The story centers on the nefarious Vontini family, who dwell in Columbia Parish in southern Louisiana. The wave of petty crimes that follows in the wake of the slippery Vontini family goes unnoticed until they step over the line when they begin to kidnap young women, abuse them, brainwash them and put them to work helping to commit any number of the family's latest criminal acts. In this sordid and grotesque tale of family values, Violetta, a mother abandoned by her husband, raises her two boys Lupin and Antoine in the art of skullduggery. The Vontini family's latest kidnapping victim, Denise, at first revolted by the family ultimately cooperates in their crimes.Enter Rikki Tate, a successful black female private investigator working out of Atlanta. Rikki is friends with the kidnapped girl's mother and agrees to take on the grueling assignment of finding her friend's daughter. The story combines sociological, psychological and philosophical analysis through observations of and by the various characters. Additionally, Riegel tackles one of the thorniest issues facing the United States of America in the early 21st century: Race. The private eye and the kidnapped woman's mother grew up together in the South, one black, one white. The question: How are we as citizens of the U.S. going to resolve the issue of race relations and realize that people are people, no matter the color of their skin?