After a harrowing year in Namibia during which time his best-friend and close companion, Heidi Kinder is murdered to get back at him, Adam Geard returns to the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. His hope is to live for some time in a small town to recover his sense of community and purpose, and he chooses the Karoo town of Steytlerville. But dual crimes of family murder and extortion test his sense of justice and he cannot avoid involvement. The extortion is of an attractive and vulnerable woman, and involves a false land claim. The murder is of a young family of four, assassinated because the husband offended a powerful and jealous man of another race.