Cassie Swann is weighing several offers, including a proposal that she join a cruise in the Indian Ocean as a bridge expert, when a chance viewing of the Grand National Day Race on television thrusts her whole life into turmoil. Cassie is shocked to realize that the owner-trainer who stares out at her from the screen, a woman named Brigid Fraser, is the mystery figure pictured in one of Cassie's old photos of her father, known as Handsome Harry, who was stabbed to death outside his pub twenty years ago. Determined to face the tragedy she's been running from, Cassie decides to arrange a meeting with Brigid. This woman will clearly be able to tell Cassie about her father. She must have known him well to have named a racehorse after him twenty years following his death. It's at least a starting point in an investigation that's sure to be painful as it brings back memories and opens new wounds. There's also another case that's troubling Cassie: somebody in the village of Larton Easewood is sending threatening letters to an Indian couple she knows through her bridge classes. As a case of racial prejudice, it's bad enough, but when the situation escalates to murder, Cassie realizes she's in the middle of a particularly deadly game. Menaced by phone calls from a psychopathic former bridge pupil, experiencing problems in her love life, fighting the battle of the bulge, and frightened by a midnight prowler, Cassie struggles to focus on the two murders - one twenty years ago, one more recent - and finds herself in grave danger before she uncovers some surprising answers.