Michael Courtland's (Cliff Robertson) tenth anniversary celebration ends tragically when his wife (Genevieve Bujold) and child are kidnapped. Though his business partner (John Lithgow) helps make arrangements to pay the ransom, neither wife nor child is recovered, leaving Courtland consumed with guilt over the thought that he botched the deal. Still lonely and grieving ten years later, he goes to Florence -- the city where he and his wife first met -- and where, under astonishingly similar circumstances, he meets a young woman (Bujold) who is her exact double. Obsessed and desperate to have this new woman for himself, Courtland persuades her to return to the States and marry him, and to fuel his fantasy even further by adopting his late wife's style of hair and clothing. On the eve of their wedding, Courtland discovers his new wife is missing and a ransom note, a duplicate of the one written ten years earlier, pinned to her bed. Determined not to fail this time, he delivers the money as demanded. However, upon discovering that the young woman is part of a scheme she concocted with his business partner, Courtland is outraged. And after killing his partner, gun in hand, he rushes to the airport where he confronts the young woman... and reaches a startling conclusion.