After the sudden death of her father, San Francisco mediator Kate Reed must work with her stepmother -- who's the same age -- to keep his firm alive by resolving a dispute between a clothing magnate and his son, who's due to inherit the business, and hiding a dark personal secret which could ruin an innocent boy's life.

Kate (Sarah Shahi) mediates a settlement between the State of California and Steve Jenks (guest star Paul Schulze), a wrongfully convicted man who spent 22 years in prison. As Kate tries to put a price on the years he lost, Steve escapes into a prison of his own making, refusing to deal with the pain of his past -- until, when pushed, he explodes.

Kate’s (Sarah Shahi) nemesis Judge Nicastro (guest star Gerald McRaney) assigns her to mediate a case between a high school football coach and the angry parents who claim his old school methods border on abuse. When the videotaped evidence doesn’t make sense to her, Kate unearths the real reason for the coach’s controversial actions.

While mediating a dispute between the star of the cooking show Burnin' with Bo (guest star Eddie McClintock) and the company releasing his barbecue sauce, Kate (Sarah Shahi) discovers that Bo's assistant Beth (Camille Sullivan) is actually the brains behind the business and that Bo's holding her up for a bigger piece of the profits. None of which matters when someone from Beth's past emerges to claim an even bigger piece for himself.

Kate mediates the settlement between an insurance company and a man who was hit by a truck, only to find the real conflict is between the man and his wife, who claims the husband she knew never came back from the accident. Richard Dean Anderson and Anne-Marie Johnson guest star.

The exasperated young inventor of a revolutionary new device, Marcus (guest star Devon Gummersal), threatens to jump to his death when John (Currie Graham), his employer and the rights holder to Marcus' invention, asks Kate (Sarah Shahi) to mediate his firing. Kate must get Marcus off the ledge, recover the device, which he's stolen, and find a fair resolution for both the disenchanted employee and his former boss.