Nina Bannister has solved many mysteries in the little Gulf Coast town of Bay Saint Lucy. But how did Nina's career begin? What was life like for this retired grande dame of education? Take a trip back in time to 1969 to meet Nina, the first-year teacher, newly married to her young lawyer-husband Frank. What started this English teacher on a life of solving crimes? How did she become the queen of this little artist community on the Gulf of Mexico? It all starts when Nina attempts to intercede for a wayward student, one Penelope Royale, when the young woman's mother is found dead. Nina and Frank, in an attempt to help the newly-orphaned teenager, start out on a mission that quickly turns very risky and the two young lovebirds find themselves in way over their heads.