Elite local patron, Joanna Silver, welcomes Liu Xing, a Chinese student, to Valley State University. He enters the university with dreams of fame and a Nobel Prize. Cultural differences and school politics threaten his ambitions and result in unimaginable violence.

Claire is a high-powered attorney whose perfect life comes crashing down around her when her husband is chardged with high crimes of murder. Enlisting the aid of a shrewd military attorney, Claire will risk her career and even her life to find out the truth.