Rory Carrick left Wyoming's Buffalo Horn Valley in 1861 to fight the Civil War. But the place he returns to ten years later is not the one he left. Empirebuilder Jackson Jones is ruthless in his quest to build the biggest ranch the valley has ever known, in rivalry with the sly and crafty Francis Oliver. Defying them both, small rancher Rebecca Lewis and her aunt are scrapping to survive when Carrick joins in the fight. In a web of old friends and new enemies, in a valley where a murderer on the loose threatens to destroy everything Carrick and Rebecca are fighting for, Carrick finds that tracking down a killer is not just about justice, it is a game of life and death.