Paula Aherne, the Wrights' lovely and trusted babysitter, is dead. Upstairs, the dark bedroom where a child once slept is empty. No ransom note. No clues. And the biggest mystery is the babysitter herself.

Now – in defiance of the police and hte FBI – the child's frantic parents have begun their own dangerous search ... through derelict factory towns and Boston's seamy North End. Only after death has struck again will they learn the fate of their baby – and the truth about ... the babysitter.