Until this fateful night, Will Galen lived an ordinary life in his family cottage and peaceful village. Tonight Will has set out to finally satisfy his curiosity about the mysterious, forbidden river that everyone fears. He finds no answers at the riverside, but he does find a helpless child and takes him home.
Though the child is only a sweet, three-year-old boy, he is greeted with superstition and fear by Will's father and his grandmother. They claim the boy carries the river's curse and want to cast him out. To keep the child safe, Will must take him away from there and not look back.
As he leaves behind his family and the place where he has lived all his life, Will finds one bright spot. The man he has been lusting after comes to his rescue and takes Will and the boy home with him.
Russ is a rough looking man with a big heart. Will is more taken with him every day, but what will happen when Russ discovers the secrets Will has been keeping about the boy?
Even if Russ can accept the strange child, their troubles are not over. As Will and Russ become close, they must risk everything when a terrible curse threatens to take away the little boy they have come to love and think of as their own.