Fifteen-year-old Kala Lannan disappeared from the tourist town of Kinlough in November 2003. No trace was ever found - until now, when her remains are discovered at a local building site. The day after the grisly discovery, Helen Laughlin, Kala's best friend and confidante, reluctantly returns to the town she ran from ten years before.

Helen falls in with two other members of their teenage gang - Mush, scarred and scared to leave the safety of his ma's café on the high street, and the Famous Joe Brennan, Kala's boyfriend, a commercially successful but emotionally conflicted musician newly returned in an effort to dry out and reconnect with something authentic in life. Their actions over the following days are propelled by the need to understand what happened to the girl who meant so much to each of them and whose disappearance upended their lives. But to find answers, they have to confront their own complicity in the events that led to Kala's disappearance. Ultimately, they must do what others should have done before them to stop the violent patterns of their town's past repeating themselves once again...