A story of love, passion, tragedy and betrayal across two continents when naive computer programmer Madeleine has a chance meeting with worldly-wise translator Rick on a flight to Los Angeles. While staying at his log cabin in the mountains she is drawn into his shadowy past when he confronts his personal shame over his wife's death. Now carrying his child, their romance is interrupted when Madeleine returns to England to see her dying father but when Rick mysteriously disappears, Madeleine has little option than to marry her former boyfriend Jeff. Nearly two decades later and with a teenage son, she is astonished when a letter from Rick, now in London, asks her to contact him. They meet and he whisks her off to Paris for two days. They realise their love for each other has never died, Rick wants her to stay and spend their life together in Paris. She returns home torn between her duty to her family and love for Rick and wonders if she has the courage to make the right decision for her own happiness.