A delayed message from her mother pricks the conscience of Hap Maryland's pal Suellen Ransom. Trudi Ransom was a grifter and a cheat who put the young Suellen, thirteen and pregnant, on a bus to be raised catch-as-catch-can by off-duty cop Wetmore Parsonage. Now Suellen must track down Trudi's killer in the country-music hotbed of Branson, Missouri. When Suellen disappears, Hap gets on her trail, helped and distracted by sex researcher Paula Vanek. Nothing, including Trudi's death, is what it appears to be. The chase brings to light a tangle of secrets that others are desperate to keep hidden, and brings Suellen, Hap, and Paula face to face with a killer storm, deadly violence, and a final horror: the truth about Trudi Ransom.