As everyone knows, lightning can strike with surprising results. A lightning encounter brings Karen and Ian together. The restaurant is crowded so he agrees to share his table, although he has no wish to get involved with this lovely, prickly, outspoken girl who is ruled by fear and superstition. Recently home again, after a long spell abroad, she finds England beautiful but confusing and soon lands herself in a tricky situation. She turns reluctantly to Ian, whom she sees as a smug, disapproving, arrogant tyrant, a far greater challenge than the loneliness, fear and uncertainty that would otherwise face her.

Trouble shadowed Dorcas's Spanish holiday. Her car broke down, causing her to continue her journey by train. The avalanche that blocked the railway line plunged her into a situation which she found unbearable. All her life, it seemed, Dorcas had danced in the shadow of a more dominant personality. Now that her dancing career had come to an untimely end, she hated the thought of being beholden to Carlos Ruiz, who was half English, half Spanish, and wholly charming. He said he wanted to protect her, but protection is often another word for domination...

Jan came to Willowbridge to look after four-year-old Stephanie whose mother was confined to a wheelchair as the result of a car accident. Six months later Stephanie's mother died. The decision about Jan's continued employment rested with David Spedding. He dismissed her on the grounds of immaturity, but she knew it was really because she had talked out of turn by letting him know how much she despised him. Her foolish lapse served to strengthen her preconceived opinion. She would gladly have removed herself from his orbit. She wanted to go but she couldn't bring herself to desert Stephanie and so she fought to stay. At the risk of getting burnt.

The engagement ring on her finger had not assuaged the keen romantic longing in Anita's eye. Will she find romance in Leyenda, her dead mother's island home? What is the mystery behind her engagement, and what strange compulsion is directing her feet? Circles of fate are spinning her into a cruel intrigue, attracting her to Felipe Sanchez, whose barbaric way of life is totally alien to her gentle nature.