HCL 109. "She's Penny Plain! But has rather good lines about her, don't you think? And not too bad for holiday jaunting, lacking something more glamorous?" Anger and humiliation and a desire to hit back washed over Penny as she heard Charles's words. She had believed that Charles's friendship for her was something deeper than a mere holiday romance. There was only one thing to do ... Cinderella had runaway from the ball, hadn't she? Then so would Penny Smith, she told herself.

Taking a job on a remote back-country sheep station in the New Zealand Alps, Penny hoped that in the silence and vastness of the mountains she would find healing and forget the memory of Charles. But unfortunately for Penny's plans, she chose the one place in the world where this task would prove most difficult.