Mitch McDeere, a top Harvard Law School graduate, accepts a lucrative offer from boutique law firm Bendini, Lambert & Locke in Memphis, Tennessee. After he and wife Abby relocate there, he prepares for the Tennessee bar exam. Senior partner Avery Tolar mentors Mitch on the firm's strict culture of loyalty, confidentiality, and high fees. Although the money and benefits, such as a new house, a Mercedes-Benz, and paid-off student loans have swayed Mitch, Abby resents the firm's meddling in employees' personal lives.

Mitch passes the bar exam and works grueling hours, straining his marriage. Under Avery's guidance, Mitch discovers the firm's primary work involves helping wealthy clients hide money in offshore shell corporations and other questionable tax-avoidance schemes. On a work trip to the Cayman Islands, Mitch overhears a client mentioning how the firm's Chicago associates "break legs”. At the firm's Cayman condominium, he finds documents linked to four deceased associates. Meanwhile, the firm's security chief, Bill DeVasher, sends a prostitute to seduce Mitch and uses photos of the assignation to blackmail him into silence. Mitch hires private investigator Eddie Lomax, a former cell mate of Mitch’s brother Ray, to investigate the associates' deaths, but Lomax is murdered by hitmen, witnessed by his secretary Tammy.