Driving home along a generally unused country road following a speaking engagement, famed mystery novelist Tess Thorne experiences a flat tire on her car. She accepts the help of who she believes is a good Samaritan who stops to help her, but who instead rapes her, leaving her submerged in shallow water in a drainage pipe as dead. She found out that he actually orchestrated her getting the flat tire just moments before the rape. Alive, she, in shock, is able to make her way home, but she does not go to the hospital, dealing with her wounds herself, does not call the police, or tell any of her friends or acquaintances how she sustained her obvious injuries. Once the issue of what happened to her settles into herself, she decides to use her skills as an investigative writer to find out the reason behind what happened - if she was a random or targeted victim - and especially if the latter, how best to use that information to her advantage. Using her stories' grandmotherly heroine, Doreen Marcus, as her inspiration, Tess decides that the best course of action is revenge, and figuring out a way not to get caught. In the process, she may discover more than she bargained for.

Whiling away the hours in an isolated countryside estate near Nazi-occupied Utrecht, the abdicated German emperor, Kaiser Wilhelm II, is still considered an influential man, and above all, a desirable assassination target. As a result, to avert a possible attempt against the life of the silver-haired former monarch, the reluctant Wehrmacht Captain, Stefan Brandt, is put in charge of his security, as there are rumours that a stealthy spy is in their midst. However, against all odds, Stefan will commence a fervent clandestine affair with the mansion's cryptic Dutch handmaiden, Mieke de Jong, threatening to put in jeopardy an already dangerously volatile situation. Now, with the imminent arrival of the powerful Reichsführer, Heinrich Himmler, can Brandt protect both the Kaiser and the unexpected love of his life?