Georgie never wanted to be a chatelaine, but beautiful Wakefield Castle is her husband Casper's legacy and he is determined to restore its fortunes. Until now Georgie has hidden her troubled past, and she fears that their new surroundings will bring her deepest fears to the surface. The discovery of an inherited recipe book with notes in many hands leads her to suspect that the castle hides secrets at least as troubling as her own . . .

In 1939, the five Wakefield children are still recovering from their family tragedy: the disappearance of their parents and a new life with their kind but remote elderly relatives. When war is declared, the family prepares to make sacrifices and open the castle doors to newcomers, including cases of fossils from the Natural History Museum and their curator, Arthur Humphries, and the Foster brothers, a pair of evacuees. But while the castle offers a refuge, it is also a place to hide things: sorrow, secrets and even people . . .

In the present, Georgie is entranced by the two towers that form part of the castle walls. One is hidden behind a fence and clearly forgotten. The other becomes her project, a place for her own escape. As the castle begins to offer up its secrets, Georgie realizes that, in order to be truly free, she must confront what she most dreads.