'I'm dying,' said the voice. Dusty clutched the phone. She had no idea who this was. A boy about her age, by the sound of him - fifteen, sixteen, maybe a bit older. 'Is anyone there?' he muttered. His voice was slurred and angry. She glanced at the clock. Twenty minutes to midnight. She'd answered the phone at once, thinking it would be Dad ringing to say he'd been held up by the snow but was on his way back. the last thing she needed was this boy. 'Is anyone there?' he said.
When Dusty gets the phone call from a mysterious boy she knows she can't ignore it. He seems to know something about the disappearance of her brother, Josh, which means that Dusty must find the boy no matter what.
But when she does finally meet him, there's something strange and haunting about him. He can see people's thoughts, and feels everything - from chilling ice to white-hot pain... and he seems to have a hold over everyone he meets.
There's talk in the town of the boy's past. Lynch mobs are out to get him. Dusty must help him and find out what happened to Josh. But when the mob turns on her, it is she, and not the boy, who is in the gravest danger.