In 1944, Tess DeMello abruptly ends her engagement to the love of her life, marries a mysterious stranger and moves to Hickory, North Carolina. Tess's new husband, Henry Kraft, is a secretive man who often stays out all night and Tess quickly comes to realize that she is now trapped in a strange and loveless marriage.
The people of Hickory love and respect Henry and see Tess as an outsider, treating her with suspicion and disdain. What does everyone know about Henry that she does not?
When a polio epidemic strikes the town, taking the lives of some of its children, the townspeople band together to quickly build a polio hospital. Tess, who has a nursing degree, bucks Henry's wishes and begins to work at the hospital. As Henry's actions grow more baffling and alarming by the day, can she untangle her husband's mysterious behaviour and save her own life?
