When an unwelcome figure from her past turns up unexpectedly, Angela Marchmont is plunged into a nightmare. Now she faces a fight for her life which she looks almost certain to lose without the help of the man she loves. But what hope does she have when the one man who can save her is the one man who has every reason to abandon her to her fate?

When an unwelcome figure from her past turns up unexpectedly, Angela Marchmont has no idea that she is about to become the most notorious woman in Britain. Forced to reveal secrets she has kept to herself for many years and which she had thought were safely buried, Angela faces a fight for her very life which she looks almost certain to lose without the help of the man she loves. But what hope does she have when the one man who can save her is the one man who has every reason to abandon her to her fate?

When Douglas Westray, the son of an eminent aircraft manufacturer, is found shot dead in a locked room at a society ball, it seems obvious that it’s suicide—after all, he had two failed engagements behind him, and had lost the family firm a prestigious prize through his own neglect. But not everybody is convinced—including Freddy Pilkington-Soames, who soon discovers that there are still questions to be answered. Why was Douglas wearing the wrong shoes when he was found? What is the connection with a near-disaster at an air show? And was Freddy’s narrow escape from death under the wheels of a car an accident or something more sinister? Assisted by his old friend, the wayward and irrepressible Lady Gertie McAloon, and pestered at every turn by rival reporter Corky Beckwith, Freddy finds himself drawn into a world of sabotage, blackmail and shady deals which threaten to scupper the success of a new fighter plane before it even gets off the ground. But there’s more at stake than just money, and now it’s up to Freddy to untangle the clues and unravel the dark secret of a murderer who has already killed at least once and will think nothing of killing again.

It is Hogmanay, and Angela Marchmont is at Fives Castle, the Scottish seat of the Earl of Strathmerrick, to see in the start of 1928. But when she finds out that the Foreign Secretary, the American Ambassador and the Head of British Intelligence are also among the guests, Angela begins to suspect that something momentous is afoot. Before long, they are all snowed in and a body is discovered, and Angela soon finds suspicion directed against herself...

While holidaying in Italy, Angela Marchmont is persuaded to postpone her trip to Venice and go to Stresa instead, to investigate a pair of spiritualists who are suspected of defrauding some of the town’s English residents out of their money. But what starts out as a minor matter swiftly becomes more serious when one of the residents in question is found dead in the beautiful gardens of his home, having apparently committed suicide. Seduced by the heady sights and scents of the Italian Lakes, and distracted by an unexpected encounter with an old adversary who seems bent on provoking her, Angela sets out to find out the truth of the affair and resume her journey to Venice before she forgets herself and loses her head—and her heart.

It's 1929, and Ticky Maltravers is the toast of London high society, adored by everyone—or so it seems, until somebody poisons him over dinner. Now it turns out that numerous people with secrets to hide had every reason to wish him dead. But which of them murdered him? For Freddy Pilkington-Soames, newspaper reporter and man-about-town, the question hits a little too close to home, thanks to an unfortunate drunken encounter with Ticky's corpse which he'd much rather the police didn't find out about—and thanks also to his exasperating mother Cynthia's seeming determination to get herself arrested by tampering with the evidence. But a pretty girl with big blue eyes is demanding his help in solving the mystery, so what can he do but agree? Now all he has to do is hide the wrong clues, find the right ones, and unmask the murderer before the police discover what's really been going on. That ought to be easy enough. If only people didn't keep getting killed...