After a teenage boy is found mortally wounded in his own bedroom, a homeless woman and a
foreign girl runaway together. Shortly after, the girl frames the homeless woman for the assault on the
boy and the homeless woman seeks vengeance but learns that her new friend is working for a Russian
mobster

SYNOPSIS:

Joy is a foreign student that is new to the Southern California area and meets 21-year-old Shelly Owens. The two young women become friends. Joy is shy but targeted by the family's son, Ryan, who is a sexual predator. The next day, Shelly is arrested after the principal of the school calls and makes a complaint about her hanging around school property. With Joy left alone, this gives Ryan the opportunity to assault her. Shelly's lawyer, Brenda bails her out and instructs her to stay out of trouble. A shaken Joy is found traumatized by Shelly and plans to get her away from Ryan.

Ryan wakes up, bleeding and castrated. Shelly and Joy arrive in Las Vegas. With little money to spend, Shelly plays a game of craps and wins 150k. Now enough money to get an apartment and able to get a job as a grocery clerk. Joy starts a job as a cook and things start to go smooth in their daily lives. The next day, Shelly goes through Joy's bag and finds a bloody butterfly knife. Joy catches Shelly with the knife. A phone call from Brenda warning her that she is in trouble with the law. Shelly is arrested. Brenda visits and informs her that the knife that was found in Shelly's possession, is the same knife used to kill her husband two years earlier. The next day, Brenda comes back with another visitor, Maggie. Shelly's mother. The same mother that Shelly thought abandoned her but was left by her father at a gas station when she was eleven years old.

The mother and daughter find peace. Brenda returns to California, leaving Shelly to her life. Shelly goes in disguise and poses as a high roller girl and meets Earl. A former football player and bodyguard. Shelly accompanies Earl on the High Roller Ferris Wheel and finds Joy with her boss, Xander. Earl and Shelly start to like each other after a fight ends with Joy and Xander getting arrested. Shelly informs Brenda that Joy is in jail but Brenda tells Shelly that Joy killed her husband to get initiated into the Russian mob and that she is in danger. A member of the mob holds Maggie at gunpoint but is rescued by Earl. Not feeling safe, Maggie and Shelly go to a motel. Shelly spends the night with Earl. Two days later, Brenda returns to Shelly's apartment to find her but finds Joy instead and is kidnapped. Brenda's twelve-year-old daughter, Lola, sits and waits but sees her mother being carried out. Urgently, she calls Shelly and tells her what happened. Shelly and Earl pick Lola up and take her back to Earl's cottage.

In Xander's office, Shelly and Earl show up to rescue Brenda. Shelly ambushes Joy. Earl takes down some of Xander's men. All coming down to Xander, who is shot and killed by Shelly. Back at the cottage, Brenda and Lola reunite and leave. Shelly is left with Joy, given word by Brenda to let her live. An army of twelve men shows up and kills Joy in the crossfire. Earl and Shelly take down the men one by one, but Earl is shot and lies dying on the ground. Shelly and Maggie go their separate ways. The next week, Shelly shows up at Brenda's front door, pregnant and allowed to stay with her. That night, Brenda is called in to take custody of a delinquent teenage girl named Nicola but is really the girls' stepmother. At the shopping mall, Brenda and the girls accompany Shelly while she looks at the baby cribs. Brenda catches Nicola talking to her friends, who are bad examples. Brenda accidentally lets it slip out that she is her stepmother. To which, Nicola runs away.

Worried sick about Nicola, Brenda goes and looks for her while Shelly watches Lola. Nicola returns to the house by sneaking into the bedroom window, drunk. Shelly finds Nicola with an empty pill bottle and causes Nicola to throw up the pills. Brenda returns and is relieved to have Nicola home and safe. The next day, Brenda praises Shelly for saving Nicola and allowing her to live with them. Shortly later, Ryan is found by Shelly and is arrested as he is getting off an elevator.

Maggie shows up at the hospital after Shelly gives birth to a girl. In the backyard, Brenda tends to her garden. She gets a glimpse of her husband, Nick. At peace now after justice has been served. Brenda says goodbye and Nick disappears.

ISSUES ISS #1