Celine Sutherland is dead - her body half-hidden under the Atlantic City Boardwalk - and Damien Dickens, P.I. killed her. Detective Lt. James Holmes found Damien's gun and wallet near the crime scene, and discovered Celine's cash-filled, emerald-studded evening bag hidden in Damien's apartment. Sylvia Sutherland, Celine's older sister and CEO of the family's tobacco empire, insists that Dickens pulled the trigger. And the Sutherlands carry a lot of influence in Atlantic City.

A mortally wounded Miss America entrusts a mysterious Russian coin to Damien Dickens, PI, before she dies. After Damien disappears while researching the significance of the coin, Millie tracks her husband's abductor to Florida. When his captor falls to his death from the balcony of a seventh floor apartment, Damien escapes; then he and Millie join forces to unravel the web of intrigue surrounding the Russian coin and its connection to the murder of Miss America.

Real estate mogul Derek J. Turpin, a chocolate company, and a journalist present the Dickens Detective Agency with its greatest challenge yet. After returning from a honeymoon cruise aboard a sailing ship, Damien and Millie land a plum assignment - a trip to Montreal to run a simple background check on a chocolate company. But, their plans are disrupted when a fellow passenger from their cruise comes to them for protection.

Derek Turpin is set on revenge, and no one is safe, least of all Damien and Millie. Yet, duty and friendship call, pulling the detective duo in opposite directions. While Damien is engaged in a race against time to rescue young Artie Sutherland, Millie goes to the aid of a sister-in-law she has never met.

When Bruno Caravaggio confesses to a murder he didn’t commit, Damien returns to Atlantic City to find the killer and clear his friend’s name. His task is complicated by Bruno’s desire to protect his mother and her equally strong instinct to defend her son. While Damien is away, Millie agrees to look into the claim of an eccentric Carmel-by-the-Sea resident that her children are trying to poison her. Her investigation leads her to Rancho Luna Azul, which sells its meat at several farmers markets in the area.

After a string of arson fires drives migrant farm workers from their homes and threatens Millie’s daughter-in-law, Damien agrees to go undercover to infiltrate the white-supremacist, neo-Nazi militia responsible for the fires and unmask the identity of their leader. Millie covers his absence by spreading the news that they have separated, while he travels back to Atlantic City. When Damien reappears in California, it’s in the guise of a former cop with neo-Nazi sympathies.