Lara and Vinny Jessup had a lovely May-December marriage. Initially, the sheriff in Loomis County thinks that Vinny died when his car rolled over on a bad curve on Lookout Mountain. Then he finds the gunshot wound. Was it suicide or was it murder? With a large insurance policy as her motive, Lara could have staged the death—or so it appears to the sheriff. Barbara Holloway finds herself drawn to the Oregon desert to take on this case. But the case itself is as dead as the desert. Is there any defense at all? Compelling and distinctive, this drama demonstrates anew why Kate Wilhelm is considered a master of the form.