Inspector Scobie Malone is called in on an easy case--Norma Glaze is found strangled in her bedroom and her husband, Ron, has disappeared. All evidence points towards the husband, so Malone puts the case aside. But the scene from the night before tells the real story: a one-night stand gone bad and a killer with a twisted claw of a right hand.

Four years later, tipped off by a local officer in the bush town of Collamundra, Malone finds Ron Glaze and arrests him. On trial for murder, Glaze insists that he is innocent, but the evidence points to his conviction. The prosecutor for the case is brilliant, young Tim Pierpont, a family man and pillar of the community. With Pierpont on the case, Malone knows it's open-and-shut. An easy win.

Meanwhile, Sydney is up in arms over the kidnapping of Lucybelle Vanheusen, a child model who is the advertising darling of the moment. Given the hysterical nature of her family, Malone doesn't take her abduction seriously--until a body is found. The murder shakes the devoted father in Malone, but as he investigates the kidnapping, it becomes painfully clear that the family life of little Lucybelle was far from the warm, loving existence of his own home.

Just when Malone thinks he can't sink any lower, a key witness comes forward in the Glaze case and implicates Tim Pierpont in the murder. Malone doesn't buy the accusation, but he can't ignore the coincidence presented to him--Pierpont's deformed right hand. He is forced to investigate the Crown Prosecutor, his friend and respected colleague. Suddenly, Malone is embroiled in two cases where the deeper he probes, the more he wishes he hadn't. And the answers he finds are too awful to reveal. Herein begins his Dilemma.
Scobie Malone is called in on an easy case--Norma Glaze is found strangled in her bedroom and her husband, Ron, has disappeared. All evidence points toward the husband, so Malone puts the case aside. But the scene from the night before tells the real story--a one-night stand gone bad and a killer with a twisted claw of a right hand.

Four years later, Ron Glaze is on trial for murder, and the prosecution is brilliant young Tim Pierpont, a family man and friend to Malone, who also happens to have a twisted claw of a right hand. A witness comes forward, implicating Pierpont in the murder--Malone doesn't buy it, but could it really only be a coincidence? Herein begins Dilemma.