Cleary, North Carolina, is a sleepy mountain town - the kind of place where criminal activity is usually limited to parking violations. Until now. Four women have disappeared in two years. A blue ribbon, no clues, and no suspects. And now another young woman has disappeared without a trace.

Lilly Martin has returned to Cleary to close the sale of her mountain cabin, marking the end of her turbulent marriage to police chief Dutch Burton - but Dutch's reluctance to let her go isn't her only obstacle to leaving. Trying to outrun a snowstorm, her car skids on the icy road and strikes a man emerging from the woods.

Lilly recognizes the injured man as Ben Tierney, who she met the summer before. They've no choice but to wait out the storm in the cabin, but as the hours of their confinement mount, Lilly begins to wonder if the greatest danger to her safety isn't the blizzard outside, but the mysterious man right beside her.