Hans Garbrecht (Klaus Manchen), the manager of a large housing company, has been shot in his house. What initially looks like a routine case soon leads Till Ritter (Dominic Raacke) and Felix Stark (Boris Aljinovic) deep into the German-German past: They find out that Garbrecht was a major in the GDR's foreign espionage and a list with aliases. Shortly thereafter, the suspects included the well-known TV presenter Maria Berkbusch (Aglaia Szyszkowitz), who was seen at the murdered man's villa at the time of the crime. The critical journalist has been looking for a mysterious spy with the alias "Leopard" for a long time.
Maria is currently researching a book that will be published by her husband Max Vollrath (Felix von Manteuffel) and will cause a stir: It is a revealing book about Stasi files and agents at the time, but above all about that mysterious "Leopard". What did Garbrecht know about it? Was he the "Leopard"? However, Maria's interest in "Leopard" is not only of a professional nature, she also has a private interest in asking him: 25 years ago, he made sure that her parents, who were opponents of the regime, were betrayed in the GDR and in front of them eyes have committed suicide. On the search for the traitor, Maria finally comes across the "Rosenholz" file and hopes to find the real name of the "Leopard", because it lists all the people who have ever spied for the GDR.
Together with her friend Dr. Gerd Rabius (Michael Goldberg) from the Birthler Authority tries to get hold of the material, but the "Rosenholz" file is under lock and key. But soon the up-and-coming politician Wolfgang Zimmerer (Christoph Grunert), who is the managing director of a housing company, is the focus of the investigation - was it his car that was seen at the scene of the crime? Was he perhaps blackmailed by Garbrecht, especially since documents appear in which he undertakes to give Garbrecht a lucrative piece of land on Rügen? Suddenly, events are rushing.
When Maria wants to cooperate with Ritter and Stark so that she can access the "Rosenholz" file via the two commissioners, her entire archive suddenly goes up in flames and all her documents about the "Leopard" are destroyed forever. The traces point to arson. During their research, Ritter and Stark also interview Maria's aunt, the sculptress Jutta Berkbusch (Tatja Seibt). Can she bring light into the darkness, because she adopted Maria after the death of her parents? But then Maria makes a discovery that she would never have expected and that shakes her deeply..