Monica is looking forward to a quiet end of the summer on Lucia Street. She’s even beginning to accept her neighborhood and get accustomed to the view from her porch – "a street lined with run-down houses, tall skinny palms, and here and there, a gnarled pepper tree." When she sets out one late summer morning amid kids playing baseball on the street and neighbors calling out to her in Spanish, she does not expect the tantalizing mystery that awaits her. While visiting a local guitar shop, Monica overhears a heated argument between father and son. They have lost La Única, a precious family heirloom that should never have been sold. Suddenly, Monica finds herself fingered as the chief suspect.