Butch Roberson, a hardworking, upright local business owner, is accused of murdering two EPA employees. As the manhunt organized itself, Joe heard about the tract of land Butch and his wife had bought to build their retirement home on, until the EPA declared it a wetland. It was an awful story. But was it the whole story? The more Joe looks into it, the more he finds himself in the middle of a war he never expected and never wanted.

Lyle and Juan are thugs who take Paul Parker hostage. Once a fine lawyer, Parker’s enthusiasm has slipped with age, and criminals like Lyle are part of the reason for his disillusionment. Years after they last saw each other in court, Lyle is convinced that Parker owes him something. At gunpoint, Lyle and Juan make Parker lead them to the old Angler ranch, to open up a hidden library whose volumes hold the secret to forgotten riches, and the strangest war profiteering scheme to ever come out of the Great Plains.

In 1995, Nate Romanowski was in a secret Special Forces unit abroad when a colleague did something terrible. Now high up in the government, the man is determined to eliminate anyone who knows about it, and Nate knows exactly how he'll do it --- by striking at Nate's friends to draw him out.

Cody Hoyt, while a brilliant cop, is an alcoholic struggling with two months of sobriety when his mentor and AA sponsor is found burned to death in a remote mountain cabin. When clues found at the scene link the murderer to an outfitter leading tourists on a wilderness trip into the remote corners of Yellowstone National Park --- a pack trip that includes his son --- Cody is desperate to get on their trail and stop the killer.

When Earl Alden is found dead, dangling from a wind turbine, it's his wife, Missy, who is arrested. Unfortunately for Joe Pickett, Missy is his mother-in-law, a woman he dislikes heartily, and now he doesn't know what to do --- especially when the early signs point to her being guilty as sin.