Catarin Kavanaugh, a beautiful woman, accomplished interior designer, and financially well-off socialite in Miami's high-society, following an irresistible courtship, marries successful Italian investment councelor, Max Ferro. They live a guilded, privileged, exemplar life for ten years, both advancing rapidly in their respective careers, until a series of nearly fatal freak accidents threaten Catarin's life. It seems she's become a magnet for disaster.Following the shocking casual discovery of photos proving her husband's infidelity, she faces him, ordering him out of her life. A quick trip to Switzerland, to remove his name from her accounts, reveals that he has already stolen her fortune. She retreats to recover energy at her uncle's estate inb Provence, before returning with a plan. Back in Miami, she discovers that her husband has also mortgaged her home, and that foreclosure is imminent. Her financial ruin is compounded by the fact that "desperation stinks". Nobody associates with a failure in Miami and that leaves her without work and with no friends. At the last minute, she manages to sell the estate and have a small amount of money left after paying off the bank mortgage. The always more sophisticated accidents continue and, although impossible to prove, it finally becomes apparent that Max is behind the plan to eliminate her. A whole new and very different set of friends rally to her cause. People she never would have bothered with before, become precious and vitally important friends. One of these is just a virtual contact; Johannes Frey, an elderly archeologist who befriends her after an initial misunderstanding when she writes an e-mail he considers offensive. The exchange of e-mails with him comforts and sustains her throughout the whole process of revolutionary change in her life and he rapidly becomes her trusted advisor.A tragicomic divorce with an incompetent lawyer and a woman-bashing judge, frees her from any ties with Max.
On the run from a glittering social world in Miami, through the vineyards of Provence, to the Yucatan jungle and the Caribbean Sea, talented and beautiful Catarin Kavanaugh flees to escape a murderer. She discovers real friendship and love when fear and necessity force her to radically alter her lifestyle. A violent hurricane on the Mexican coast, will alter her destiny.
