An Englishwoman is attending an expensive psychotherapy course near Vicenza, Italy when she dies in a freak accident. The Italian verdict is accidental death, but the woman's husband questions the decision. Morse and Lewis are sent to Italy where Morse discovers that the psychotherapy centre is run by an old adversary.

Sergeant Lewis gets to display his cricketing skills as a sub with the Clarets XI old boys' team when they gather for their annual match at Oxford, but Morse is called in when one of the team is murdered.

Bailey, Thornton and Cryer were eighties entrepreneurs until it was found that they had stolen millions of pounds from their investors. All three are serving sentences in the same prison where Cryer is found dead in his cell. It looks like a heart attack but the pathologist's report quickly points to murder. Morse and Lewis go behind bars to investigate but must tread carefully with the prison governor.