Jessica Martin (Kim Basinger) is a high school biology teacher who lives with her husband Craig (Richard Burgi), a realtor, and their son Ricky (Adam Taylor Gordon). One day, after taking Ricky to the bus stop for school, she is kidnapped by a group of five men who break into her house, slay her housekeeper, confine her in the attic of their safe house, and smash the landline telephone with a sledgehammer hanging on one of the beams in the attic to prevent her from contacting anyone. Jessica, however, manages to use the wires of the broken phone to contact a random number.