A domestic violence call leads detectives to a stately residence on Philadelphia's affluent Main Line. They conclude there's no cause for concern, but Chief Detective Jake Guiliani can't help but wonder after he's handed a manuscript a member of the Balough family gave to one of the detectives.
The manuscript details the history of the Balough family leading back to colonial times-nothing too strange, that is, until Guiliani comes across the family's truly bizarre preoccupation with discovering the secret of eternal life-an obsession that's shrouded generations of Baloughs in murders and mysteries.
The past is yanked violently into the present when Edmund Balough, a scientist and the patriarch of the Balough family, is found in his mansion-stabbed to death.
Dante Balough, Edmund's grandson and heir to the family fortune, has an alibi. The alibi, however, makes him a suspect in the drugging of a police officer.
Edmund's brother, Adam Bolough has a theory about the murder that seems too crazy to believe, and separating fact from fiction becomes increasingly difficult for the chief detective when he learns the story of the ruby necklace hanging around the neck of the family's macaw parrot...