When Kelin McKenna loses her mother at age fourteen, her father, hoping for a job in the administration of newly elected President Abraham Lincoln, moves the two of them to Washington, D.C. on the eve of the Civil War. Kelin struggles to adapt to her new surroundings, the cruelties of war, and all of her new emotions as she finds herself falling in love.

Shelby Baylor is a career woman in her late twenties navigating her way through single life in the eighties, coping with trouble at work, and dealing with a growing tension between her and her mother as she discovers an all-consuming passion for ballroom dancing.

When Kelin and Shelby's lives intersect in an unexpected way, Shelby realizes she must draw on her inner strength and her faith in God if she is to ever find her way home.