Paradise has a price. For Jesse McDermitt, that price is his moral compass and a bullet. The retired Marine and charter skipper takes on a passenger in Nassau, a young woman who is a breath of fresh air. She introduces him to the laid-back cruising crowd on an idyllic small cay in the Berry Islands. Jesse takes to the relaxing lifestyle like a fish to water. Living each day on its own terms is a new experience for Jesse, but it doesn't last long. Trouble always seems to find him. When Jesse gets word that someone is destroying nearby patch reefs and poaching sea turtles—and that all this is happening in the same area where a trio of sadistic murderers may be hiding—it triggers his instincts for investigation. Has Jesse's urge to find out the truth cost him everything? He came to the Bahamas on a fool's errand to reconnect with a lost love. The image of her on a beach in the Virgin Islands fills his mind as he passes out from loss of blood...