Wild child" Chessie Partin has had enough of being branded a woman who never finishes what she starts, so when she stumbles on murder evidence implicating the local "bait man", her tormentor, she sets her jaw and enlists the help of her suspended policeman brother, Reading, to catch the man she's sure is a killer, but there's not enough proof. She strikes out on her own to gather more facts to convict bait man, Rooster Cocker, and to prove he is the despicable villain she believes him to be. Chessie finds she's only partly right when she uncovers an international sinister enterprise cloaked in mystery and disguised as a top-secret research site.