Dorset 1838. When a ship is wrecked in a storm off Portland, Joseph Rushmore finds more than the usual haul of plunder. He and his wife, Anna, have just lost a baby, and when an infant is washed ashore in a cradle it seems that their prayers have been answered. Joanna grows up knowing nothing of her origins, but at the age of sixteen she is orphaned and finds herself at the mercy of her violent Rushmore cousins. She is rescued by middle-aged sea captain Tobias Darsham, who has made a pilgrimage to the island to visit the graves of his wife and baby daughter. Overwhelmed by the feeling that they belong together, he proposes marriage, and, in gratitude, Joanna accepts. However, Tobias is shocked when he discovers her childhood cradle among her belongings - because it is the one he carved himself for his own baby daughter. Horrified that he might have married his own daughter, Tobias fakes his death, leaving Joanna in the care of Alexander Morcant. Finding themselves mutually dependent, Alexander and Joanna's initial animosity develops into a fierce attraction. But will she ever discover the truth about her origins...?