'Not a friend, not a friend greet / My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown.' As she wrote she imagined a stand of Scots pine, their shade cool on even the hottest day, and her bones glowing white in green twilight. She smiled. Seventeen - year - old Isabelle Mattias, the privileged daughter of an artist and a dead rock star, is an unusual teenage girl. When she disappears from her college in the middle of the night, Chief Superintendent Andrew Fenwick arrives to investigate. As unsettling hints of an abusive past surface, Fenwick grows ever more concerned for Isabelle's safety. Is it too much to hope that the girl is still alive? As the investigation falters and time runs out, Fenwick must act quickly to save Isabelle before her trail runs cold. And meanwhile, Inspector Louise Nightingale is preoccupied with her own investigations into the identity of a serial rapist. Could their separate inquiries in fact be linked, forcing the pair to work together once again? As the country is gripped by a treacherous and icy winter, Fenwick and Nightingale must use all their skills to reveal the sinister truth ...