Daunis defers her University of Michigan admission to stay home and care for her mother after two family tragedies strike.

Daunis meets Jamie Johnson at the ice rink when the hockey team skates with her summer camp group.

Travis shoots Lily at a party on Sugar Island, then turns the gun on himself.

Jamie reveals to Daunis that he is not a high school student but an undercover law enforcement officer.

Ron identifies himself as FBI and explains in Uncle David's old classroom that David had been a confidential informant before his death.

Ron asks Daunis to become a Confidential Informant like her Uncle David to help track meth distribution across reservations.

Daunis and Jamie travel to Marquette to learn how to make meth at an FBI lab, where Daunis outperforms Jamie.

Daunis discovers Heather Nodin's body on the shore of Duck Island while searching for mushrooms.

Robin dies of a meth overdose, and Daunis shames the hockey team into organizing a benefit game in Robin's honor.

Grant Edwards lures Daunis to a hotel room under false pretenses and sexually assaults her at the Shagala gala.

Daunis discovers over ten thousand dollars in her shared bank account with Levi, then finds wire transfer records to Panama in his room.

Dana Firekeeper drugs Daunis's tea and has her transported to a trailer on Sugar Island, where Daunis wakes up shackled next to Jamie.

Levi and Mike explain to Daunis and Jamie how their hockey-class business plan became a meth distribution operation.

Elders on the ferry block Levi's car so Daunis can escape, and TJ arrests Coach Bobby after Daunis crashes the car into a tree.

At the annual powwow, Daunis dances the Jingle Dress dance in full regalia, ending her year of grief while facing the eastern direction.

Daunis Fontaine, torn between her French and Ojibwe heritage, defers college to stay home after two family tragedies shake her mother's world. When she witnesses her best friend Lily's murder, she discovers that charming newcomer Jamie is actually an undercover law enforcement officer investigating a meth crisis on her reservation. Daunis agrees to become a Confidential Informant, using her science background to help crack the formula behind an unusually potent drug called meth-X. As the investigation intensifies, Daunis uncovers evidence pointing closer and closer to home — and to her beloved half-brother Levi. After being kidnapped, escaping with the help of tribal elders, and surviving a serious car crash, Daunis heals from her injuries and ultimately claims her full identity at the powwow.

The headline events that drive Daunis's undercover investigation from start to finish.

Levi asks Daunis to be Jamie's social ambassador at a house party, pressuring her to blend her hockey world and regular world.

Daunis takes Jamie to the annual powwow and tells him the difficult story of her father's death and her parents' history.

At the powwow, Daunis and Jamie spot a coffee filter inside Travis's Mountain Dew bottle, confirming he is actively making meth.

Granny June gifts Daunis Lily's Jeep as repayment for Daunis using her own trust fund to cover Lily's funeral costs.

Daunis and Jonsy discover a suspicious fresh garbage bag deep in the landfill, which Daunis secretly doubles back alone to retrieve.

Jamie and Daunis attend Coach Bobby's Labor Day cookout as their first official public appearance as a pretend couple.

Heather offers Daunis a pouch of pills at the cookout, and Daunis angrily confronts her for bringing drugs so soon after Lily's death.

Stormy tells Jamie that Daunis comes from inherited old money, highlighting financial divisions within the group during a morning run.

Teddie presents Daunis with her tribal enrollment application and photos of her father, and twenty-six elders come forward to sign her paperwork.

Ron admits he ordered Jamie to distance himself from Daunis after seeing how genuine their feelings were at the Edwards family dinner.

Daunis and Jamie share their first genuine kiss alone together at the hotel during the away hockey game weekend.

Daunis finds her Uncle David's hidden journal inside a secret drawer in his old high school classroom desk.

Teddie holds an intervention sweat ceremony for Daunis, sharing her own painful past to help Daunis learn to see people clearly.

Daunis tears out and destroys the final pages of her uncle's notebook to protect her community's traditional medicine knowledge from the FBI.

Daunis reveals to her mother and Teddie that Grant Edwards raped her, and Teddie quietly agrees to arrange a blanket party.

While the FBI investigation unfolds, Daunis's daily life fills with smaller but crucial moments that define who she is becoming. From being pushed into Jamie's orbit as his social ambassador, to spotting Travis's meth paraphernalia at the powwow, Daunis gathers evidence while navigating her deepening feelings for Jamie. Her connections to elders like Granny June and her eventual discovery of her uncle's hidden journal push the investigation forward in ways the FBI never anticipated. A sweat ceremony with Teddie becomes a turning point in Daunis's ability to trust herself and see clearly, while her interactions with the hockey girlfriends challenge her lifelong habit of judging people by their surface appearances. By the end, Daunis's willingness to speak the truth about Grant Edwards's assault to the two women who love her most marks the completion of her journey from secrecy to hard-won clarity.

The key secondary moments that shaped Daunis's relationships, discoveries, and growth.

Teddie gives Daunis an unusually long hug and whispers a phrase meaning 'you have my heart' before leaving for a blanket party.

Jamie dives for cover when firecrackers go off at the powwow, convincing Daunis that he is not who he claims to be.

Daunis honors Lily during her four-day funeral journey by bringing tobacco to the poplar tree and visiting Granny June.

Daunis realizes during the FBI meeting that she is being asked to replace her Uncle David as the investigation's confidential informant.

Daunis confronts Travis's mother Angie at Lily's funeral, and Jamie pulls Daunis away to tell her the meth problem is far bigger than one family.

The hockey girlfriends surprise Daunis at the away game by presenting her with a team jersey bearing only her own name.

Robin's grieving parents tell Daunis that Robin had not been enrolled in classes but had been battling a painkiller addiction that turned into meth.

Daunis overhears her mother alone in her room confessing the true story of the car accident, including that she falsely blamed Daunis's father for driving.

Daunis realizes the kids who hallucinated on meth-X were not having drug reactions but were being genuinely warned by the Little People.

Daunis realizes Travis put love medicine into the meth after Lily refused his Valentine's Day offering, explaining meth-X's extraordinary and dangerous power.

Tribal council approves Daunis's membership application on her actual birthday, announced publicly on the day of the benefit hockey game.

Jamie secretly places his GPS tracker on Daunis's ankle before Levi takes her away from the trailer toward the meth lab.

Daunis tells Jamie that Grant Edwards raped her and then confesses her love using an Ojibwe phrase meaning scar on his face.

Daunis collapses from internal injuries after tackling Stormy and has a near-death vision where Lily places a flower necklace around her neck.

Jamie visits Daunis in the hospital and asks her to commit to a future together, but Daunis turns him down and offers only Someday.

Beneath the thriller plot lies a series of quiet but shattering revelations that reshape Daunis's understanding of the people around her. Small moments stack up into hard truths: a soldier's reflex at a firecracker exposes Jamie's real identity, and a Valentine's Day rejection unlocks the secret of meth-X's power. As Daunis moves deeper into the investigation, she begins seeing people's whole stories — Robin's hidden addiction, her mother's buried confession about the car accident, Travis's warped love for Lily translated into poison. These revelations converge as Daunis is kidnapped, finally tells Jamie the truth about Grant's assault, and is rescued by the very elders she had been faithfully serving. Her near-death vision of Lily and her final, loving refusal of Jamie's hospital proposal signal that Daunis has grown into someone who can hold complexity, grief, and hope all at once.

The pivotal revelations and decisions that transformed Daunis's understanding of herself and her community.

Angeline Boulley

Novel

Fiction

Guide