Receiving a lucrative anonymous offer to track down an escaped criminal, private investigator Michael Kelly unwinds the past of the fugitive's wife, who harbors deeply complicated and dangerous reasons for standing by her husband.

It's been two years since disgraced Illinois governor Ray Perry disappeared from a federal courthouse in Chicago moments after being sentenced to thirty-eight years in prison on corruption charges. P.I. Michael Kelly is offered nearly a quarter million dollars if he will find Perry, no questions asked. Kelly's investigation begins with the woman Ray Perry left behind: his wife, Marie, who has been ostracized by her former friends and hounded by the feds. As he hunts for her husband, Kelly finds that everyone in Chicago has secrets, including the governor's wife. And some of them could get Michael Kelly killed....