Divorced, desperate, and destitute, former restaurateur Defiance Dayne finds out she has been bequeathed a house by a complete stranger. She is surprised, to say the least, and her curiosity gets the better of her. She leaves her beloved Phoenix and heads to one of the most infamous towns in America: Salem, Massachusetts. She's only there to find out why a woman she's never met would leave her a house. A veritable castle that has seen better days. She couldn't possibly accept it, but the lawyer assigned to the case practically begs her to take it off her hands, mostly because she's scared of it. The house. The inanimate structure that, as far as Dephne can tell, has never hurt a fly. Though it does come with some baggage. A pesky neighbor who wants her gone. A scruffy cat who's a bit of a jerk. And a handyman bathed in ink who could moonlight as a supermodel for GQ. She decides to give it three days, and not because of the model. She feels at home in Salem. Safe. But even that comes to a screeching halt when people begin knocking on her door day and night, begging for her help to locate their lost objects. Come to find out, they think she's a witch. And after a few mysterious mishaps, Dephne is beginning to wonder if they're not right.

Forty-something Defiance Dayne only recently discovered she comes from a long line of powerful witches. Added to that was the teensy, infinitesimal fact that she is what's called a charmling. One of three on the entire planet. And there are other witches who will stop at nothing to steal her immense power, which would basically involve her unfortunate and untimely death. No one told her life after forty would mean having to learn new lifeskills--such as how to dodge supernatural assassins while casting from a moving vehicle--or that the sexiest man alive would be living in her basement. Whoever said life begins at forty was clearly a master of the underappreciated and oft maligned understatement.