It's 1970, and on the Windy Creek Reservation in South Dakota, amidst the rise of AIM in neighboring Pine Ridge, a baby boy appears nestled in a box of Styrofoam peanuts on the doorstep of St. Rose Catholic Church by longtime reservation priest Father Joe Kreitzer.
Thirteen years pass when Alice's older son, Albert, is mysteriously murdered outside a bar in Rapid City, and Bear is accused of attempting to kill the only person who knows what happened that night. To keep Bear's case from federal prosecution, Father Joe and Alice begin a search for Bear's long-lost mother. But their journey unearths more than they bargained for, plunging Father Joe into a labyrinth of secrets and revelations.