The fourth book in the Florida Keys Mystery series.

Fishing guide and part-time sleuth Sam Sawyer is with a client in the remote backcountry of Everglades National Park, when they come upon the abandoned remains of an old red canoe. Forensic evidence suggests it may have belonged to Sebastian Brophy, a fisherman who disappeared without a trace twenty-five years earlier. Brophy's day job had been working as a municipal building inspector, but his passion was conservation of wildlife in Florida Bay and the everglades.

Further evidence revealed that Brophy almost certainly had been murdered. Sam and his wife Katie-a forensic scientist-work with local law enforcement to search for someone with a motive to kill the man. Did Brophy have the goods on a pair of lobster and conch poachers, or had he scuttled the dreams of unscrupulous builders and developers out for revenge? The challenge, as in any cold case, was to piece together a mystery that had lain dormant for a quarter century.