Kevin Duffy, a young American surfer, has inexplicably fallen to his death from an overlook in the cliffside park high above the Cotes des Basques beach in Biarritz. Peter Ellis, an investigative journalist who lived in Biarritz as a young man, is summoned from Paris by his old friend, Maurice Claverie-Laporte, a recently retired organized crime inspector. The corrupt police chief, Jacques LeClerc, has ruled the death an accident but Claverie-Laporte is not convinced and with good reason. LeClerc has close ties to local Mafia boss Joseph "Jojo" Gambia and his charming, treacherous partner, Janine Destin, both of whom are associated with Jean-Claude Duchon, the jealous, spurned lover of Kevin Duffy's girlfriend, Chantal Clairac. Once in Biarritz, it does not take Peter Ellis long to discover that the boy's death could hardly be just an accident and that Jojo Gambia almost certainly had something to do with it. Nor does it take him long to become romantically attached to lovely Dutch artist, Anya, who just happens to be visiting his oldest local friend, Olga Van Cys. Peter Ellis concludes that the key to bringing Gambia and his accomplices to justice is to implicate the despicable Duchon, who had earlier threatened Kevin Duffy. With the help of his cagey old friend, Claverie-Laporte, Ellis devises a plan using equal parts intimidation and subterfuge. While waiting for his scheme to develop, Ellis takes advantage of his free time, surfing with his longtime friend, Marc Dufau, and introducing his beautiful new friend, Anya, to the charms of the surrounding Basque and Bearn countryside. This idyllic interlude, however, soon comes to a sudden end when he is paid a harrowing visit by three of Gambia's young enforcers, led by an unbalanced, switch-blade wielding punk named Carlos. Suffice to say that before this treacherous, complicated intrigue plays itself out, there will be more than one "accidental" death in Biarritz.