Wisecracking reporter Dixie Flynn thinks fast and talks even faster it's the only way to survive the San Francisco crime beat. When she's assigned to look into the death of her former lover, artist Diego Chino, Dixie's instincts tell her there's more behind the apparent suicide than the police are letting on. Dixie's canvassing of the Bay Area art district reveals it to be a perfect picture of corruption, with a handsome art dealer and a reclusive patron in the foreground. After a romantic evening in Chinatown ends in a brush with death, Dixie is more determined than ever to expose the truth. But when a fire in her vicinity turns out to be more than just performance art, it's clear the perpetrators would rather see Dixie dead than let her destroy their criminal masterpiece. "