Wealthy, handsome, and totally unscrupulous, developer Warner Hayden has big plans for an over-the-top luxury resort on Mount Ada overlooking Avalon Harbor, and a collection of dark secrets to ensure the cooperation of key community leaders. His plans aren't what Santa Catalina islanders want, but he seems unstoppable - until he's found dead on a steep slope below his property. Virtually everyone who's anyone on the island has a motive for the murder. With a detective inspector borrowed from the mainland determined to pin the crime on visiting butterfly hunter Robert Michael Pyle, and a host of Plein-Air Festival artists underfoot at every turn, it's up to young Detective Rhys MacFarlane and his islander friends to unravel the tangled webs of intrigue and deception.