Lauren Cross does not want to go home for Christmas.

On the cusp of thirty, she's the youngest of four children, and the only one who doesn't work in the family business. When she surrenders to her mother's badgering and agrees to attend the big Christmas party at the estate, Lauren brings her new boyfriend for moral support, and an easy excuse for spending just one night.

But when someone turns up dead, Lauren finds herself driven to figure out what happened. It shouldn't matter that the deputy assigned the case was her high school boyfriend. Right?

With perpetual scorn heaped on her by her siblings and mother, the familiar sights and memories of her hometown, and the nearness of her ex who looks really good in a uniform, Lauren must come to terms with the passage of time and wonders if all her life decisions were the right ones.