This is the concluding work of the Llewellen trilogy, which began with In the Heart of Things and continued with Into the Ashes.

Robert Llewellen is living in Norfolk, Virginia, living alone, working as a firefighter, living with his memories of his earlier life. Then two things happen. He meets an extraordinary woman named Sandy, and his old friend Fish arrives at his door, mortally ill, asking only for a place to die. Llewellen is once again faced with love and death and the meaning of life.