Forensic expert and amateur sleuth Aimee Machado is searching for the dangerous link between a local California shooting and an abduction in the Azores.

In the Intensive Care Unit of Timbergate Medical Center, Paulo Ferrara, a young Portuguese man, lies in a coma after being shot in the spine. Aimee Machado, the center's forensic librarian, finds the case especially curious. Paulo was looking for his kid sister, Liliana, last seen on a superyacht leaving the Azores for the Atlantic. Why would a man from Pico Island be looking for Liliana in rural Northern California? And who'd want to stop his search with a bullet to the back?

With the help of her pilot boyfriend Nick Alexander, she's determined to find the answers. And fast. They're becoming more elusive as Paolo's condition worsens with each desperate hour. But following the mystery from San Francisco Bay to the Azorean coast puts Aimee and Nick in dark waters roiling with kidnapping, murder, and criminal conspiracy . . .