Looking for her wayward son in 1960s Italy, an English widow encounters revelations and begins a dangerous romance.

In Venice Lillian Rutherford meets the ex-gigolo who has shared the last four years of Andrew's life; his disclosures force her to confront a side of her son that she never suspected. Going on to Amalfi, she meets the charismatic Prince Massimo Monfalcone, whose playboy son is being held to ransom in Corsica with Andrew. Massimo distracts Lillian with his life story: his first wife was murdered in a Sicilian blood-feud; his second wife killed herself because of his infidelity. As they wait for news of their sons, a bond grows between Lillian and the Prince...