Houston residents don’t expect a white Christmas but hope for a dry one. It is 1982, hot, humid, and floodwaters have trapped people in dangerous situations. At a small specialty store in a high income community, a dozen or so people are stranded, apparently strangers caught at random. But murder reveals the only stranger is a detective whose presence is hardly coincidental. This is a mystery in the tradition of Agatha Christie featuring the descendant of a famous 1900s Texas lawman. The free and easy 80s are a sharp contrast to the world his ancestor lived in but murder is just as common.