Regan and Jack Reilly return home from a weekend in Cape Cod
where they celebrated Jack’s father’s birthday, wanting
nothing more than to enjoy a quiet dinner and a relaxing evening on
their rooftop terrace. While Regan lounges on the terrace, Jack
heads out to pick up dinner and grab a report from the local police
station where he is Head of the Major Case Squad.

The relaxation lasts only a moment for Regan, as the entire city is
plunged into the suffocating darkness of a power outage on a hot
and steamy summer night. When Regan tries to return to the safety
of their Tribeca apartment, she finds that she has been locked out
by an intruder and is stuck on the roof. Meanwhile, in the city,
crime escalates in the anonymity of darkness.

Also trying to make her way through the darkened city streets is
Kit, Regan’s best friend. Making her way, however, is not
easy on the crutches she must use due to recent foot surgery.
Abandoned at a comedy club by Georgina Mathieson, an associate from
a conference she’s attending, Kit calls on Regan, who quickly
swoops in to her rescue.

What they discover though is that Georgina is not who she appears
to be. It turns out she is wanted for picking up, drugging and then
branding unsuspecting men. She was seen leaving the club with a
tall, blond individual who may now be her latest victim.

As Regan and Kit race against time to find Chip, the unaware
victim-to-be, another couple is plotting how to get back into the
empty apartment Regan and Jack have just purchased in order to
enlarge their own abode.

Lorraine Lily, an aspiring actress, is desperate to gain entry to
the apartment that used to belong to her. Upon returning to the
city from an acting stint in England, she is chagrined to find that
her soon-to-be ex-husband, Conrad Spreckles, has sold the
apartment, making access to a hidden safe suddenly more difficult.
The thing is, Lorraine stored information in there that would
completely ruin her acting career --- which is about to take off
--- if it found its way into the public domain.

Lorraine is not the only one eager to access the empty apartment.
Wally, an employee of the contractor doing the work on the Reilly
expansion, has discovered the safe and is determined to confiscate
any booty it contains for his own personal gain. He goes so far as
to talk his friend and cohort Frank into breaking into the
apartment and cracking the safe.

As the blackout continues, Jack, Regan, Kit and a growing cast of
others all work as hard and as fast as they can to achieve their
individual goals. Will they find Chip in time and save him from the
diabolical Georgina? Will Wally and Frank be found out as amateur
burglars and be locked up for a good long time? Will Lorraine get
her personal documents back, or will her career be over before it
has barely begun?

Only time will tell how this comedy of errors plays out. The only
way to find out who succeeds in their nefarious deeds and who gets
swept up by the long arm of the law is to keep reading Carol
Higgins Clark’s 11th Regan Reilly mystery.