NYPD detective Billy Taggart (Mark Wahlberg) is arrested for the murder of Mikey Tavarez, who raped and murdered the sixteen-year-old sister of Taggart’s girlfriend Natalie Barrow (Natalie Martinez). His superior officer, Captain Carl Fairbanks (Jeffrey Wright) goes to Mayor Nicholas Hostetler (Russell Crowe), who eliminates the evidence against Taggart. Tavarez’s death is ruled as self-defense, but even though the mayor calls him “a hero” in private, Taggart is forced to leave the police.

Seven years later, Taggart is a private detective on the verge of bankruptcy when he’s hired by Hostetler to investigate a romantic affair that his wife Cathleen Hostetler (Catherine Zeta-Jones) is having. Helped by his assistant, Katy Bradshaw (Alona Tal), Taggart learns that Cathleen is seeing Paul Andrews (Kyle Chandler), the campaign manager of Hostetler’s rival in the upcoming elections…