BRIDGET O'KEEFE has her entire life planned down to the last detail. She'll complete a three-year contract with the small town of Lacrimas, North Carolina and wipe out the enormous school debts she incurred to become a physician. Afterwards, she'll have her pick of any genetics lab in the country for full time research. She doesn't need any personal entanglements with the Harkers, a strange and reclusive family who own a thirty-mile section of swampland near Lacrimas.