A decades-old plane crash leads Du Pré to possible murder, and to a landowner with dark secrets,


Officially, Gabriel Du Pré is the cattle inspector for Toussaint, Montana, responsible for making sure that no one tries to sell cattle branded by another ranch. Unofficially, he is responsible for much more than cows' backsides. The barren country around Toussaint is too vast for the town's small police force, and so, when needed, this hard-nosed hybrid of Indian and Frenchman lends a hand. When the Sheriff offers gas money to investigate newly discovered plane wreckage in the desert, Du Pré quickly finds himself embroiled in a mystery stretching back a generation.

For three decades the crashed plane has sat in the sun as the bodies inside rotted away to their bones. Two skeletons are whole, but for one nothing remains but the hands, skull, and the bullet that ended his life. The crime was hidden long ago, but in the Montana badlands, nothing stays buried forever.