Charlie Perkins receives a terrifying threat. The notorious Louisiana Mafia, known for feeding live humans to the alligators, gives him an ultimatum: pay up or take a boat ride in the reptile-infested swamp. Charlie owes money to Tony Caruso, head of the Organization. His gambling debt becomes a tripwire which triggers a series of seismic events and rocks a small Southern town. The trail of duplicity leads back to Charlie's boyhood home of Grayson, where Sheriff Boyd McCabe attempts to find Fred McCall, Charlie's friend and companion, whom he believes is an endangered species. The Sheriff is also dealing with a death threat on the life of Tom Edwards, the town's beloved physician who, to protect his family, makes his own Faustian deal with the Devil. On a larger stage, in November, gunshots ring out in Dallas that shocks the country. It is ironic that the man to whom Charlie Perkins and Tom Edwards are indebted may have drafted the plan to assassinate the President.