The novel starts with Chief Ed Kapenash, who has appeared in other novel, gets a call at 6 in the morning on Juny 7 to tell him that a woman has been fished out of the sea dead. The woman's name is Merritt Monaco, who was the maid of honour at the wedding that was to be celebrated that day.
From this point the novel moves between different points in time and we get to learn more about the characters.
The couple to be married was Benji Winbury and Celeste Otis. Benji is a rich young man, and his parents own the property where the wedding was to be celebrated. Greer Garrison, his mother, is a famous writer of mystery novels, and her husband, Tag, has a hedge fund. Tag seems to be a bit of a philanderer, and his wife knows about it. The person she suspects he is having an affair with is Feathereigh Uxley, who is Tag's friend's sister, but when the woman arrives, Greer realises that whatever was going on between her husband and Feathereigh is over. The truth is that Tag started a relationship with Merritt, the woman who has been found dead. Merritt was Celeste's best friend and maid of honour, and when she stayed in Nantucket for Celeste's hen weekend, she seduced Tag. However, it seems that during the pre-wedding dinner he may have broken up with her because Merritt was seen crying.
Celeste met Benji at the zoo where she is the assistant director. One of her colleagues was sick so she gave a talk about snakes, and Benji came with his former girlfriend and her daughter, Miranda. After that, Benji asked her out and they began their relatioship. Celeste was awed by how rich Benji and his parents were, and it seems that she was not swept off her feet. Now that the wedding is close, Celeste has developed a stutter. Her parents have come. Her mother, Karen, has terminal cancer, and she suspects that something is the matter with Celeste.
The Chief and Nick from the state police question those who are in the house. Nick questions Abby, Benji's sister-in-law, and he thinks that she hasn't told him everything. She tells him about seeing Merritt crying and Celeste comforting her, but when Nick pushes her for details, Abby claims that she went to bed and didn't see anything else.
Ed questions the wedding planner, who was the one to find the dead woman. He tells him that Celeste was the one who got Merritt out of the water, and she was histerical, and now she is in hospital. What is strange is that Greer and Tag, who were in the house, did not seem to have heard anything. Ed next questions the best man Shooter Uxley, who arrives at the house with his luggage, and when he is asked about his movements the night before, he says that he stayed with a waitress and took all his luggage because he thought about staying there, but then he changed his mind. When Ed keeps questioning because he knows he is lying, he excuses himself to go to the toilet, and Shooter runs away through a window. Ed alarms the airport and the staff in the cruise. Lola, who is dating Ed's adopted son Finn, sees the picture of Shooter and knows he has boarded the ship, so she calls a policeman and Lola points at Shooter, who is arrested.
A very interesting plot like I am used to with this author.
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