Sassela Jack's life is in the doldrums: she is burned out by her fourth-grade students and fed up with living with a man she no longer trusts. It is a balmy breeze in her otherwise cool life when Sassela meets Ciam - his lilting accent and warm smile are as beguiling as the Caribbean sunshine he was raised in. Sixteen years Sassela's junior, with no money, no cares, and not many scruples, Ciam is no more than a flirtation, until she takes an unexpected trip to Greece and he turns up on the same flight.

Viewing him with a mixture of suspicion, attraction, and curiosity, Sassela gives in to temptation, and allows Ciam to introduce her to island life.

But this Greek paradise is deeper and darker than Sassela could have predicted, and what began as a fling - a moment out of time well within her control - becomes shadowy and disturbing when an otherworldly local girl develops a menacing obsession with Ciam. As the girl's fascination with Ciam becomes more perverse, her hatred for Sassela becomes more frenzied and irrational, and Sassela comes to realize how little she understands outside the tired world she left behind.