A developer plans to turn the Thorne Swift nature preserve-home to the lady's slipper flower-into million-dollar lakefront homes. With moneyed interests aligned against him, Burr takes the fight to the courtroom. But when the caretaker at Thorne Swift is found face down in the swamp, stabbed in the eye, Burr finds himself knee-deep in murder.

Who stabbed Frank Slaughter?

Thorne Swift is the biggest piece of undeveloped lakefront real estate in Harbor Springs-seventeen acres of pristine woods, ponds, creeks, and swamps with over a thousand feet of shoreline on Lake Michigan. It's a nature preserve, but a real estate developer wants to turn it into million-dollar homes.

It's also home to the lady's slipper, a beautiful pink and white orchid shaped like a moccasin and central to an Ojibwe legend.

Burr Lafayette, recently divorced, is the deposed head of the litigation department of a major Detroit law firm. A man at loose ends, he's a brilliant but troubled lawyer. He prefers boats over courtrooms, dogs over clients, and martinis over just about everything else.

Burr also likes Thorne Swift the way it is. He goes to court and argues that the lady's slipper is endangered and Thorne Swift can't be developed.

But when Frank Slaughter, the caretaker at Thorne Swift, is found face down in the swamp, stabbed in the eye, Burr finds himself knee-deep in murder.