Doctor Jonathan Ransom thought he knew everything about his wife Emma until she was killed in a tragic skiing accident in the Swiss Alps. They had been married for eight years, eight blissful years in which they had travelled the world together. But the day after her death a mysterious letter addressed to her arrives at their hotel. When he opens it, his beliefs begin to unravel -- fast. .

In the envelope is a railway baggage check to a suitcase that reveals an Emma far removed from the down-to-earth nurse who has been his constant and loyal companion all those years. In it he discovers the clues to a double life. Was she having an affair? When is your wife not your wife? And when she is not your wife, who is she?

The answers begin right outside the train station where two policeman are waiting - to kill him. There are more answers as Jonathan escapes and the action sweeps him through Switzerland on a quest to discover the truth abut Emma. He is pursued by ruthless killers, entangled in an international conspiracy that touches all the world's Security Services and which will end in a denouement which is as breathtaking as it is totally unexpected.