Annie Darling, owner of the Death on Demand bookstore, is shocked to hear talk about her husband, Max, and a beautiful blonde. By the time she's faced down a hostile police chief and bailed Max out of the Chastain, South Carolina, jail, the lady has vanished and Max is the prime suspect in an unspecified crime. The baffling, bloodstained trail leads straight to the doorstep of Tarrant House, home of a venerable Southern family with a violent history dating back to the Revolution -- and ghosts of a far more recent vintage.

Annie and Max find that the dignified facade of Tarrant House hides a hotbed of deadly passions as the family turns on itself in a mayhem of murderous motives and angry accusations. But in the end Annie must summon all her sleuthing skills to stop a desperate killer who is ready to strike again to keep the secrets that haunt the Tarrants from the light of day....