When Washington, D.C. journalist Marshall McEwan discovers that his father is terminally ill, he goes home to Bienville, Mississippi, a place he vowed he would never return. Jet, the love of his youth, married into the family of Max Matheson, who rules the town through the exclusive Bienville Poker Club. Bringing a billion-dollar Chinese paper mill to the region, Matheson is offering economic salvation to this community. As the deal nears completion, though, two deaths rock Bienville, and McEwan and Jet find explosive secrets far more destructive than injustice.