Marshall McEwan is one of the most successful journalists in Washington, DC. But his father is terminally ill, and he must return to his childhood home - a place he vowed he would never go back to.

Bienville, Mississippi, is no longer the city Marshall remembers. His family's 150-year-old newspaper is failing, and Jet Talal, the love of his youth, has married into the family of Max Matheson, one of a dozen powerful patriarchs who rule the town through the exclusive Bienville Poker Club. The city's only hope of economic salvation is a new, billion-dollar Chinese paper mill. But on the verge of the deal's consummation, two deaths rock Bienville to its core.

Joining forces with his former lover, Marshall begins digging for the truth. But he and Jet soon discover that the soil of Mississippi is a minefield where explosive secrets can be far more destructive than injustice.