When a man calling himself Chris Hale arrives at the doorstep of her Ashton, Ohio, house, widow Mrs. Brentman invites him in. The unemployed Chris then accepts the offer of a room and takes a job in the shipping department of the Corelli shoe factory. One night, Chris wanders into the Ashton country club and meets Elaine Corelli, his boss's beautiful but paralyzed daughter. Speaking of the days when he used to deliver newspapers to her door and adored her from afar, Chris amuses and fascinates the once-vibrant Elaine. The encounter plants a spark, softening Elaine’s posture with a mix of humor and curiosity, and the two begin a wary, evolving connection.
The next day, Chris is called in to see Elaine's father A.J. Corelli, A.J. Corelli himself, who explains that Elaine was so taken with Chris that she asked for a better job in sales. Chris declines the offer, but reassures Corelli that he will explain his decision to Elaine. True to his word, he visits Elaine to talk things through. His explanations are vague, yet his self-deprecating humor and easygoing charm help Elaine relax and joke about the skiing accident that left her paralyzed, a moment that deepens their bond despite the shadows hanging over his past.
The following morning, Chris flies to another city for a rendezvous with petty criminal Whitey Lake. Whitey, who calls him "Steve," pitches a plan to rob Bowen, a gambling-house owner, of $200,000 in cash—money that isn’t expected to be reported. The heist goes smoothly, the two men split the cash, and Chris advises Whitey to disappear. With the score in hand, Chris returns to Ashton and agrees to join a double date arranged by his co-worker Ray Healy. When he runs into Elaine, he breaks the date and takes the reluctant heiress to a working-class nightclub. Gwen, Chris’s jilted date, is there too and denounces him in front of Elaine. Elaine watches the flirtatious crowd, and the sight unsettles her; the idea of losing the man she’s growing to love because of her paralysis becomes a painful fear.
As Christmas approaches, Elaine’s hope rises again. Chris’s skeptical bravado softens, and by New Year’s Eve, the two are deeply in love. Yet happiness is fleeting. Whitey reappears, broke and anxious, and Chris urges him to stay hidden inside Mrs. Brentman’s house while he works on an escape plan. Whitey’s nerves fray, and he starts tearing through Chris’s room in search of his own share of Bowen’s money, driven by paranoia and fear.
Then comes a wrenching turn: Chris learns that Mrs. Brentman plans a trip to Arlington Cemetery to visit her son’s grave, and Whitey, who takes afternoon walks despite Chris’s orders to stay indoors, grows convinced that Chris intends to kill him during her absence. Chris manages to calm Whitey, and sees Mrs. Brentman off at the airport. But a sense of danger lingers as two men follow him on the road; he reaches Elaine’s home just in time for a confession. Elaine listens with understanding, urging him to return the money. She also reveals a truth about her past in Ashton—she had suspected that Chris’s stories about his life weren’t entirely true, and she knew it all along.
When Chris returns to Mrs. Brentman’s house, Whitey has been killed and Bowen’s cash is reclaimed. The intruders now press Chris toward Bowen, who, riding with his prisoner in a car, proposes that they jointly rob Elaine of her fortune. Chris refuses to cooperate and makes a bold move to surprise Bowen’s driver, but Bowen shoots him in the struggle. The car crashes, and Chris ends up in a police hospital. As the wounded man recuperates and faces possible prison, Elaine visits him with a quiet, steadfast vow: she will wait for him until his release, when he will need her the way she has always needed him. In that commitment lies a fragile, stubborn hope that love and truth can outlive danger and deception.
