Samorn is nine years old when her family sells her. An 'auntie' trawling the Northern Thai villages for 'brothel fodder' takes her to Bangkok where she is destined for a short life of servitude and sexual abuse. She is saved from this fate when the kingpin of organised crime, renowned industrialist, Henri Sahliman, sees her while meeting with a business associate. Entranced by the small girl he buys her for an outrageously high price.

Sahliman's background is one of tragedy and loss from the civil war in Algeria where his mother, father and siblings fall to a murdering regime. As an adult he leads the young of Algeria in a revolution against the pro-war factions, until his wife, son and daughter are also brutally executed in retribution.

Broken and grieving, his cousin Ghas and Ghas's wife Amira take him to Bangkok where he regains a level of equilibrium. When he rescues a street boy and buys the small girl, his world changes forever. The possibility of losing another family is unbearable and he closets the girl away from society. The consequences of this action shatters his world irrevocably.