When a body is found floating in a Thames river lock one damp and dreary morning, Superintendent Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Gemma James are summoned from Scotland Yard to the Chiltern Hills outside London.

The dead man is Connor Swann, son-in-law of two of London's most renowned opera personalities. And prints on his neck suggest that Swann was strangled. As Duncan and Gemma explore the quiet woods above the Thames and the flamboyant world of London opera in search of answers, they discover a tangled web of family secrets and hidden emotions. And when Duncan finds himself dangerously drawn to a suspect, he and Gemma must sort out their complicated feelings for each other....