Lisa Kallisto is one of those overworked, overscheduled mothers who never secure enough sleep at night. After getting her three kids off to school, working all day as the manager of a charitable animal shelter and taking care of her household, she's lucky to get a few minutes to herself. So when her daughter's friend Lucinda turns up missing after she was supposed to spend the night at Lisa's home, Lisa is full of blame and self-loathing. Now, it looks like the kidnapper, who has already abducted one other girl, is at it again, and Lisa is trying to put the pieces together. So is Joanne Aspinall, an investigator with the local police in the small English town where both Lisa's and Lucinda's families live, and Joanne's finding that things are growing more and more curious as the pieces to the puzzle refuse to fit together.