After years on the job as a private investigator in Sitka, Alaska, Cecil Younger doesn’t claim to have learned much about humanity as a whole, but he does know this: truth is a slippery thing.

When the wife of a former client comes to Cecil to ask for help finding her husband, Cecil agrees. After all, helping get Richard exonerated during a tragic murder trial three years ago had been one of the biggest successes of Cecil’s career. But why, if Richard’s name had been cleared, was he M.I.A. now? Patricia, Richard’s steadfast wife, has one guess: someone is after Richard. It’s no secret that Richard has a long list of enemies, not least of which are the family members of the dead. But things soon get complicated when Patricia is killed, sending Cecil on a desperate trip to sea to chase down the twisted truth.