Meg Morton has come to Kauai, Hawaii, with a promising career, a business-deal marriage proposal to consider and a very empty heart. Motherless since she was small, Meg has tried to be a good daughter, following in her father's footsteps to become the brightest star in the family's internationally known auditing firm. All of which has left her cold and empty inside. She's looking for something-or someone else in her life. Something to give her life purpose and make her feel really alive. She's had a marriage proposal that sounds suspiciously like a business merger offer. Certainly not one that brings joy to her heart. Her bloods stirs, when she sees a surfer stud, golden and tall, riding the waves in Lihue Bay. The golden one, Marco Akilahu turns out to be the perfect host for her get-away week before going to work on a huge audit. Marc, however, has his own problems. He's the only son of a wealthy native Hawaiian family. A son destined to inherit a fortune on his 30th birthday, provided he's married to a native and has no hint of scandal in his past. However, he has no bride in sight. He's been running from eager bridal wannabees since college. He'd like a wife to love him for him, not just for the money and he hasn't found a likely candidate yet. The two meet at his family's luau, a concession to the hard times plaguing his family. He isn't introduced and decides not to tell Meg his real identity. It's just easier at the time. He becomes Meg's guide for her getaway in Paradise. They try to keep their time light and fun but their lustful feelings for one another quickly build to a passionate climax in torrid lovemaking on a secret beach. Marc isn't good at keeping secrets. Nearly everyone on Kauai knows him, so his true identity soon surfaces. They confess to one another that neither is free. They each have family obligations that come first in their lives. The only time they will have together is this short fling in Paradise. They separate at the end of the week, each trying to put the other in the past, into their private world of secret dreams. However, once in Honolulu, Meg finds her audit will be of the cultural foundation Marc heads, and he's the prime suspect in the disappearance of close to $60 million in foundation funds. Meg has to sort through the minutia and prove who really took the money. She has to decide whether or not she believes Marc. As she digs through Marc's business and life, she realizes that her feelings are much more than lust, she is falling in love with him and his way of life. In her search, she finds clues to her past and a part of her own life that had been denied her. She must confront her past before she is free to move into her future. Marc has to chose between his love for Meg and inheriting his share of the Queen's money. He must devise a plan to save the plantation, meet his family obligations and still be free to love and marry Meg. They both have to learn that there are many ways to happiness and that love has "everything to do with it" in life. When the chips are down and things are the "Darkest " they must learn to trust in one another and believe in "Paradise".