Sayer returns to art crime investigation with a promotion to detective inspector in the 'elite' Art and Antiques Unit at New Scotland Yard. Her first assignment is to join a major investigation into an international art crime ring. As she begins her new role she is also hand-picked by a senior Home Office bureaucrat to look into the origin of a painting found in a village in mid-Wales in the home of a recently-deceased judge.
As she balances the competing casework assigned, a deacon at the local church in the village, Tregynon, comes into her sights. John Farrell had been open about his past life of crime and imprisonment when he was appointed at St. Deiniol's. But is there more, unshared? Bit by bit, between events in London, Dubai and a small village in Wales, Sayer unravels the secret of the painting and the burden still carried by the Powys Deacon.