We left season one with councilman Darren Richmond shot and taken to the hospital and Belco is arrested by the cops. Richmond survives after being operated on but he loses the use of his legs as he is paralyzed from the waist down. He struggles with it and Jaime spends a lot of time with him in the hospital trying to help me get through this ordeal. Sarah Linden puts her plans on going to California on hold; she leaves the plans with her son immediately on learning that detective Holder had forged documents framing Richmond. Initially she avoids Holder believing that he is a corrupt cop but meanwhile, Holder learns that he was a pawn in a bigger conspiracy and his recent promotion to homicide detective may not have had anything to do with his police merits. The two regroup and plan to prove Richmond’s innocence.

The truth about Richmond’s location the night of Rosie Larsen’s murder was that particular night, he attempted suicide due to lingering grief over his wife’s death. He jumped a bridge but was rescued by a fisherman. As Richmond contemplate his political future and life as a paraplegic, stricken with guilt Gwen leaves for Washington DC to work for a senator friend of her father, but returned to help Richmond distance himself from the murder suspicion.

After the false arrest Jamie also steels Richmond’s campaign resolve by suggesting that the current mayor might be behind the false arrest. Richmond puts his campaign back on track and he gets a lot of sympathy support from voters. The Larsens are stunned by the developments and Mitch is particular is unable to stand it. She leaves for a few weeks, leaving Stan to take care of the boys with help from Terry. The older boy Tommy goes through a rough patch, acting out and getting in trouble at school which Stan reacts badly to. After a tense few days Stan has a talk with his son and they patch things up. The boys even get a new dog which helps them take their mind of the terrible things in their life.

Rosie’s bloodied backpack is found outside the Larsen’s house and this leads to a possible suspect in a young  man who’s father was killed by Stan on orders of his then mob boss. After being questioned by Holder & Linden, the boy is ruled out as a suspect but he ends up killing Stan’s old boss. During the questioning it is revealed that Rosie knew that Stan wasn’t her biological father. Meanwhile all clues leads back to the Native American casino which Holder & Linden stake out. The first time Holder creates a diversion in the casino floor while Sarah sneaks in. Holder is taken out to the woods and beaten severely while Linden gets back to the prescient and screams to her boss to get a search out for her partner. The police get a warrant to search for him and they finally find him beaten and have to hospitalize him. Linden then sneaks in once again, given a lead by a concerned staff of the casino – Rosie moonlighted as a staff in the casino and used to go up to an unfinished floor to view the city from there. Sarah searched & finds a keycard stuck in the boards but is beaten and lands up in a psychiatric ward on the grounds that she tried to kill herself at the casino.

With Holder’s & her ex-fiance’s help, Linden is released and they two finally get some backing by their chief to search the unfinished floor – and they find the keycard. At city hall they find that the keycard belongs to the Richmond campaign. All eyes are on the killer being either Gwen or Jamie. Finally in a stunning season 2 finale, it appeared that Richmond’s aide, Jamie, had killed Rosie after she stumbled onto a conspiracy involving Jamie with crooked real estate developer Michael Ames and casino boss Nicole Jackson. Holder shots and killed Wright when Jamie, after confessing, raised his own gun. Case closed? Nope. It turns out Rosie’s aunt Terry ultimately killed her, by driving a campaign car into a lake – not knowing that it was Rosie in the trunk. She thought it might lead her lover, Ames, to leave his wife. When Linden deduces this, we have a heart wrenching scene where Terry breaks down and tries to apologizes to Mitch & Stan.

At the end of the episode the Larsens move into their new house with their boys and new dog and try to start life afresh. They are given a video that Rosie made called “What I Know,” in which she expresses her dreams of traveling and love for her family. She had planned to leave Seattle and travel. As Holder & Linden sit in their car outside, they get a call for a new case Linden gets out of the car. Holder insists they got the “bad guy”. She asks who it was. He drives off, leaving her behind to stare at the Larsen garage, then she walks away.

Brilliant show with some good solid acting and a stunning end. I suggest you watch it and enjoy it for yourself. 26 episodes, which one could argue could have been made into a single season.