Lanky ranch hand Case Walker works in the hot sun digging post holes for a fence on the Texas side of the Mexican border when he gets wind of the one thing that could tug him to rush off on a brash and dangerous adventure-treasure. The gleam of silver lights his eyes. Casting his lot with traveling trader Gilberto Reyes, a man about whom he knows very little, Case climbs into the saddle of his bay gelding Buck and rides north across late 19th Century rough country marked by prickly plants, rattlesnakes, and the likes of Chon Molina, a Comanchero, the most feared bandit and killer in the area, Hawk's Talon, the revenge-driven leader of a Comanche renegade band, and all manner of obstacles in a violent land ready to stand between him and his desires. Then fate deals from the bottom of the deck in the form of Mei Lin, a young Chinese woman in trouble, who may just give Case a whole new desire.