No one is more surprised than Judge Deborah Knott by her engagement to her childhood friend Dwight Bryant. Stressed out by the impending marriage, Deborah agrees to fill in for a vacationing judge in the hills of Cedar Gap. With its fresh mountain air and gorgeous fall foliage, it’s the perfect place to clear her head … until a local doctor is brutally murdered. Presiding over the probable cause case against the main suspect, Deborah decides the trial can proceed. But when a second person is killed, Deborah begins to look at this case-and her relationship with Dwight-with more critical eyes. And if she fails to notice the fast approaching darkness, she could end up as another corpse in the High Country fall.