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'Dangerous' Davies in a dutiful, decent, uncharismatic detective not held in high esteem by his co-workers. Despite his diligence, he is never assigned anything more than the most innocuous of cases by his superiors. His only friend is Mod, an idiosyncratic Irishman who walks dogs professionally and conducts sex surveys involving senior citizens. Davies stumbles onto a cold case involving a missing seventeen year old girl, and with his quietly effective persistence proves the disappearance to be murder and exposes the killer.
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Acting upon information received from his friend Mod, Dangerous Davies investigates the disappearance of a man whose wife seems strangely unconcerned about his whereabouts. As he delves deeper into the mystery he discovers that his behaviour is not unusual, however, his absence this time is somewhat longer than normal. When the husband's car is discovered at Heathrow under suspicious circumstances Dangerous probes into the husband's past and discovers some disturbing facts. Slowly, Dangerous pieces together what actually happened and determines the real culprit.
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A pretty full case load for Dangerous as three cases nobody wants ends up on his desk. First, there is the stupid armed robber that rushes into a job centre ordering the staff to open the safe. When the staff point out that there is no safe he realises that the place is no longer a building society. Next, there is the pensioner who believes that her next door neighbour has murdered his wife, cut her into pieces and is gradually flushing her down the toilet piece-by-piece. Finally, there is the irate victim of a burglary who came to the police station to complain to the chief about the lack of information and progress of her case. Dangerous takes an interest in the case and the woman begins to take an unhealthy interest in him gradually reaching obsessive proportions. Dangerous soon realises that she is seeking attention rather than the solution to her case.
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Maurice Lehman, a self-proclaimed, untalented artist, burns to death in his locked studio on the property he bought several years earlier when he won the lottery. An often abusive alcoholic, he lives with his beautiful Irish wife Christine, twenty years his junior, and Henry, a teen-aged Granadan boy whom he has "adopted" after spending time on the island celebrating his lucky windfall. Neither seems especially upset at his death. Also on Dangerous' list of people of interest are Lehman's brother and his wife, whose garment factory he walked out on after his lottery win.
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Dangerous Davies is assigned to investigate the murder of Frank Moore who was shot and dumped in a rubbish heap. Turns out Moore was a decorated former soldier who'd left the army some 5 years earlier. His daughter Karla is now a member of his old Regiment but both she and her mother are holding back information from the police. Moore had a breakdown of sorts some two years before and from that point seemed to be very unhappy. His dissatisfaction also coincided with a domestic dispute at his residence. Turns out Moore was released from the army as part of the cutbacks and he had recently had an altercation with his wife. Davies suspect that Moore's murder is somehow connected to his time in the army but finds any number of suspects.
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Teddy O'Connor was the lead singer for a rock-and-roll band during the Seventies and the object of adoration for his many teen-aged fans. Twenty years later after he is found dead in his modest flat, a whiskey bottle shoved down his throat. The motive seems rooted in the past and Davies interviews other group members, his corrupt manager, and those who knew him twenty years earlier.
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Dangerous Davies investigates the death of Geoff Fallon, a stock car driver who was killed during a race at the local stadium when his car exploded due to a leaky fuel line. There seemed to be a considerable animosity with his brother, also a stock car driver, but it turns that Fallon was convicted of killing a child with his car some years previously and the dead child's older brother was working at the stadium on the night in question. When a second person is killed, Davies determines that the case is far more complex than originally thought. Meanwhile, all of the officers at the local station are under investigation when information is leaked to the press.
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On the day Jimmy "The Gent" Vincent is released from prison, an armed gang robs an armored car carrying diamonds. Jimmy was a well-known diamond thief and the robbery seems to be right up his alley. However, he is discovered the following day, shot in head and floating in his swimming pool. When the police learn that had written a soon to be published tell-all memoir, Dangerous Davies can't help but wonder what may have been said in the book so as to set someone off. At home, Dangerous' wife Julie puts her foot down and insists that his friend Mod move out. Whe Mod is badly beaten, he ends up living with yet again.
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When the police find Dominic Sylvester murdered in his home, they also find something far more sinister among his belongings: an 8mm snuff film made sometime in the 1980s. Sylvester was a bit off-kilter and was living the life of a hermit. As the police look into his background, they find that he once was an avid amateur photographer who had an interest in pornography. He is divorced and his ex-wife has re-married; he is also estranged from his now adult son. Dangerous tries to identify the murdered girl in the snuff film but makes little headway until a lip-reader suggests to him that the girl in the film isn't speaking English. Meanwhile Dangerous' friend Mod finds himself a job in what he grandly calls children's entertainment that leads to a relationship with a rival.
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Bunny Hopper is half of a stand up comedy act who were once on the brink of stardom but are relegated to playing to small crowds in social clubs. When Bunny collapses on stage, everyone assumes a heart attack but the post-mortem reveals that he had ingested rat poison. Despite his age, Bunny was quite a ladies man. Not only was he married, he had a long list of lady friends all over the country with three regular girlfriends in Willesden alone, all of whom were at the club the night he died. With most of the squad away on a special assignment, Dangerous and his friend Mod start interviewing all of the suspects in the case only to come to the realization that he's got it all wrong.
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DC Davies investigates the murder of a limousine driver who is found in his limo, his neck was slashed with a broken bottle. The investigation focuses on his previous evening's customers but it appears the driver also had secrets. He'd been living in Uruguay until a few months before and apparently had undergone extensive plastic surgery. The case takes a decisive turn when the victim is identified as a former London cabbie who disappeared after a passenger left a case with 2 million pounds in his cab.
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Dangerous Davies investigates the death of Daniel Boden who is found dead sitting in his car on a football pitch. According to Bowden's wife, her husband was having an affair, but Dangerous learns that he was a member of a lodge that was involved in shady financial dealings. The case becomes ever more complicated when Davies learns that a colleague is also a member of the same lodge and now suspects there may be a cover-up. On the home front, things are not going well as Dangerous fears his wife may be having an affair.
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