Eleven years ago, Ken fled his family's suburban New Jersey neighborhood after Will's ex-girlfriend, Julie Miller, was raped and strangled. The Kleins eventually convinced themselves that Ken perished on the lam. But as Will discovers, the facts are not so simple. On her deathbed, his mother tells him that Ken is still alive. Then Will's girlfriend and "soul mate" disappears too, only to have her fingerprints turn up at a New Mexico homicide scene. How are these tragedies connected? And what's their relationship to the recent appearance of a contract killer known as the Ghost? With help from an abused ex-hooker, a former white supremacist turned yoga guru, and Julie's younger sister, Will finds himself in a tightly twisted plot that turns on double identities and misplaced trust and that forces him to dig for the courage he was always sure he lacked.