Sylvia Chatsworth, flamboyant daughter of a U.S. Senator, and Lyle Thomas, rising star in the San Francisco D.A.'s office, are the city's latest item. Until the tabloid news paints Sylvia as a party girl too naughty for Lyle, and her parents suggest they'd be happier if she disappeared. So she does just that.

For a hefty fee, the Senator sends Lyle off to find his daughter. When Lyle locates Sylvia in the Napa Valley and finds she's changed her image, he's intrigued enough to delay turning her in. Attraction growing, they hide out at a romantic Victorian Inn.

Lyle isn't idle, however. He's hot on the trail of some questionable real estate trades-schemes that connect a missing developer and his vintner brother, the D.A., and the Senator's "blind" trust. When a local spring in wine country turns up with mercury pollution, Lyle and Sylvia wonder how far someone would go to crash land prices and pull off a real estate coup. And is her father hip deep in Mafia activity?

With their growing love threatened by arson and attempted murder, there's also the question of trusting Lyle . . .when Sylvia discovers he's on her father's payroll . . .