Widowed and without grandchildren, the loneliness turns into crippling for children’s illustrator Beverly Vernon. So she begins a family portrait of the perfect granddaughter, who’s blonde, violet-eyed and smiling.

Until she uncovers the bones of a young child in her back garden. Then Beverly’s painting changes of its accord; the girl’s smiling expression becomes grim. As Beverly endeavours to identify the child and exactly how it died, her sanity is tested to the limit. While hunting for the truth in a dark previous, Beverly dangers everything in her present.