On a late October Sunday morning in Gravigna, local maresciallo Perillo is having breakfast with ex-NYPD detective Nico Doyle when he is called back to the station in Greve. Laura Benati, the young manager of Hotel Bella Vista, is worried--her bartender and good friend eighty-year-old Cesare Costanzi has been missing for three days.

The next morning, Jimmy, co-owner of Bar All'Angolo, Gravigna's local café, where Nico is a frequent patron, runs out of gas on his way back from Florence. When Nico meets him to help, Nico's dog, OneWag, reacts to the smell coming from Jimmy's trunk. Inside Nico finds a body wrapped in plastic: Cesare Costanzi, stabbed several times in the chest.

Why would anyone kill Cesare, and how did he end up in Jimmy's car? That's for Nico to find out, as Perillo once again turns to Nico for help with the investigation.