When the patriarch of a family of burglars is imprisoned, his wife makes the decision that the family will leave their lives of crime and 'go straight'.

When her husband Wolfgang (Wolf) is jailed for previous burglaries, Cheryl West comes under pressure from his associates to move into drug dealing. She is outraged by this, and makes the decision that the family will move out of the crime business and get honest employment. Wolf is not pleased about this, but there's not much he can do from jail.

Cheryl and Wolf have four children. Jethro has already set himself up with an honest career: he's just graduated law school and has a job with a law firm, although he wasn't entirely upfront with his employers about his qualifications for the job. His twin brother Van has severely offended an Asian family who might be linked to the Triads, and has to work as their pool boy to repay his debt. Both the mother and daughter of the Hong family have designs on Van.

Pascalle, the eldest daughter, wants to become a model, and is trying to raise money to pay for the shots that an unscrupulous photographer has taken of her. She will do almost anything to succeed, but there is a line which she will not cross.

Loretta is the younger daughter, who is bored by school and blackmailing the deputy principal, who she caught having an affair with Jethro some years earlier when he was her student. Loretta has a significant entrepreneurial talent and a lack of respect for the law.

The final member of the family is Ted West, Wolf's father, who appears to have Alzheimer's disease some but not all of the time.