Since her mother was institutionalized, sixteen-year-old Celeste has been in and out of orphanages. Celeste is overjoyed when Wade and Ami Emerson adopt her. But when she discovers Ami's real reason for adopting her - a reason that involves a sexual tryst with Ami's father-in-law - Celeste is terrified.

Willow De Beers leaves her North Carolina college town and sets out in search of her birth family amid the glamour of Palm Beach, where she falls head over heels for a young lawyer, but soon the truth about her family threatens her happiness and pushes her to the brink of insanity.