"The Dishwasher" of the title is Bill Malone, a stoic, tough-as-nails ex-con who has just finished a stretch of fourteen hard years in prison for bank robbery. What he wants more than anything is peace and refuge from the chaos and mortal danger of penitentiary life. Released in Fresno, he quickly finds a room at the Star Motel on the edge of town and a job as a dishwasher at Ferraro's restaurant. The motel owner is Gail, a retired exotic dancer and the wife of Tough Tony, Malone's friend from the joint.

Gail and her ravingly nubile thirteen-year-old daughter, June, take Malone under their wing; Leona, a bluntly sensual black waitress, ministers to Malone's aching need for sex. He seems finally to have arrived at a safe place.

1. The safety disappears at once when Malone is forced to take brutal revenge against a Mexican drug dealer who rapes June. That moment of explosive violence sets him on an inexorable collision course with the Sandinos, a dysfunctional Mafia family in stark decline. Somebody is going down - and Malone is determined to stand his ground.