Barbara Holloway's a trial lawyer who tends to take on difficult cases. One involved a woman accused of killing her own child, another involved a mentally handicapped man, and her last one found her entangled in such a mess that it's a wonder she lived through it at all.Lara and Vinny Jessup had a lovely May-December marriage. It renewed his lease on life after a battle with cancer, and it rescued her from a bad first marriage.Initially, the sheriff out in Loomis County thinks that Vinny died when his car rolled over on a bad curve on Lookout Mountain. Then he finds the gunshot wound. Was it suicide or was it murder? With a large insurance policy as her motive, Lara could have staged the death - or so it appears to the sheriff.Barbara Holloway finds herself drawn to the Oregon desert to take on this case, accompanied by her associates: her colleague Shelley, with her Barbie-doll looks; the inimitable detective Bailey Novell; and her father, Frank (who's soon to be a published writer!).But the case itself is as dead as the desert. Is there any defense at all?