Annie Darling, owner of the Death on Demand mystery bookstore, is understandably upset. It isn't like her p.i. husband Max to abruptly disappear—and homicide is definitely not his style. But when his car is found abandoned on a remote road with a brutally slain, once-beautiful young woman nearby and the murder weapon stashed in the trunk, Annie's worst fears seem justified.

The police have Max all but tried and convicted—except

Leah Devereaux is a dead woman. At least, that's what the folks now running the Devereaux plantation tell her: Leah has been presumed dead for nineteen years - since the day that both her parents died. Leah, very much alive, has returned to South Carolina to uncover the untold story of her parents' deaths. While some, like her adopted cousin Merrick, welcome her, Cissy and John Edward tell her to stay away, tell her to stop meddling in secrets