from the courtroom.

Kennedy accompanies Ruth on a shopping trip and witnesses security guards stopping Ruth alone at the exit to check her receipt.

Ruth and Edison are invited to Kennedy's house for dinner, where Violet makes an innocent comment about slavery.

Ruth's mother Lou dies of a stroke, and Ruth and Adisa reconcile over their shared grief at the funeral.

Brittany Bauer sobs and threatens Ruth from the gallery when Davis's photograph is displayed during testimony.

Edison is arrested and charged with a hate crime for spray-painting a swastika on the hospital.

Turk and Francis find Brittany at Davis's grave with self-inflicted wounds on her arms and rush her to the hospital.

Before Davis Bauer's death, Ruth had already noted a heart murmur in the infant and endured the humiliation of a posted note barring her from his care. Her offhand sterilization joke and her presence during the resuscitation become pieces of evidence the prosecution later weaponizes against her. In the aftermath, Ruth faces pressure from the hospital's lawyer, is interrogated by detectives who assume her guilt, and quietly tries to rebuild her life through government assistance and a new job. Kennedy deepens their partnership through shared experiences—a shopping trip exposing everyday discrimination and a dinner where race is discussed with surprising honesty. The novel's emotional center shifts when Ruth's mother dies and she and her sister Adisa reconcile over their grief. The stakes are sharpened further by Brittany Bauer's breakdown in the courtroom and her self-destruction at Davis's graveside, showing how hatred can consume those who wield it.

The evidence, relationships, and consequences surrounding the trial.

A car accident involving a Black driver kills Turk's older brother, setting Turk on a path toward radicalization.

Turk beats his own father at a gay bar attack, making him a legend within the white supremacist movement.

Ruth tells Marie she was doing what she was supposed to do—nothing—effectively lying about not touching Davis.

Turk visits former mentor Raine Tesco and discovers Raine has left the white supremacist movement entirely.

Kennedy watches daughter Violet make racially charged remarks and resolves to fight to remain Ruth's lawyer.

Turk posts on the Lonewolf blog under his real name, turning Davis's death into a white nationalist rallying cause.

Brittany sees Turk speaking on television and emerges from her medicated grief, telling him he is a star.

Wallace Mercy arrives at Ruth's door offering support and comparing her situation to Trayvon Martin's story.

Kennedy and Howard allow a school teacher they suspect of deep implicit racial bias onto the jury.

Ruth confesses to Kennedy that she did attempt to help Davis and had been lying about it the entire time.

Ruth shouts from the witness stand that Davis would be better off dead than raised by Turk, then fires Kennedy.

Kennedy finds sickle-cell abnormalities in Davis's lab results, revealing a clue to Brittany Bauer's hidden ancestry.

Outside the courthouse, a Black woman named Adele confronts Brittany Bauer and announces she is Brittany's biological mother.

Francis Mitchum confirms Adele is Brittany's mother and reveals how his heartbreak over Adele drove his own radicalization.

Six years later, a reformed Turk working with the Anti-Defamation League brings his daughter to a clinic where Ruth is the nurse and thanks her.

Turk Bauer's radicalization is rooted in childhood tragedy and his subsequent rise to infamy within the white supremacist movement—a path that is quietly tested when his former mentor abandons it entirely. In the present, Ruth makes a fateful decision to lie about her inaction during Davis's death, a small deception that shadows her throughout the trial. Kennedy's commitment to Ruth deepens from a personal epiphany in her own living room, while Turk's public blogging and Brittany's reawakening show how grief and hatred fuel each other. As the trial reaches its crisis point, Ruth confesses her lie, insists on testifying against Kennedy's advice, and then explodes on the stand in an outburst that seems to doom her case. Kennedy uncovers a biological secret buried in Davis's lab results, which Wallace Mercy uses to expose Brittany Bauer's Black ancestry publicly outside the courthouse. The novel closes years later with a transformed Turk—humbled and working to dismantle the movement he helped build—thanking the woman his hatred once tried to destroy.