"It has been a year since Mike Barnett's beloved wife, Joan, was killed in a car accident. Since then, he has anesthetized his grief with alcohol. But when he returns home one drunken evening to discover his house ransacked and Joan's private law files in shambles, he is forced to face the possibility that there may have been more to Joan's death than he has heretofore imagined." "As Mike puts Joan's files back in order, he discovers that some of her papers are missing, and he begins what he believes, at first, to be the simple and straightforward task of finding them. However, as his search continues, he is confronted with a series of disturbing facts, each one pulling him deeper into the past as he retraces Joan's steps through the mystery of Grieve vs. Retif, a case she successfully tried before the Supreme Court but which continued to obsess her long after she won. From the integrated uptown neighborhoods of New Orleans to the antebellum mansions of the city's Garden District, from racist real estate scams to a corrupt hall of vital records, Barnett pursues secrets kept for decades - a pursuit that uncovers unimaginable greed, deceit, and murder."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved