Newly appointed Detective Inspector Gemma James has never questioned her friend Hazel Cavendish about her past. So it is quite a shock when Gemma learns that their holiday retreat to the Scottish Highlands is, in fact, Hazel's homecoming--and that fellow hotel guest Donald Brodie was once Hazel's lover, despite a vicious, long-standing feud between their rival fine-whiskey-distilling families. And the fires of a fierce and passionate affair may not have burned out completely--on Brodie's part, at least, since he's prepared to destroy Hazel's marriage to win her back. But when a sudden, brutal murder unleashes a slew of dark secrets and long-seething hatreds, putting Hazel's life in peril, Gemma knows she will need help unraveling this very bloody knot--and calls on the one man she trusts more than any other, Scotland Yard Superintendent Duncan Kincaid, to join her far from home ... and in harm's way.