The fate of two strangers becomes part of the heartbreaking history of a celebrated painting in a novel of suspense and forbidden love by the bestselling author of The Lost Letters of Aisling.

The historic art gallery Hatterfield House symbolizes hope for cancer survivor Hannah Caddell. Like the art she painstakingly restores, Hannah needs to be brought back to life herself. Everything is upended when she and a new client, Lucas Henry, are held hostage by gunmen in search of a world-renowned painting from the Cuban Missile Crisis that, decades ago, captured both dread and beauty in a time of cataclysmic fears.

In 1961, Maryann Linnegan can’t see beyond her narrow future as a traditional wife and Florida socialite. Then she falls unexpectedly, deeply in love with Elio, a construction worker and Cuban immigrant. Their forbidden love couldn’t possibly survive beneath the weight of expectations. But when the Cuban Missile Crisis threatens to end the world as they know it, will they choose each other in spite of it all?

Past and present converge as Hannah and Lucas find a startling connection between the painting and the long-ago love story. As the mystery reveals itself, Hannah wonders who she can trust and what she must risk to protect a profound work of art—and to make it out alive.

Cynthia Ellingsen is the Amazon Charts bestselling author of The Lighthouse Keeper, The Winemaker’s Secret, A Bittersweet Surprise, and A Play for Revenge in the Starlight Cove series, as well as several stand-alone novels, including The Cut of the Moon, The Lost Letters of Aisling, Marriage Matters, and When We Were Sisters. She lives in Lexington, Kentucky, with her family. For more information, visit www.cynthiaellingsen.com.