The Hamptons Lawyer

Jane Smith, an undefeated criminal defense attorney and former NYPD cop living on Long Island, is preparing for what may be the last major case of her career. Eight months earlier, she was diagnosed with neck and head cancer and told she has a year to live. She is now defending Rob Jacobson, a wealthy real estate figure, in his second triple homicide trial in Nassau County for the shooting deaths of Hank Carson, his wife Lily, and their teenage daughter Morgan. Jane's investigator and best friend, Jimmy Cunniff, is at her side, as he has been since they survived a shootout at the Walking Dunes of Montauk.

The prosecution, led by Nassau County District Attorney Katherine Welsh, possesses formidable evidence: Jacobson's DNA near all three bodies, the murder weapon recovered from his Manhattan town house, and a time-stamped photograph placing him at the Carson home the night of the murders. Jane secures a continuance and hires Norma Banks, a legendary eighty-three-year-old jury consultant who tells Jane she believes Jacobson is "guilty as balls" but that the belief will not affect her work.

Jane's health remains precarious. She hides the severity of her symptoms, but chemotherapy leaves her sick most nights. On an evening beach walk, her boyfriend, Dr. Ben Kalinsky, a veterinarian, proposes marriage. Overwhelmed by her diagnosis and the approaching trial, Jane tearfully declines. Unbeknownst to them, Robby Sassoon, an impeccably dressed enforcer for mob boss Sonny Blum, watches the proposal through binoculars from a nearby parking lot. Sassoon has been stalking Jane and plans to kill her when ordered.

Jane flies to the Meier Clinic in Geneva for experimental cancer treatment. Her sister, Brigid, a cancer patient in remission whose marriage collapsed after she testified about an affair with Jacobson during his first trial, drives her to the airport. At the clinic, Jane's doctors deliver grim news: the chemotherapy has failed, and her prognosis remains roughly four months. Jane agrees to a new treatment plan using antibody drug conjugates (ADCs), which require stopping chemotherapy entirely.

Meanwhile, Blum's criminal organization tightens its grip through violence. Sassoon threatens Jane's ex-husband, Martin Elian, owner of a Manhattan restaurant called Café Martin, who has relapsed into a gambling addiction and owes a mounting debt to Blum's operation. As the novel progresses, Sassoon murders multiple debtors using his signature method: one bullet to the forehead and one to the chest.

Back from Switzerland, Jane is confronted by Jimmy, who knows the ADC treatment is her last chance and demands she quit the case. She refuses. That evening, Paul Harrington, the corrupt former commander of detectives who once sent a hitman after Jane and Jimmy, appears at Jimmy's bar in Sag Harbor. Harrington, recently released from jail after his charges were dismissed on technicalities, offers a deal: if Jane and Jimmy leave Jacobson's son, Eric Jacobson, and Jacobson's old friend, Edmund McKenzie, alone, Harrington will reveal that Rob murdered his own father as a teenager while McKenzie killed the father's young mistress, and that Harrington's dirty cops staged the scene and extorted both families for years. Jane pretends to accept, then reneges. She later admits to Jimmy that, despite her professional rule of never asking whether clients are guilty, she does not believe Jacobson killed the Carsons.

Sassoon escalates his campaign, breaking into Jane's house and ransacking it as a warning. Jacobson further complicates his defense by hiring Thomas McGoey, a flamboyant mob-connected attorney, as co-counsel without consulting Jane. Jacobson admits he leaked Jane's plan to subpoena Blum, revealing a long-standing arrangement with the mob boss, and tells Jane that McGoey is a backup plan in case she does not survive the trial.

The trial proceeds in Mineola. Welsh presents the DNA evidence, the murder weapon, and the incriminating photograph. Jane opens with a provocative gambit, telling the jury "Well, of course he did it" before arguing the case is an elaborate frame-up. She freely acknowledges Jacobson's terrible character with women while insisting he is not a killer. Through cross-examination, Jane establishes that DNA can be harvested and planted, and that the prosecution's crime scene technician only collected evidence near the bodies rather than sweeping the entire house. When the murder weapon is discovered at Jacobson's town house by one of his houseguests, Jane surrenders it to Welsh, fulfilling her duty as an officer of the court even though it could devastate her case.

Throughout the trial, Jane's health fluctuates. She faints in the courthouse bathroom; Welsh provides cover by requesting an adjournment and privately reveals she is also a cancer survivor. A CT scan shows Jane's tumor has shrunk for the first time. Jane also learns that Brigid's cancer has returned at stage four, with a worse prognosis than Jane's own.

When Blum visits Jimmy's house uninvited, Jimmy serves him a subpoena hidden under his Yankees cap. On the stand, Blum feigns confusion, denying knowledge of Carson. Jane plays video Jimmy recorded with a camera sewn into the cap, capturing Blum confirming Carson owed him a million dollars. Confronted with his own words, Blum loses composure and inadvertently confirms his connection to the victim, then fakes a heart attack and disappears. That same night, Sassoon murders Martin at Café Martin and sends Jane a photograph of the body with the message "You were warned." Sassoon also murders Harrington, staging the killing as a suicide.

The case reaches a crisis when Jacobson demands McGoey handle his testimony so he can lie on the stand. Jane quits and demands to withdraw, but Judge Horton refuses. Norma privately tells Jane the jury believes Jacobson is guilty, and her only hope is finding the real killer.

The breakthrough arrives when state cop Danny Esposito, Jimmy's friend and ally, discovers Eric in a photo from Morgan Carson's high school yearbook, seated behind Morgan at a football game, evidence that Eric had been stalking her. Jimmy and Esposito then find a hidden security camera at the Carson house, installed by the paranoid Hank Carson through a separate security company, that was still operational the night of the murders. Time-stamped footage shows Eric and McKenzie entering the house with guns drawn. With an arrest warrant, Jimmy and Esposito confront both men at a house in Water Mill. McKenzie opens fire; Jimmy and Esposito shoot back, killing him. Eric surrenders. Before dying, McKenzie records a confession: He and Eric planned the murders for years, driven by Eric's hatred of his father for repeatedly stealing girls from him. McKenzie had the scientific expertise to harvest Jacobson's DNA and plant it at the crime scene. If Jane had won another acquittal, they planned to kill Jacobson themselves.

In a parallel scene, Blum confides in Sassoon about his decades-long control over both families. When Sassoon asks if it is time to kill Jane and Jimmy, Blum agrees, then shoots Sassoon in the back of the head, eliminating another loose end.

Charges against Jacobson are dropped. At the celebration in Jimmy's bar, Jane collapses and is hospitalized. After scans, her doctors deliver extraordinary news: the tumor is gone, a spontaneous regression triggered by the combination of chemotherapy and the ADC treatment. In the aftermath, Jane contemplates proposing to Ben. A lone hummingbird appears at her feeder one last time, impossibly late in the season, and flies away.

The final scene reveals Jacobson, reunited with his wife Claire in their Sagaponack mansion, slapping her twice after discovering photographs Blum sent of Claire in bed with the now-dead Sassoon. Claire pulls a gun from under her pillow and shoots Jacobson repeatedly until it is empty. She calls Jane: "I just killed Rob. I'm going to need a lawyer."