The small community of New Liberty in rural Maine is horrified when a young girl is brutally raped and murdered. Dodd's Convenience Store serves as the social center of the town, and Clary Dodd is one of its most prominent citizens. Clary is an inveterate puzzle solver. She has helped the police with one or two minor cases in the past and feels herself uniquely qualified to catch the murderer. Against the advice of her husband and with the help of her friend Laura Dearborn, the indomitable Clary digs into the backgrounds of people she's known for years and turns up disturbing information about many of them. A second violent death clouds the picture and escalates tension in the town. Ignoring threats to their safety, Clary and Laura persist in their investigations only to find themselves in mortal danger as they close in on the murderer.