James Sallis

A hired killer on his final job; a burned-out detective whose wife is dying slowly and in agony; a young boy abandoned by his parents and living alone by his wits. Three people, solitary and disconnected from society.

A age 8, Jenny Rowan was abducted and kept for two years in a box beneath her captor's bed. Eventually she escaped and, after living for 18 months on cast-offs at the local mall, was put into the child-care system. Suing for emancipation, at age 16 she became a legal adult and now she works as a production editor for the local public TV station. One day she is asked to help a young woman who, like her many years before, has been abducted and traumatised....