Gloria Sharon Stone has just gotten out of prison after serving three years to save her boyfriend, Kevin. While behind bars, she realizes he never visited, and when she reunites with him, she makes it clear the relationship is over and that she wants the money he promised her for taking the rap. Kevin refuses to pay, laying bare a betrayal that sets the tone for what follows.
Meanwhile, the gang’s accountant tries to protect himself by creating a computer disk that lists all the people involved in the outfit’s criminal activities. The plan backfires in a brutal, shocking sequence: as someone tries to retrieve the disk, one of Kevin’s trigger-happy henchmen wipes out the accountant, his wife, his mother-in-law and his daughter. Only the seven-year-old son Nicky survives, is quickly caught, and is brought to Kevin’s apartment. It is there that Gloria and Nicky cross paths, and Gloria must decide whether to risk her life to save the boy.
Gloria’s encounter with Nicky sparks an unlikely connection. The child’s innocence and sharp, perceptive nature begin to affect her, and she finds herself drawn to him in a way she never anticipated. She confesses that she hates kids and has no kids of her own, yet she becomes a caregiver and a guardian in this perilous world. She initially tries to ditch him in a subway, but Nicky returns, and as they spend more time together, their bond deepens into something resembling a fragile family.
The danger outside mirrors the danger inside Gloria’s heart. News reports reveal that Nicky’s family was killed by the mob, and the boy flees the hotel room where he and Gloria have been staying. Gloria pursues him across the city, and when Nicky sneaks onto a train heading toward 158th Street, she begs the cops to find him, insisting that her child is on that train. After Nicky is eventually apprehended, the two share a quiet, intimate moment back at the hotel where Gloria gives Nicky a bath. Lying awake, Gloria hears Nicky wake up and, with a tremor in his voice, he asks, “Did it really happen?”
The pursuit resumes as Kevin and the gang close in, separating Gloria and Nicky in a crowded cityscape. Nicky is captured again, but Gloria manages to secure a tense exchange: the boy for the accountant’s disk, negotiated with Ruby at a race track. In the end, Gloria takes Nicky to a boarding school, but the two choose to stay together as a makeshift family, intent on a future where they can rely on each other rather than the mercy of a ruthless world.
