When a man breaks into Mollie Chambers' house and blows his brains out in front of her, she tells the police that she has never seen him before.

Ex-DI Alec Friedman - her honorary nephew - isn't so sure. Mollie has lived an eventful life, as the wife of a diplomat, and he knows she is still haunted by the horrors of more than one war. Alec and his blind wife, Naomi, want to help, but prickly Mollie is a private person, and he and Naomi have their own pressing issues: now that Alec has resigned from the police, what should he do next? And where should they make their home?

But while Alec has quit the force, the force hasn't quit him - his former colleague, DI Barnes, wants to bring him in on the case unofficially, and Alec finds it hard to say no. But just what is it that Mollie has got herself in to? Alec and Naomi only find out just what murky waters they're wading in when it's much too late . . .