Mike learns from his caretaker Bill that Mattie's father-in-law is Max Devore, an elderly rich man who will do anything to gain custody of his granddaughter. Kyra's father, Lance, has died. Max learns of Mike and threatens him over the situation. Mike hires John Storrow, a custody lawyer, for Mattie. Invited to dinner, Mike gets to know Mattie and Kyra, and learns more about their situation. In passing, Mattie repeats a remark once made to her by Max Devore, implying that the two men's great-grandfathers were associates. Mike is puzzled by this, since his family came from points quite distant from TR-90.
Max manages to drag Mike into the custody battle by forcing him to make a deposition for the impending custody hearing. Accompanied by a local lawyer, Romeo Bissonette, Mike makes the custody lawyer hired by Devore look foolish by beating him at his own game and calling his bluff.
Mike begins to write again, while both Kyra and Mike experience hauntings in their homes. Mike realizes that the ghost of Jo is assisting him in solving the mystery of Sara Tidwell, a blues singer whose ghost is haunting the house. Mike asks the locals what happened to Sara Tidwell, and is warned to refrain from digging in old scandals. He also learns that Jo frequently returned to the town in the year before her death, without telling him.
Max Devore threatens Mike again, and in an encounter with Mike, Max and his personal assistant, Rogette, try to drown him. Mike survives due to the help of his wife's spirit. In an unexpected turn of events, Max Devore commits suicide, which seemingly leaves Mattie and Kyra free from his influence.
Throughout the novel, Mike experiences psychic phenomena. He has complex dreams of Sara Tidwell, Mattie, and Jo; he speaks on the phone with Mattie and can tell not only what she is wearing, but what she is thinking. After Devore's death, Mike is plagued by uneasy feelings on behalf of Mattie. Clues gradually appear, provided by Jo, while Sara Tidwell's spirit fights to keep him from learning the truth. He begins to understand some of it when he notices how many names of local inhabitants begin with a "K" or "C." He learns how relatives of several people he knows in town have drowned in childhood.
Mike, Mattie, John, Romeo Bissonette, and George (a detective that helped Romeo with the trial) are having a party when two gunmen commit a drive-by shooting. Mattie is shot fatally in the head, while John, Romeo and George are wounded. George fires back, rupturing the fuel tank and causing the car to crash into a ditch, where it burst into flames. Mike, the only adult not hit, takes Kyra back to Sara Laughs as a huge storm breaks. Under the influence of the ghost of Sara Tidwell, he finds himself preparing to drown Kyra and commit suicide himself, going so far as to give Kyra cocoa and Benadryl to make her sleep, and drawing the bath. The ghost of Jo is trying to prevent him from doing what he's doing.