The prison doctor delivers the bad news. A tattered left ventricle. Haig Dumfries should have known. Every ten years Fate hands him a birthday present guaranteed to rip his life apart. On his 20th birthday his father died in a bizarre construction site accident. Exactly ten years later Haig was wrongfully arrested for murder. Today is his 40th. He will not live to see his 41st.

Haig refuses to die in some grotty cell. There are so many wrongs that must be put right. Somehow he has to find his way home and pay one last visit to The Buzz Building, the secret sea cave where it all started. The place where on his 10th birthday, he watched his best pal drown .'Killer Escapes '.Despite suffering a severe bout of man-flu it's up to Detective Inspector Craven to trace this killer. A killer who thinks he's dying thanks to a doctor's sick joke. Someone else aims to beat Craven to the prize.

Nick Dodds loads the boot of his car with everything he needs to make sure the man who murdered his wife dies a slow, merciless death.