3AWARD WINNING AUTHOR. When Judge Parker of Fort Smith, Arkansas, sends two US marshals on a routine prisoner pickup and they never make it to their destination, he sends Marshals Emmet and Jack Youngblood to find them.

Emmet and Jack, considered two of the best marshals in the West, come upon the dead bodies of the missing marshals, but their prisoner wagon is not to be found. They follow the tracks left behind by the heavy wagon to Springfield, Missouri. In Springfield, the brothers learn that notorious outlaw Joe Foster, wounded in a bank robbery attempt, was broken out of jail by members of his gang, who disguised themselves as the two murdered marshals and used the prisoner wagon for his escape. Emmet and Jack return to Forth Smith, where they gather intelligence on Joe Foster. Foster comes from a Mormon family in Salt Lake City. After traveling to Utah to see the Foster family, Emmet and Jack learn that Joe left the Mormons before the Civil War with his friend Jacob Compton and that the Fosters received a letter from Joe one year ago from Deadwood, in the Dakota Territory.