"Dickinson, North Dakota, 1965. It's a harsh winter and freelance indexer Marjorie Trumaine struggles to complete a lengthy index while still mourning the recent loss of her husband, Hank. The bleakness of the weather seems to compound her grief and then she gets more bad news: a neighbor's fourteen-year-old disabled daughter, Tina Rinkerman, has disappeared. Feeling she needs to do something to help the Rinkerman family, Marjorie joins Sheriff Guy Reinhardt in the search for the missing girl. Their investigation quickly leads to a shocking discovery and further complications. Entering the Red Owl grocery store, she and Reinhardt stumble upon the body of manager Nils Jacobsen with a bullet in his head. Despite a looming deadline for the book index, Marjorie is more and more distracted by the disturbing events surrounding the hunt for Tina Rinkerman. Instead of focusing on her work, she follows leads that take her all the way to the state mental hospital in Grafton, some five hours away. Until recently, Tina had been a resident there. The information she uncovers raises more questions, but it ties together the murder of Nils Jacobsen and the girl's disappearance. On a treacherous drive home to Dickinson, she becomes aware that someone doesn't want her to return. She fears the person who murdered Nils will not hesitate to silence her, now that she knows an age-old secret"-- "Marjorie Trumaine, a freelance indexer from rural North Dakota in the 1960s, risks her life to help local law enforcement track down a missing, disabled girl"--